Journal Thursday, May 24, 2012

Boston Globe Talks to Richard Goode About Upcoming Set of Complete Beethoven Concertos

Richard Goode has joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra, led by conductor Herbert Blomstedt, for a series of four concerts at Boston's Symphony Hall over the past several days and concluding in a final concert Tuesday night. On the program are Nielson's Helios Overture; Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 18 in B-flat, K. 456; and Brahms's Fourth Symphony.

"Though Richard Goode is playing Mozart during his current engagement with the Boston Symphony," writes the Boston Globe's David Weininger in a profile of the pianist, "the composer with whom he's most closely identified is Beethoven." On May 5, Nonesuch will release a three-disc set of that composer's complete piano concertos with Goode joined by the Budapest Festival Orchestra and conductor Iván Fischer.

In 1993, Nonesuch released ten-disc boxed set of Goode performing the complete Beethoven piano sonatas. The collection, says Weininger, "stands as one of the most important statements made about this music in recent decades. In their subtlety and dedication to the integrity of the score, his performances bear comparison with those of his teacher, Rudolf Serkin."

Goode had performed all of those pieces over a series of concerts at the 92nd Street Y in New York City in the late 1980s, culminating in a performance of the Beethoven's final sonata, of which Weininger writes, "I have not heard a more profound realization of the piece since."

The Globe correspondent spoke with Richard Goode about the forthcoming Nonesuch release of the piano concertos, and, in particular, why he chose to wait 15 years between the respective cycles' recordings.

Read the article at boston.com.

---

Following his Boston Symphony performances, Goode will head to St. Louis, where he will perform Beethoven's powerful final piano concerto, the "Emperor," with David Robertson and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra.

Sarah Bryan Miller, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's classical music critic, also spoke with the pianist, whom she describes as "a musician's musician," about the challenges and rewards posed by performing the different musical forms. "Ideally," Goode tells Bryan Miller, "if you have the right conditions and the right orchestra, you can make music together."

Read more from their discussion at stltoday.com. For information on this weekend's program, visit slso.org.

• Journal Topics:
• Album Release
• On Tour

• Go to Richard Goode's page

Comments