"Music, Sense and Nonsense: Collected Essays and Lectures", por Alfred Brendel.

Capítulo: “Thanking the Critics - London Critic’s Circle Award

Alfred Brendel ganó en 2003 el London Critic’s Circle Award, el cual que se otorga a quienes han prestado por un largo tiempo un servicio distinguido a las artes. Este premio se ha entregado a Ninette de Valois, Alicia Markova, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Helen Mirren, entre otros.
En su discurso, Brendel confiesa que aún en ese punto en su vida y con el gran éxito alcanzado, sigue teniendo algo de la aprehensión que tenía en un principio cuanto trataba de consolidar su prestigio con la ayuda con la prensa, y a veces sin ella.
Brendel agradece en particular a los críticos que después de su primer recital en Graz, Austria, le predijeron un futuro brillante, y a William Mann, quien lo describió en “The Times” uno de sus primeros conciertos como “un recital en mil”.
Brendel también agradece en retrospectiva al “New York Times” que por varios años lo menospreció, por demostrarle que es posible ganar admiradores y establecer una reputación a pesar de él.

https://t.co/d8L71O5LQ3
A pesar de haber escrito algunas reseñas, haber ocasionalmente ventilado públicamente sus recelos sobre Glenn Gould y reconocer en algunos de sus colegas lo que un gran intérprete puede alcanzar, Brendel no se considera un crítico.
Brendel prefiere hablar de la facultad crítica con la que se siente más familiarizado: la autocrítica: “One’s own performances, musical goals and perspectives need to be continuously aired, scrutinised and measured with the yardsticks of the compositions themselves.”
Para Brendel también es importante que no todo sea autocrítica. “Where there is a healthy balance between elation and scepticism the performer is in the right track providing that there is also talent, patience, perseverance, vision, a sound constitution and luck.”
Brendel limita esta autocrítica al plano musical. “A famous pianist once stated that the ethos of a performance was inextricably linked to each and every bite the performer undertakes to swallow. This, I believe, is nonsense. The human being and the artist often operate…
on very different levels if not in different worlds and no one has yet been able to explain the gap between the almost limitless range and accomplishment of the great artist and his limitations as a private person. The idea that the artist necessary mirrors the man is a fallacy."
Para finalizar su discurso, Brendel menciona el obituario que Goethe y Zelter escribieron después de la muerte de Haydn. En el decían que en la música de Haydn encontramos al mismo tiempo ingenuidad e ironía, las características distintivas de un genio.
“I have never considered myself a genius, yet this dichotomy - next to that of chaos and order - has told me something about my own frame of mind. I think it may serve well, not just for geniuses, but as the bond that unites them with civilized critics and performers.”
Este capítulo es el penúltimo de este libro, que ha sido un compañero excepcional en este caótico y difícil último año. Afortunadamente ya tenemos tres nuevas opciones para este 2021:
¿Con cuál preferirían que empecemos?
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