Thought 401: Is Popularity a Measure of Quality?

No, if we consider

how unpopular quality

generally is as compared

to what is convenient

and addictive.

Thought 400: God

'I am that I am.'

—(Un)Holy Bible,

Old Testament,

Exodus 3:14

God is infallible

and therefore

something

we can trust

in through faith:

our oldest consolation.

The God concept

comes at a price:

it falsifies reality.

Ultimately speaking,

when people say

'God' this, 'God' that,

they mean to say

'I' this, 'I' that.

God is the oldest

trick in the book

and the most

proven way

to exercise

cruelty.

Thought 399: Freedom in Peril

'Freedom is in peril.

Defend it with all

your might.'

Freedom

isn't free.

Thought 398: My Drug

Abstract thinking is my drug.

Thought 397: No Money in Philosophy

Who trusts philosophers?

No one wants to be straight,

except philosophers, and

that is because philosophers

aren't straight but crooked.

Thought 396: Chubby Women

Chubbiness and fat on women are attractive.

Below is the ancient Venus of Willendorf 

fertility symbol to show that this

is a time-honoured view.

 

Thought 395: Magnanimous Squandering

The magnanimous

often squander themselves

for the larger picture.

Thought 394: What We Care about Can Destroy Us

What we care about

can be our undoing.

Thought 393: Life's Too Long...

...to waste it.

Thought 392: Am I Crazy?

Yes.

Thought 391: (Wo)man

Men should rule

the world but

women should

rule the men.

Thought 390: Know Thyself—My Example

390 down, 276 to go.

Thought 389: On Being Well

Not being in hell.

Thought 388: On Mental Immunity

All amounts to zero.

Thought 387: Finding Nobody

Thought 386: Money's Liberating Enslavement

Money liberates

by enslaving.

Thought 385: I Love Generalisations

I love sweeping generalisations 

but this too, of course, is a 

sweeping generalisation. 

Thought 384: My Anti-Conformity

I would conform

if I could.

Thought 383: What Is Madness?

Measurelessness.

Thought 382: What Is News?

The same old.

Thought 381: What Is Suffering?

Injury.

Thought 380: Overcoming Nervous Tension

Allow yourself

to relax.

Thought 379: My Thinking Style

Condensed compositional simplicity.

Thought 378: The Meaning of Competition

To ask together.

Thought 377: Why Pubs Aren't My Scene

I'm autistic.

Thought 376: Favourite Writer

Heraclitus.

Review 9: Friedrich Gulda's Second Cycle of the Beethoven Sonatas

Gulda does it again!—A review of Friedrich Gulda's 

recording of Beethoven's piano sonatas.

Friedrich Gulda's recording of the so-called Old Testament of classical keyboard in the shape of Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier almost instantly became my definitive interpretation of the preludes and fugues contained therein, short of recording them all myself. 

Having never until now found a satisfactory Beethoven piano cycle, I naturally looked to Gulda's recording, despite it not being available for digital download, once I was made aware of its existence—which was no mean feat. 

To be succinct, I will say that just as Gulda mesmerised me with his Old Testament rendering, so his performance of the New Testament in the shape of Beethoven's piano sonatas is now my go-to favourite. 

I have explored interpretations of these sonatas for many years, owning the cycles by Artur Schnabel, Wilhelm Kempff (mono and stereo), Maurizio Pollini, Richard Goode, Alfred Brendel (second cycle), Paul Lewis, Annie Fischer, as well as odd sonatas played by Glenn Gould, Rudolf Serkin, and Emil Gilels.

None of the above was I truly happy with, for the reason that many of the lesser known sonatas made me feel bored and I was often in disagreement with the way the greater sonatas were played. 

Moreover, the quality over the entire cycle either wavered (Pollini and Goode) or failed to captivate (Brendel and Kempff), and listening to the whole corpus was, in the case of these aforementioned interpreters, more of a chore than a pleasure (the sound quality of the Schnabel set is too poor for me to be fully happy with it, much as I adore his playing and spirit). 

Not anymore. 

Gulda's fiery, immediate, un-belaboured, non-deferential, un-romantic, quick-witted approach to these piano monuments has made them all a pleasure to listen to, almost without exception, and his performance of the named sonatas is also much to my liking, e.g. the first movement of the Waldstein. 

Gulda was called a 'terrorist' pianist for a reason in so far as he was keyboard maverick with little time for the ostentation and preciousness (not to say pretentiousness) of the classical music world, openly preferring jazz in some cases, and having the decency to also compose which is not the case of many pianists schooled in the classical tradition. 

In my opinion, these elements of his pianistic temperament are perfect for Beethoven, a keen improviser himself with little time for common public perception, and, unlike the ponderous Kempff or the uneven Pollini, Gulda makes these works exciting and arguably as fresh as when they were first conceived, which is quite an achievement given how familiar I am with all of them. 

Now I am aware that this is a matter of taste as I doubt Gulda will be to everyone's liking, but it is a joy in my case to finally find a pianist who corresponds largely with my musical sensibility and has managed to deliver the goods in the case of giants Bach and Beethoven (I do also like his Mozart). 

I have not taken the trouble to listen to the concerti included in this box set as they were not the reason I purchased it, but rest assured that the piano solo works covering the first nine discs are brilliantly done justice, if of a vigorous and irreverential kind. 

Thought 375: The Long Road to Well-Being

Learning to harmonise one's 

psyche with the laws of nature.

Thought 374: The Police and the Military

The police and the military cannot help

but be the guardians and executors

of those who order them.

Thought 373: Alexander and Aristotle

Aristotle: spiritual power.

Alexander: temporal power.