Obituary: Keith Emerson (1944-2016)

The rock keyboard legend found dead at 71.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

He was a lucky man: Keith Emerson. Photo by Michael Tweed.

Keyboardist Keith Emerson, founding member of the supergroup Emerson, Lake and Palmer and a pioneer in bridging the gulf between rock and roll and classical music, was found dead at his home in Santa Monica, California yesterday. The cause of death has been confirmed by Santa Monica police as a self-inflicted single gunshot wound to the head.

Concert Review: The Return of the Dazzler

Yuja Wang in recital at Carnegie Hall.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Yuja Wang. Photo by Xavier Antoinet.
Image © 2013 YujaWang.com.

In the course of this young decade, the pianist Yuja Wang has emerged as one of the most galvanizing artists of the keyboard appearing on concert stages. Her rock-solid virtuosity, brave repertory decisions and habit of playing recitals in a minimal black dress and a dazzling pair of heels have made her a piano celebrity, the kind that comes along once in a generation.

Concert Review: The Quickness of the Hand

András Schiff conducts the New York Philharmonic.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Up from the piano: soloist and conductor András Schiff.
Image courtesy the New York Philharmonic.

The Bach Variations, the New York Philharmonic's month-long excursion into the repertory of Johann Sebastian Bach, came to a fitting end this week with concerts featuring Hungarian pianist and conductor András Schiff. But where Mr. Schiff is known for his international appearances as a virtuoso concerto guest and solo performer, these concerts cast him in the less familiar role of conductor,  both from the keyboard and later, the podium.

Obituary: Jon Lord (1941-2012)

Keyboard pioneer was a composer and founding member of Deep Purple. 

"We're as valid as anything by Beethoven."
--Jon Lord, in an interview with the New Musical Express, 1973.

Organist, composer Jon Lord.
Photo from JonLord.org.

Keyboardist, organist and composer Jon Lord has died after a long bout with pancreatic cancer. He was 71.

Born Jonathan Douglas Lord, in Leicester in 1941, Mr. Lord began studying classical piano at the age of five. He was a London session musician in th early '60s playing keyboards on The Kinks classic "You Really Got Me." In 1968, he founded Deep Purple with guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, injecting his classical influence into projects like Concerto for Group and Orchestra.

Mr. Lord's signature sound combined the Hammond organ with the Leslie speaker cabinet, a rotating amplifier that created a distinctive, swirling tone. He then drove the Leslie through a Marshall stack to create an over-driven sound that could duel on equal footing with Mr. Blackmore's guitar.

After the first of many lineup changes, Purple evolved from blues and experimental music into one of the cornerstones of the first wave of British heavy metal music. They recorded seminal albums like Deep Purple In Rock, Machine Head and the live Made in Japan. Internatonal stars, Purple rode the forefront of a wave that also included Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath.

The Rosalyn Tureck Confession

What a missing CD cover taught me about Bach.
by Paul Pelkonen

The missing Rosalyn Tureck album cover. I still don't have it!

Today is the 327th birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach. To celebrate, it's time to take a look at some of the recordings of Rosalyn Tureck.

Born in Chicago in 1914, Dr. Tureck was a pianist who devoted extraordinary keyboard gifts to the interpretation of Bach. Her recordings of the Goldberg Variations, Keyboard Partitas and the two books of The Well-Tempered Clavier are touchstones, revered by collectors and by pianists like Glenn Gould. She died in New York at the age of 88.

I first encountered Ms. Tureck's playing in 1999, when Deutsche Grammophon sent me the 4-disc set of her recordings of the complete Well-Tempered Clavier. I well remember putting the first disc into the drive of my office tower computer, putting on the big noise-blocking headphones...and hating it.

The familiar C Major Prelude of Book I was taken at a maddening, slow pace, the notes seeming to sleep-walk out of the speakers in hissy mono sound. The whole piece was a minute slower than other recordings, like Chinese water torture.

I kept listening. Some of the later Preludes and Fugues were still slow to me. My inner Bach metronome was used to the "Gould" approach to tempo. I didn't really appreciate the beauty of her approach to this music. After writing a mumbling, middling review for the website I was working for, I put the recordings aside, going back to Glenn Gould and Andràs Schiff, another pianist who remains a favorite today.

Later, I wanted to get rid of that set, to send it out into the world of used CDs where music journalists often trade in their acquisitions for a bit of ready cash. But I didn't, mostly because the producer at that website had lost the front-cover label insert, making the set worthless to a dealer.

Reluctantly, I kept it. The set sat on my shelf for years, wedged between the big Sony Glenn Gould "Original Jackets" box and Mr. Schiff's orange box of Bach for Decca. It stayed silent in its case for over a decade. When I did "Project Upload" (moving many recordings of mine into hard drives and iPods) it was left out.

With the Bach birthday this week, I took out that Tureck boxed set, as well as recordings of the Partitas and Goldberg Variations that I'd acquired as part of the Great Pianists of the 20th Century series.

I uploaded all eight discs of Ms. Tureck's recordings that I had. I transferred them into my iPhone. Now, her approach to these short pieces not only felt right, but were extraordinary in their beauty. The piano works seemed thoughtful, beautifully paced and carefully measured. Ms. Tureck's playing hadn't changed.

I had grown up.