Personal Info

To bring the notes on a page to life as vividly as possible, while neither adding anything that is not there, nor subtracting anything that is there. I am well aware that such an endeavor is not the easiest path to fame and fortune. Moreover, this is certainly not the only way of playing; nor is it the only way of playing well. However, it is definitely the most difficult way to play, and for better or worse, it is the only way I feel that I'm doing an honest day's work.

I put it another way when I was recently asked what are the most important qualities in a great pianist:  "Listening to a piece with your inner ear, developing a concept of how it goes, then conveying exactly that sonic image with urgency, passion, and profundity.  Quite simple, really.  (oh, plus running with the wolves, taking on a single career name mid-stream, and posing for fashion magazines)."

"The vine grower determines a wine's quality; the wine maker's job is to bring out that quality and not alter or destroy the grower's effort. A real winemaker is subservient, not arrogant." ...Michel Chapoutier

"You see, my son, here, time becomes space." ...Wagner (Gurnemanz to Parsifal)

"Events do not take place in time, they express time." ...Leibniz

"Keep everything as simple as possible, but no simpler." ...Einstein

"No interpreter of any dramatic work, if he is genuinely intent on elucidating its inner meaning, can afford to be entirely subjective. It is clearly not enough to identify certain features of it which correspond to one's own view of things, and then to ignore or coerce any recalcitrant elements which do not fit in with that view. This is simply making the work mean what one wants it to mean. An interpreter should surely begin by paying full respect to the objective side of interpretation: he should adopt a realistic humility towards the artist's own avowed intentions in creating the work, and towards the manifest intentions of the work itself, before putting his own construction on these." ...Deryck Cooke

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1. One of the ways I supported myself when I was a student was to accompany ballet classes. Some of the instructors were very responsive to the music, but as far as others were concerned, any piece worthy of being choreographed had to consist solely of four- or eight-bar phrases. I quickly learned that if I played an extended phrase containing, say, nine or ten measures -- a relatively routine occurrence in music -- I would be cut off in mid-stream by "Six.......seven...... and eight. THANK YOU!" Conversely, whenever I played something that ended sooner than she'd expected, I'd sit there quietly while the teacher would count through the silence toward that Apollonian goal of reaching a number that was some power of two.

After a few such events I began to use my ingenuity to improve upon the music of Schubert, Brahms and Mozart, by altering it so that each phrase was exactly four or eight measures long. It was during such an inspired revision of some masterpiece or other that the director of the school entered the classroom, accompanied by a distinguished-looking gentleman who, whenever the music failed to proceed in a fashion originally set out by the composer, would glance briefly in my direction, then continue talking quietly with the director.

At the end of the class, she brought me over to him and said "Mr. Silverman, I would like to introduce you to Maestro Robert Casadesus."

2. I am not the Robert Silverman whose name appears frequently in connection with Glenn Gould's. Over the years, my friend Bob Silverman (the editor-founder of Piano Quarterly) and I were mistaken for each other on numerous occasions.* He also was one of Gould's closest friends, whereas I never met the man. The closest my path came to crossing his was in 1967. To commemorate Canada's centennial, he recorded an album entitled Canadian Piano Music of the Twentieth Century. Included were the Jacques Hétu Variations, a work which is in the repertoire of several Canadian pianists, including mine. Gould's performance was frankly not at all respectful of the composer's wishes, and Hétu himself confided to me at the time that, despite the honour he felt at having an artist of Gould's calibre record the piece, he was a little upset by the freedom (some might say license) that characterized the interpretation.

A few months later the Stereo Review critic perceptively wrote that, although he did not know any of the works on the album, he suspected that the performances were a product of Gould's imagination as much as the composer's. "Right on!" I exclaimed. I immediately wrote the reviewer, enthusiastically agreeing with his assessment. I think I even called Gould's reading of the Variations a travesty. That wasn't all. I fearlessly continued: "And I should know. I have performed the piece often since it was written three years ago, and am about to give the world premiere of Hétu's Piano Concerto." Naturally, they printed the damned letter. As a result, I am probably the only Canadian musician who spent the next fifteen years hoping he would never have to meet Glenn Gould.

*For the record, I am also not the Dean of the Faculty of Arts at Queen's University, nor am I the pro-Palestinian activist Robert Silverman (aka Bicycle Bob), also from Montreal, who once got arrested for painting his own bicycle path on a Montreal street (our fathers actually knew each other, but we have not met). I am not related to the late Monsignor Robert Silverman of San Antonio, Texas (if you don't believe there was one, Google his name). I once received a cheque from CBC television that was meant for a Toronto actor sharing our distinguished name. Finally, I am not related to Jonathan or Sarah, and above all, I do not need saving.
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