Allan Evans promised a biography on Ignaz Friedman, but ended up producing an utter travesty. The vast majority of his book didn’t even mention Friedman—instead, it consisted of “lesson notes” for a completely different pianist (who once knew Friedman). Evans tried to justify his fraud by saying he had trouble finding information about Friedman… Even the recent release by Ward Marston claiming to contain “secret” interviews about Josef Hofmann contains very little material not available two decades ago. 1
…clarity of texture, deftly defined articulation, sprightly rhythm, and beautifully burnished tone.
…crystalline tone, disarmingly direct delivery, fluid legato phrasing, and gorgeous nuancing.”
Mindless comments like these make a mockery of his audience. He just recycles the same comments over and over, no matter who the pianist is. His page reads like satire…and he’s been posting this garbage daily for many years!
Haha, this sort of writing always makes me think of my hypothesis that music criticism always boils down to “I like it” or “it was sheeyat”, and the only variable is how much flowery prose that fundamental opinion gets shrouded in
Good criticism is useful, but it’s rare. You don’t read it in newspapers or sites like Bachtrack (at least the French version which I read occasionally), but you can find it in places like da sdc. The most important, in my opinion, is that it signpost things for you to listen out for yourself. I remember when I was 16 and first becoming interested in historical recordings, I used to read this site, which helped form my early taste and also writing style (of course both have changed a lot since then). Incidentally, it was through this site that I first found the original Chopin files forum.
In all fairness I’ve been unnecessarily critical of Ainley on this forum… He’s an easy target for poking fun of because of his characterizations, and an easy target for annoyance because of his narrow taste and consequent blanket dismissals of whole generations of musicians. But he’s highly passionate, clearly a good guy, and no one - me included - should come and tell him he should like things he doesn’t. He’s like da TM in the sense that despite that I love picking on him, I also love that he’s around.
Yes, though I often disagree with his taste or his assessment of a certain performance, I really like some of his contributions (also on YT) and he also has been very appreciative to my own YT page.
