>Well, you're not the only one. I will try to be equitable so as not to >rouse the ire of the Gould enthusiasts, but good ol' Glenn may not be the >best place to start with the inventions. Some of them are merely played >quirkily and with peculiar idiosyncracies, but others are truly odd. I >have played two of the inventions, the perennial favorites in d minor and >a minor (nos. 4 and 13), and I could barely recognize them in their >Gouldian incarnations. It's been a while since I listened to the CD, but >my memories of it are decidedly mixed. I wish I could offer a better >recommendation, but I think other listmembers with larger discographies >could help you more adequately. I just wanted to point out the possibility >that it may not be the music that's giving you trouble! Well, I wish I had heard only the Gouldian interpretation... I got an LP of Bach's sinfonies performed by a T. Nikolaeva (she may be unknown on the other side of the iron curtain but she's good). Then I compared them to cembalo ones by Christiane Jaccottet and... ended up in a total maze. Yes, I really don't like it when you change discs like a mad DJ hardly recognizing sinfonies' numbers and reflecting on which interpretation you liked most of all. Same happened when I listened to Chopin's Waltz Nr.2 performed by Rachmaninov. I couldn't like it mainly because I've already got used to the LP of waltzes by Vladimir Bunin (again possibly unknown in the west but awfully good). Then again, take the 25th Mazurka by Horowitz and Michelangeli. The latter plays it MUCH slower and I feel uncomfortably because my mind is used to Horowitz interpretation. Probably, if I had heard the Michelangeli first, Horowitz could seem too fast... Maybe some people like it when they have a chance to compare dozens of various interpretations (so that they're always able to find new stuff to listen to when they have listened to all possible compositions) but I'd be truly happy if there was a Celestial Guru (or a few of them) who would've played everything on earth and their records would be the Great Standard. Juozas Rimas