The Young Friedrich Gulda

Regular price $27.99
Added to Cart! View cart or continue shopping.

Friedrich Gulda was born in Vienna on May 16, 1930. He began his musical education at the Grossmann Conservatory and subsequently took private lessons from Felix Pazofsky. From 1942 to 1947 he studied piano at the Vienna Academy of Music under Bruno Seidlhofer and Music Theory and Composition under Joseph Marx. He gave his first public performance in 1944 and, two years later when just 16 years old, won the Geneva International Music Competition. Starting after the Second World War, as a 20-year-old, Gulda established himself as a piano soloist with an excellent international reputation and even performed at Carnegie Hall in New York City in 1950. In the 1950s he was celebrated and considered the leading interpreter of Beethoven in his generation. He founded his own Klassische Orchester Gulda for chamber music with members of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.

In addition to Beethoven, Gulda’s repertoire encompasses works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Schubert, Frédéric Chopin, Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel and Richard Strauss, whose Burleske in D minor and lieder are included in this release, with Gulda accompanying soprano Hilde Güden. Gulda was essentially an out-and-out contrarian who showed that a great genius can sometimes be only a step away from a certain madness. While Karl Böhm or Rubinstein admired him as a magnificently talented interpreter of Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, Gulda could also be provocative – including inciting his fellow concert pianists. Asked about Vladimir Horowitz, Gulda once responded: “Horowitz is a master. Because he is able to do – whatever he wants,” but also added: “But what he is after doesn’t interest me” (Joachim Kaiser).

REVIEW:
Friedrich Gulda (1930-2000) was certainly never a conformist pianist. But he was less flamboyant in his youth than in his later years, and he did present new perspectives at the beginning of his career, which helped to provoke a change in thinking. The recordings in this CD box set date from this period.

He recorded the freshly perky Mozart Sonata K. 576 in 1948, and both Concertos K. 503 and 537 in 1955 with the New Symphony Orchestra under Anthony Collins. Gulda’s fresh yet nuanced playing compensates for the weak orchestra’s playing. The Beethoven sonatas Nos. 4, 7, 8 and 19 show the still searching Gulda of 1955 on his way to the 1967 complete recording. The 3rd CD includes the concerto piece by Carl Maria von Weber and the Strauss Burlesque, as well as a set of Strauss songs that Gulda recorded with Hilde Güden in 1956. These are wonderful interpretations of rare freshness and suppleness. Güden’s silvery timbre and her confidently controlled, light vocal line coupled with Gulda’s spontaneous and sensitive playing make for an uncommonly natural performance.

Recorded in 1954, Chopin’s compositions, the 4 Ballades and the 1st Piano Concerto, are among Gulda’s ‘immortal’ recordings. In the 1st Piano Concerto, Gulda collaborates with the more traditional Adrian Boult, but it is precisely the contrast in temperament that leads to special tension and dynamics. This recording has been available several times on various labels, but here it definitely sounds in the best quality so far. Also very exciting are the four ballads, which he plays dramatically and narratively.

Debussy and Ravel, the composers represented on CDs Nos. 5 and 6 of this box, have been Gulda’s recurring preoccupation. The early recordings from 1953 and 1955 may not yet be as stylistically tested on the hard, sharp and pithy of jazz as the late recordings, but their analytically modern style, with clear, precise lines and contours and good transparency, shows the intellectual brilliance of these interpretations.

The bottom line is that this encounter with the young Gulda is a very important one that should help one understand the older musician and could help bring respect to Gulda among those who did not appreciate his later work as much.

-- Pizzicato



Product Description:


  • Release Date: September 02, 2022


  • Catalog Number: PH19017


  • UPC: 881488190175


  • Label: Hänssler & Profil


  • Number of Discs: 6


  • Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven, Frederic Chopin, Claude Debussy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Maurice Ravel, Richard Strauss, Carl Maria von Weber


  • Conductor: Anthony Collins, Volkmar Andrae, Sir Adrian Boult


  • Orchestra/Ensemble: London Symphony Orchestra, Wiener Philharmoniker, London Philharmonic Orchestra


  • Performer: Friedrich Gulda, Hilde Guden



Works:


  1. Concerto for Piano and Orchetra No. 25 in C Major, K. 503

    Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Ensemble: New Symphony Orchestra

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)

    Conductor: Anthony Collins


  2. Concerto for Piano and Orchetra No. 26 in D Major, K. 537, "Coronation"

    Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Ensemble: New Symphony Orchestra

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)

    Conductor: Anthony Collins


  3. Sonata for Piano No. 18 in D Major, K. 576

    Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  4. Sonata for Piano No. 4 in E-Flat Major, Op. 7

    Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  5. Sonata for Piano No. 7 in D Major, Op. 10, No. 3

    Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  6. Sonata for Piano No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 13, "Pathétique"

    Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  7. Sonata for Piano No. 19 in G Minor, Op. 49, No. 1

    Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  8. 13 Lieder (various opuses)

    Composer: Richard Strauss

    Performer: Hilde Güden (Soprano), Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  9. Burleske in D Minor, TrV 145

    Composer: Richard Strauss

    Ensemble: London Symphony Orchestra

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)

    Conductor: Anthony Collins


  10. Konzertstück in F Minor, Op. 79, J. 282: I.

    Composer: Carl Maria von Weber

    Ensemble: Vienna Philharmonic

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)

    Conductor: Volkmar Andrae


  11. Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 1 in E minor, Op. 11

    Composer: Frédéric Chopin

    Ensemble: London Philharmonic Orchestra

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)

    Conductor: Adrian Boult


  12. Ballade No.. 1 in G minor, Op. 23

    Composer: Frédéric Chopin

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  13. Ballade No. 2 in F major, op. 38

    Composer: Frédéric Chopin

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  14. Ballade No. 3 in A flat major, Op. 47

    Composer: Frédéric Chopin

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  15. Ballade No. 4 in F minor, Op. 52

    Composer: Frédéric Chopin

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  16. Préludes (12), Book 1

    Composer: Claude Debussy

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  17. Préludes (12), Book 2

    Composer: Claude Debussy

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  18. Suite bergamasque

    Composer: Claude Debussy

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  19. Pour le piano

    Composer: Claude Debussy

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  20. L'isle joyeuse

    Composer: Claude Debussy

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  21. Valses nobles et sentimentales

    Composer: Maurice Ravel

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  22. Gaspard de la nuit

    Composer: Maurice Ravel

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)


  23. Sonatine

    Composer: Maurice Ravel

    Performer: Friedrich Gulda (Piano)