More recording thoughts

I was back in the recording studio to record the Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel G Minor sonata—the original version that the concerto I played in June was based on.

Each time I return to the studio, I get a little better at this strange process. (The irony is not lost on me that while I’m still learning to be comfortable with the recording process, more people know my playing from listening to my recordings than hearing me play live.) Glenn Gould thought of recording as being a purer, more honest form of music-making than performance—while I see his argument, I feel the exact opposite way. The heat and uncertainty of live playing, of drawing on the audience’s energy, toying with their expectations in real time, the inevitable imperfections, the ecstatic moments of brilliance that disappear immediately, never to be experienced by anyone again—that’s real to me, far more real than generating repetitions in a small empty room.

Recording is the most un-musical way to make music that I know of. In live performance you never want to play anything the same way twice; in recording you’re trying to hit your marks, turning out consistent takes that are as identical as possible. In performance, playing any piece is about the journey from beginning to end—you’re creating and shaping a single narrative arc, conscious of the music’s overall structure and pace; in recording you fixate, repeatedly, on fragments out of context. In performance you can throw everything you have—all your energy—into the music, because you only have one go; in recording you have to conserve your energy for hours of nonstop playing, yet you have to make it sound like you’re giving it your all, take after take.