I just keep going back to this recital, over and over again. It is the most extraordinary examplar of instrumental musicianship I've ever heard. Abram Chasins said that this recording is an abomination of what he was just a few year previously that never should have been released what must he have been at his absolute prime?!? Hofmann distrusted recordings deeply, so we have just a small piece of his repertoire. I so wish we had more examples of Hofmann's superhuman musicianship, of which I wonder if there's any equivalent on any instrument at all. Until recently...
When I hear Kirill Petrenko, there is such deep thought and meaning, control over the orchestra, expressive sincerity, that I wonder if there is no equivalent figure in podium history and you have to think of Josef Hofmann to find any performing musician in any capacity at all. Petrenko is not yet fifty, and is now facing the most overrated, difficult, unconductable orchestra on earth whose self-regard ruined a large part of the gifts of Abbado and Rattle. When they rebel from his rigor, and they will... there is plenty of time for his gifts to curdle into insincere mannerisms, but for the moment, there is no equivalent in conducting history. Like Hofmann, he is a musical singularity.
PS: I linked to the wrong Hofmann recital.... because of course I did. meant the Golden Jubilee Met Opera recital. Like Joe Biden I have unfathomable gaffes.
Shows you how much I know what I'm talking about.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yk9hz-JfdLs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVkZL8mcx04&list=PLNSPbKyOeokcvKfbG1ZGdmjf73wSLZk1H&index=3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4ifu1KYUKc&list=PLNSPbKyOeokcvKfbG1ZGdmjf73wSLZk1H&index=11&fbclid=IwAR3WxgeKwlEOBB_Zvi_9UZNqL2pTwaWL1IWnsl8HdaUDj_M7xxGHkOPUeOA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqPN4gXy834
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