# Wanda Landowska



## Gaspard de la Nuit (Oct 20, 2014)

Wow....just started listening two days ago....piano can just not compare to Wanda Landowska's harpsichord (or George Malcolm, for that matter), for Bach (and couperin and rameau as you might expect).....the different colors it has available are so obvious, unlike on piano. The variety of timbre IMO really does more than the dynamic power a piano might have, even though some of the stops/ pedals or whatever (I really need to learn more about it) certainly do change the dynamic and she seems to have something resembling different articulations. 

I was so bored listening to well-tempered clavier on piano, and some of the 48 preludes and fugues are better than others but the richly-colored harpsichord really makes it sparkle.


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## CypressWillow (Apr 2, 2013)

A famous quote attributed to Wanda Landowska, having a disagreement with another musician about Bach:
"You play Bach your way and I'll play him HIS way." 
Always have loved her for this.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

I always think of Wanda Landowska as being old enough to have known Bach personally. But even if she isn't that old or didn't know the composer personally, she sure plays his music as if she did, or could have.









Long a favorite disc.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

Landowska's fame was in part because she returned to basics -- the harpsichord and a lack of romanticism in Bach. Pianists of many stripes had until her time highly romanticized his music with big ritards and volume unsuitable for it. She went back to basics and many followed.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

larold said:


> Landowska's fame was in part because she returned to basics -- the harpsichord and a lack of romanticism in Bach. Pianists of many stripes had until her time highly romanticized his music with big ritards and volume unsuitable for it. She went back to basics and many followed.


Which pianists are you thinking of? Edwin Fischer? It's a while since I listened to him but I don't recall big retards - on the contrary, he's always driving the music forward.

Do you not think that her WTC is romantically played? I do. But it may be true that her approach to Bach changed radically after the war, WTC is a post war recording.


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## pokeefe0001 (Jan 15, 2017)

SONNET CLV said:


> I always think of Wanda Landowska as being old enough to have known Bach personally. But even if she isn't that old or didn't know the composer personally, she sure plays his music as if she did, or could have.


On the other hand, de Falla and Poulenc wrote concerti for her. She may have had roots in the baroque but she had branches in the 20th century.


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## lextune (Nov 25, 2016)

CypressWillow said:


> A famous quote attributed to Wanda Landowska, having a disagreement with another musician about Bach:
> "You play Bach your way and I'll play him HIS way."
> Always have loved her for this.


The other musician was none other than Pablo Casals. And as great as the quote is, she most definitely played Bach _her _way.

Here is an interesting blurb from a 1965 review of the book: Landowska on Music.

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1965/03/11/the-landowska-approach/


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## Myriadi (Mar 6, 2016)

When I was younger, I went through a phase during which I absolutely adored Landowska's and other recordings made on Neupert harpsichords and their kin - heavy, thick stuff. But over the years authentic instruments and their copies have won my heart. There are some very interesting Mozart recordings by Landowska - very minimal, very literal interpretations which I find quite intriguing. But those were made on a piano.


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## Myriadi (Mar 6, 2016)

CypressWillow said:


> A famous quote attributed to Wanda Landowska, having a disagreement with another musician about Bach:
> "You play Bach your way and I'll play him HIS way."
> Always have loved her for this.


Am I the only person to think this was kind of arrogant of her? Especially now that history has proven her completely wrong - the instruments she used were a far cry from those of Bach's time, and her interpretations don't really take into account anything of what we now know of Baroque performance practice.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

She is to be admired for reviving the harpsichord.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Myriadi said:


> Am I the only person to think this was kind of arrogant of her?


Oh, it's quite arrogant!! :lol: but, understandable - she was a great musician, a superb artist, who had definite ideas of how she wanted to present various works. many great musicians are quite egotistical, and are convinced that their way is the right way. 
The great ones "walk the walk", they don't just "talk the talk".
I find Landowska's performances most convincing and powerfully delivered. is it "authentic"?? or not?? I don't really give a *****...it works for me.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Just to get this in perspective, I think (though I'm not sure) that this comment about doing it his way was all to do with trills, the note that a trill ends on. They were talking about old manuals about ornamentation. 

I think she had pretty casual ideas about rubato in Bach, but I'm also pretty sure that she wouldn't say that her way of using rubato was Bach's!


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

ArtMusic said:


> She is to be admired for reviving the harpsichord.


She didn't, she promoted a plucking piano. Leonhardt revived the harpsichord.


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## David Phillips (Jun 26, 2017)

Landowska's Goldberg Variations is very beautiful - the 'Black Pearl' is heartbreaking.


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## Gaspard de la Nuit (Oct 20, 2014)

What I think is amazing is Wanda Landowsa's harpsichord's ability to sound like two or three different instruments, it really adds something. Her versions always seem like the absolute best of any kind of keyboard performer whatsoever.


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