Gustav Leonhardt
Though participants in the "authentic performance practice" movement might insist otherwise, the search for the old is really a search for the new. This statement certainly captures the spirit that Dutch keyboardist Gustav Leonhardt brought to his early music performances in the 1950s. His style was characterized not by a rigorous observance of rules, but by the intuitive, almost spiritual connection it tried to establish with the music -- a kind of authenticity that sought validation not so much from a rigorously academic accuracy (though Leonhardt is by no means historically careless) as from its having an "authentic" effect on the listener.
Born in Amsterdam in 1928, Leonhardt learned cello and piano before entering the Schola Cantorum in Basel to study organ and harpsichord with Eduard Müller. After graduating in 1950, he undertook a year of musicological studies before accepting a position at the Vienna Academy. Shortly thereafter, he returned to his home town, where he assumed a position at the Amsterdam Conservatory that he would keep for decades thereafter.
His first public performance took place in 1950, when he performed J.S. Bach's The Art of the Fugue for a Viennese audience. This marked the beginning of a legendary and influential career that would take him to performance venues all over the world, setting stylistic and interpretive standards for keyboard music dating from the early 1500s to the late 1700s. His treatment of the works of Couperin, Froberger, and Frescobaldi were pivotal in affecting a shift in Baroque performance practice from the motoric to the malleable.
Beginning in the 1950s, he also established the Leonhardt Consort, a group applying his same performance ideals to chamber works; during his career he also demonstrated great skill in conducting early choral and operatic works. Along the way, he tutored an entire generation of the most vibrant and stylistically varied early music figures, including Christopher Hogwood, Pierre Hantaï, and Ton Koopman.
When Leonhardt spoke of "correct" style, certain parameters were clear, while others left much to be read between the lines. The use of the proper instrument, for example, was crucial to Leonhardt: one should not play a piece from a particular country and a particular time on an instrument from a different region and century (and of course it goes without saying what problems he might have had with playing 18th century music on a 20th century Steinway). His discussion of style, however, was quite flexible -- or at least elusive: "I cannot say it's a secret, but it's almost impossible to describe in words....Essentially, it must be based on a dynamic wish." Though he did consult primary sources to justify his sound, which fell somewhere between the rubato sound of Landowska and the robotic sound of her immediate successors, he insisted that the truest "rules" about the music he played were to be discovered through the playing itself.
© TiVo
Artistas semelhantes
-
A Tribute to Gustav Leonhardt (The Last Recordings / Les derniers enregistrements)
Classical - Lançado por Alpha Classics em 15/05/2012
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Six Partitas BWV 825 - 830
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 01/06/1996
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
DHM Splendeurs: J.S. Bach: Variations-Goldberg
Classical - Lançado por Deutsche Harmonia Mundi em 01/05/1990
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach : Suites anglaises (Intégrale)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 14/03/2020
A discografia ideal da QobuzQualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Goldberg Variations
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 01/01/1987
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach : Weltliche Kantaten BWV 30a & 207
Les Chantres du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles, Café Zimmermann, Gustav Leonhardt
Classical - Lançado por Alpha Classics em 01/10/2007
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Sacred Cantatas, BWV 1 - 9
Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Gustav Leonhardt
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 07/03/2024
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
J.S. Bach: Easter Oratorio; Ascension Oratorio
Gustav Leonhardt, Choir of the Enlightenment, Orchestra Of The Age Of Enlightenment
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 03/06/1994
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord, BWV 1014 - 1019
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 14/01/2022
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: English Suites & Keyboard Partitas
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 01/01/2001
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Corelli: La follia
Classical - Lançado por Sony Classical em 10/02/2010
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach, J.S.: Harpsichord Works
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 01/01/1985
A discografia ideal da QobuzQualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Musik in Versailles
Sigiswald Kuijken, Gustav Leonhardt
Classical - Lançado por Deutsche Harmonia Mundi em 09/03/1990
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Kantaten, BWV 47 - 149
Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Gustav Leonhardt
Choral Music (Choirs) - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 21/01/2000
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Quodlibet, Canons, Songs, Chorales & Keyboard Pieces
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 01/01/1964
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Harpsichord Recital
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 01/01/1989
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Rameau: Pièces de clavecin en concert
Gustav Leonhardt, Frans Brüggen, Sigiswald Kuijken, Wieland Kuijken
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 01/01/1971
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sweenlinck - Orgelwerke
Chamber Music - Lançado por Deutsche Harmonia Mundi em 26/03/1972
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Telemann, Lœillet, Fasch & Quantz: Chamber Music with Flutes
Frans Brüggen, Frans Vester, Gustav Leonhardt
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 01/01/1964
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Froberger: Oeuvres pour clavecin
Chamber Music - Lançado por Deutsche Harmonia Mundi em 28/08/2009
A discografia ideal da QobuzQualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Telemann: Paris Quartets
Frans Brüggen, Jaap Schröder, Anner Bylsma, Gustav Leonhardt
Chamber Music - Lançado por Warner Classics em 10/01/2020
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo