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Glenn Gould

Later Career

Transcriptions (Part 1 of 2)

Towards the end (or what should have been the middle period) of his life Gould became interested in piano transcriptions of orchestral and operatic music. In 1966/67 he recorded Liszt's piano version of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5. Later he made his own transcriptions of music by Wagner, Ravel and Richard Strauss. Undiluted by the sound of other instruments, the single tone colour of the piano clearly reveals the structure of the musical pieces.

Wagner, Richard. Siegfried Idyll. New York: Associated Music Publishers, n.d. Annotated photocopy

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Cover of score

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Annotated page

Manuscript of Gould's piano transcription of Richard Wagner's SIEGFRIED IDYLL, draft 1, 1972

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Piano transcription of Richard Wagner's Siegfried Idyll. Draft 1, manuscript, ink on MS paper, December 24, 1972

Manuscript of Gould's piano transcription of Richard Wagner's SIEGFRIED IDYLL, draft 2, 1973

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Piano transcription of Richard Wagner's Siegfried Idyll. Draft 2, manuscript, ink on MS paper, annotated, ink and pencil, June 5, 1973

CBS editing notes for Wagner's SIEGFRIED IDYLL

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CBS editing notes, undated, for Wagner's Siegfried Idyll, manuscript

Although Gould's recorded and concert repertoire focused on a dozen composers, he studied many others, and remained an explorer of piano (and other) literature to the end. His score library was extensive, but since he did not mark up his scores, as other pianists usually do, except for tape-editing purposes, it is difficult to say which works he played.

In Richard Strauss, at least the Strauss of the later decades, he saw "the man who makes richer his own time by not being of it; who speaks for all generations by being of none."13 Gould continued to champion Schoenberg and several other avant-garde composers, but he rejected the notion that "novelty equals progress equals great art."14

Krenek, Ernst. Sonata No. 3, Op. 92, No. 4 (New York: Associated Music Publishers, 1945). Annotated

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Cover of score

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Annotated page

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