David Jaeger - Just Shy of Two Hours ... And Just as New

Brian: Hello, everybody. I'm Brian Levine. Welcome to The Gould Standard, a podcast brought to you by the Glenn Gould Foundation. And we're here once again bringing you conversations with some of the most remarkable people from all across the world of the arts. While you're stopping by under our fabulous flickering neon piano sign, Please do take a moment to press like, share, and subscribe, and for the visually inclined among you, please check out the Glenn Gould Foundation's YouTube channel for a growing library of episodes that you can watch as well as hear. Speaking of which, if you like what you're hearing, please go to glengould. ca, our very own website, click the donate button, and give generously to the Glenn Gould Foundation. We're a registered charity, and we do rely on your generous gifts. Now today, as we continue our celebrations of Glenn Gould at 90, we're absolutely delighted to welcome a man who knew Glenn Gould and worked closely with him on one of his most important projects for radio. We'll explore that, but we'll also want to talk about David's remarkable career as a composer during his A golden age of adventure and experimentation in contemporary and electronic music when Canada was at the leading, some might say bleeding edge, of the new. And his history, making career as a radio producer, as the creative force behind CBC's Two New Hours, which had an incredible run of 29 continuous years. So I'm so delighted to be welcoming him. David Jaeger. David, thank you so much for joining us. David: Pleasure to be here, Brian. Brian: Now, David, you were born in Wisconsin. I have to say, not a place that I think of at first blush as a hotbed of, uh, of new music, uh, experimentation and the avant garde. Uh, but you got your Bachelor of Music degree at Madison. What were your early musical influences and how did you actually develop a passion for new music, electronic composition, and the collision between music and technology? David: Well, you mentioned my bachelor degree was, uh, completed at Madison. The campus of the University of Wisconsin at Madison is the, of course, the main campus, the University of Wisconsin. And, um, It's a big school. It had a music faculty of some 600 students in those days. This was in the late 1960s. And, um, you know, just in your introduction, you reminded me that The Wisconsin Union, uh, the main sort of social focus on campus in those days, had a beautiful theater, and I believe Glenn did appear there, uh, when he was still recording concerts, um, uh, because of, the funny thing was, when, when Glenn, um, when Glenn and I met, uh, at the CBC. Uh, this was in, uh, 1974. Um, uh, he soon met my wife, Sally, who is also a Wisconsin girl, and he, he, you know, with the guessing games, Glenn loved to play. He said, I'm guessing from your voice that you must have originated somewhere around Appleton, Wisconsin. Heh. Appleton being a town about 100 miles north of Madison, Brian: Uh huh. David: and it's a town that also has a well known music conservatory, Lawrence Conservatory, is in Appleton, Wisconsin. And in fact, so, She and I both grew up in a small town about 30 miles north of Appleton. So he, you know, his instincts were spot on and she was delighted and rather impressed by that observation. But yes, um, the campus, of the University of Wisconsin. Uh, in those days, uh, there were, for example, um, in the, I think, my freshman year, um, Rudolf Kolisch, the violist of the Fine Arts Quartet, was in residence. in the music school, and he had arranged for Rene Leibovitz, uh, to come in and visit for, for a term. And, you know, one of the most thrilling experiences I had as an undergraduate was singing in the University of Wisconsin concert choir in a concert when, with, um, Rene Leibovitz conducting the Schoenberg Friede Auf Erden. Uh, unforgettable experience. And, um, so, you know, I guess it was, it helped to cement my, my own personal, uh, line of connection with the Second Viennese School Brian: Mm David: and, and, and with the contemporary thought at the time. I must say that before I arrived in, As an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin, my, um, I would say principal pipeline to cultural matters was probably Wisconsin Public Radio, which, of course, was produced largely in, um, in Madison. at their, their headquarters. But in fact, there were stations around the state at the various smaller campuses, the satellite campuses of the University of Wisconsin. But I remember, for example, having heard John Cage, uh, before I entered university. I heard an interview on Wisconsin Public Radio, um, on the topic of the prepared piano. Uh, an interview with John Cajun, which he laid out his complete, um, thinking on why the prepared piano and how to use it. And, um, and a little bit about the repertoire that he had created. And ironically, you know, many years later when I was working with Glenn and, uh, And helping to create these ten programs that we made on Arnold Schoenberg to celebrate the centenary of Schoenberg's birth in 1974. John Cage was one of the people that Glenn chose to interview. And, um, curiously, Um, I, I actually worked with Cage subsequently, uh, more than a few times. Um, so, you know, I met him on air, shall we say. Brian: hmm. Did you, uh, did you confide in him that he had been your gateway drug to, uh, to the world of, uh, contemporary music? David: I, I did, I did share that with him. And of course with John, you know, he's, he was such a nice person and. You know, very, a very gentle soul, a very, uh, uh, patient and kind man, you know, with a powerful, powerful intellect. Uh, uh, we, we, we got along extremely well. You know, my name is Jaeger, which means in German, it means hunter. Brian: Yes. David: And my, my, the German side of my family, uh, my roots go back to the Black Forest, the Schwarzwald. My father was a first generation American born of German immigrants. And, uh, you know, if you're in the Black Forest, uh, everything bears the, the, the hook, Jaeger this and Jaeger that, because of course the forest is filled with hunters, uh, out, out seeking game. And I, and, you know, so, Forgive me if this is, forgive me if this is just a slightly, uh, lengthy, um, interjection, but it's quite, quite fascinating. John Cage was a very serious, very serious amateur mycologist. Brian: Mm hmm. David: And his knowledge of mushrooms was extremely, uh, highly, well known and highly respected. And so I, I, um, I shared with John Cage, I think on our, maybe not our first meeting, but probably our second meeting. You know, I mentioned to him that, um, when I had been to Dono Eshigan, in the Black Forest that I was surprised to notice right off the train, you know, a few steps from the train station, I noticed there's a Jägerstube. Uh, it's not, you know, easy to find and, and we went inside and we, we saw on the menu that you could order a Jägersuppe or a Jägerschnitzel. And of course, um, anything bearing the name Jäger in cuisine meant mushrooms. Brian: Ah. Yeah. David: And so I, I, I shared the, the, the conjecture with John Cage in one of these early meetings. I said, you know, when the hunter goes out and returns empty handed, he's left with foraging. We're gathering the mushrooms, uh, to provide something, uh, for the meal. Brian: Mm hmm. David: so I think this is why, why the cuisine bearing the name Jaeger is always mushrooms. Just like in, um, in Italian, you know, if you have cacciatore, you know, chicken cacciatore is with, with mushrooms. Or in, in France, if it's chasseur, you know. So, and, and he said, um, this was an entirely plausible, uh, Uh, conjecture and, and, and he accepted my, uh, my, my position on that. So you can see we had a very easy, cordial, friendly relationship. And so when Glenn, when Glenn laid out his plans for the celebration of the Schoenberg centenary, of course, it became important to speak to people who knew Arnold Schoenberg, who had worked with Arnold Schoenberg. And, of course, John Cage, um, went and sought out Schoenberg and, uh, uh, and convinced him to take him, Cage, as, as his, Schoenberg's, student. And, um, and so, uh, the interview, uh, Uh, dwelled on that relationship, uh, when we made that particular broadcast. So Glenn, Glenn had told me that, you know, his three avatars in music were Strauss, Richard Strauss and Schoenberg. And um, so this occasion of the, the centenary was very important. to him. Brian: That's absolutely fascinating. Now, you were in Wisconsin. What brought you to Toronto, and what would that have been, around 1970? David: That's right. Uh, at the end of my, uh, undergraduate career, I, uh, competed, uh, for and won, uh, a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship. And it's actually, you know, the foundation, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation still exists. It's an international foundation based in Princeton, New Jersey. Um, they've changed their name. The fellowship is, But, but it's the same, it's the same principle. They were actually, they were encouraging people who were, who were, they deemed to be excellent communicators and who, uh, uh, held the potential of being, um, uh, of being the teachers of tomorrow. So they were looking for people entering graduate school, uh, who might in some way, uh, help to support and, and increase and strengthen the teaching profession. Well, you know, when I became a, uh, radio music producer at the CBC, uh, in, starting in 1973, um, you know, thinking back on what brought me to Toronto, um, because it was the University of Toronto who saw my name on a list of Woodrow Wilson laureates and who Contacted me, in fact, and said, would, would I like to come and study at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto? Um, so, um, uh, coming with, with this in, in mind and, and, and working my way gradually into broadcasting. And as you mentioned in your introduction, I did create. a network radio program, long running show called Two New Hours. Um, and we did, in the course of making those broadcasts, uh, create original content and share, share that content, uh, world premieres, um, uh, with listeners across the country. So, I did, I did, this is kind of coming the long way around, but to say that I finally, In, in reflecting on this, uh, I've thought, well, you know, I didn't actually teach in a classroom, but I think I had a very large constituency, uh, with whom to share the information and the music and the, the whole creative act with, and so I feel, um, there was, there was no betrayal of the, Woodrow Wilson Foundation, uh, had in me. Brian: Well, I, I promise we're, we're not going to rat you out, and I think it's probably a little late in the day to do that anyway, that you took it under false pretenses, but, but seriously, though, um, the University of Toronto Faculty of Music at the time, and in fact, the whole Toronto scene was really a ferment of new music activity. There was. A generation and more than a generation. You know, there are the, um, the precursor artists who were laying the groundwork as early as the fifties, uh, and they were still around and then those who are coming after them. And there was a great deal of experimentation with electronics going on. And correct me if I'm wrong, but it. It seems as though, along with perhaps a half a dozen other places, Toronto was really one of the vanguard places in the world for experimentation and new music creation. Am I, am I overselling us? David: No, you're absolutely spot on, Brian. Um, and you know, this was one of the, you know, when, when I got that phone call, I was still in my, in my student residence in, in Madison, having, having been named a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, and Harvey Olnick, uh, called Brian: I knew, who I knew quite well. Yes. David: uh, a distinguished, uh, musicologist and, and, and scholar. And, and one of, one of the people who actually, um, was the, the initiators of the establishment of the University of Toronto Electronic Music Studio. Harvey Olnick, along with Arnold Walter, who was Dean at the time, uh, and Myron Schaefer, um, These were the people who felt it was important, uh, to, to strike out in this new direction. The Columbia, Princeton Electronic Music Studio, uh, already existed. The U of T, they call it, they called it U uams, U-T-E-M-S, the University of Toronto Electronic Music Studio was in fact the second studio to, uh, to be opened in North America, you know, a few years after. You know, European radio stations in Cologne, Brian: hmm. David: in, in Milan, in Paris, and, and, and so on, Brian: Right. Paris would have been ear cam, right? David: well, actually this was, no, it was the OR, the, uh, it was the ORTF, uh, it was, uh, um, uh, Pierre Chaffeur. Brian: Uh huh. Oh, David: And yes, and uh, uh, the earcom came along a decade or two later, but, but certainly carried on in that tradition, uh, as, as a leading international center for, uh, research and development of, of, of new music and remains as such, Brian: Right. Well, the, just to, just because we are in such a different world when it comes to electronics, digital technology, synthesizing sounds, repurposing and processing sounds, sampling sounds, and all of the rest of it, but it must, it must from today's perspective, feel terribly primitive, what you had to work with. But on the other hand, when you consider that the history of electronic instruments goes back to the 1920s with the Theremin and the On Martino and a few other, um, tube devices, David: the Trotonium. Brian: must, yes, yes, yes, you, you must have felt like you were really on the edge of a brave new world with all sorts of devices. I saw this special purpose tape machine with Something like a dozen reels hanging off the side of it. These are things that you were, you or your colleagues were, were literally inventing on the fly, right? David: Well, we were lucky at UTEMS, if I can use that anagram, Brian: Mm hmm. David: freely, at UTEMS, uh, we were lucky to have the collaboration of a genius, a Canadian inventor genius, uh, by the name of Hugh LeCain, who in the post war, post Second World War years, uh, uh, at his lab at the National Research Council in Ottawa, a lab which during the war had worked on, um, the establishment of sonar and radar. and had made important contributions to that, uh, developing technology. Um, Hewlett Kane, um, uh, was a very gifted amateur musician, had a great love for music, and, you know, when the, when the, in the post war period, when, when the urgency to, you know, to, to, to create, uh, defensive and, and, well, weaponry and, and, and, and, uh, technology, technology. to defend the nation. Um, you know, he gravitated towards, towards music and invented, in fact, the first portable synthesizer. which he called the Sackbutt. Brian: The sack button. Mm David: And, and many other devices, including that special purpose tape machine, which was a loop player. It would, it had a keyboard. It was a tempered keyboard. Uh, had multiple spools and multiple what's called cap stands, which is the thing that comes down clamps on the tape and, and, and applies the moving force to it. and, and draws it over the playback head, which you could then change the pitch, and you could have as many as eight loops going at the same time, and, and each loop could be of a different length. so so yes, looping was, uh, was very much already, uh, on, on the scene in those days. Uh, and Hugh LeCain was, he would come down from Ottawa to visit us at UTEMS. I would say more or less monthly. Brian: Mm David: He wanted to know. You know, what did the students feel they were missing? What did they, what did they need for their creative work, for their, for their studies and, uh, and, and, and their work going forward? And so there was kind of an open conversation, an ongoing conversation with, with Dr. LeCane. Um, And, uh, uh, and he, you know, he was an inventor. He was an inventive person, as an inventor would need to be. Uh, and, uh, he was interested in, in, in the discussion and interested in, in applying his, his knowledge, his talent, his understanding of electronics, uh, to finding solutions. I know there was a, a device that, that arrived while my, my class of students were, were, were there, uh, where he had built a, uh, A whole panel of touch sensitive conductors, and each one was connected to an oscillator. So it was a bank of, I think, something like 200 oscillators, and they were all accessed by, by, um, uh, by touch sensitivity. Brian: Ah, David: And, and we, we discovered actually, the way that technology worked was, was a combination not only of pressure and, and, and heat from touching, but also of moisture. So you could actually breathe on these things and create a cluster effect. You get all of them sounding, sounding simultaneously just by breathing on them. Brian: With that heat and moisture, boy, you could have actually rigged that thing up to be a good lie detector. David: I suppose so, yeah. Brian: Yeah. Anyway, the, uh, the, uh, It's really fascinating. I think again for, for people who are used to buying, you know, devices that do everything right off the shelf, and you never really have to worry about it. The, the level of artfulness, of ingenuity, of, um, belt and suspenders, You know, whacking things together and, and hoping and praying that they'll, but that actually is, it's something I've heard you speak about, which is, um, the transition from being able to create exciting original works of music that could only exist in a recorded, uh, environment to getting to the point where you could actually create new music using electronic instruments or electronics combined with acoustical instruments in live performance. Was that kind of a big sort of threshold for the, the arts to, to, to come across? Yes, David: think it was, um, I and my fellow graduate students who were working, uh, at the time in the studio, and these are the years 1970, 1971, 1972. Um, you know, we were all composers. We were all doing composition degrees. Uh, and we had our, we had our electronic studio, uh, course. But we also had another course, uh, with John Weinsweig where, you know, writing notes on paper. And, and, you know, studying the, the art of, of, of writing, but, you know, the distance between notes on a page and just working with media, with electronic devices, working with your ears. And responding, uh, suggested very strongly that there, there would be a kind of a performance element to this activity because, you know, even if it was twiddling knobs and, and, and, and, and adjusting dials, you know, and, and, or, or, or doing, using that special purpose tape player, you know, moving up and down the, The, the frequency spectrum, you know, you, you had to do it, you would do it yourself and, and curiously, uh, the combination of being in with that, that equipment and, and being, uh, very focused on creating original work with it, having to share studio time with other students, it became very collegial. Brian: Hmm. David: had not only composition, but also performance backgrounds. So it was, it was inevitable. Someone was, was going to come up with the suggestion that, well, why don't we, let's unscrew some of these gadgets from the rack, and, and let's, let's, let's, uh, Take them outside and take them on stage and, you know, create some work that, uh, that's meant to be performed with, with these very unconventional instruments. So we did exactly that, uh, in those, in the earliest years. And, um, uh, it's funny. We would, uh, work all hours of the day and the night. Oftentimes after midnight. There were the four of us, because there are actually two studios in UTEMS. One was the kind of the introductory studio, and then there was like a more advanced, you know, we called it the big kids studio. When Stockhausen came to visit in the 1970s, he came down and of course he was shown the advanced studio. Brian: Yes. David: And, and he got a, he got a pulse wave going, uh, rotating around the four speakers of the Advanced Studio. And, uh, we just stood there listening and watching him adjust the frequency and, and, and the, and the, and the wave shape of these pulses that, that he had going. And, uh, I remember when, when he, when he stopped. To pause, at one point I, I asked him about his plan for his work, and his answer was, really caught me off guard. He said, I am a radio to the cosmos. Brian: That's very good. And, uh, and, uh, Just a little mystical. You, you want a bit of that. Um, well, it's very interesting the, because there you were in the thick of, you know, this, this brave new world. You weren't Schoenberg's children. You were Schoenberg's great grandchildren. The world had progressed a long way since the, the advent of, of dodecaphonic music. Um, and you're in the world now of the Boulez's and the Stockhausen's and the, you know, Martin Feldman's and, you know, uh, Milton's. Milton Babbitts. This is a David: Vladimir, Vladimir Yushachevsky Brian: Yes, absolutely. David: came to visit. Robert Moog came to visit. And, uh, yeah, we, we, we met them all. Brian: Well, and that's really interesting. And of course you mentioned Moog and of course the advent of the synthesizer, which could be because it was connected to a regular keyboard. It required presumably a lot of preparation and live. There were only so many things you could do spontaneously, I assume. But the, the, the Moog synthesizer and the ARP synthesizer and some of those early models were really a liberation. That actually raises a very interesting question for me. How did your corner of the electronic music world respond to the popularization of electronic instruments with things like switched on Bach or in Canada, Syrinx and John Mills Cockle, or, you know, in Japan, I say Otomita and these things that were. basically applying these cutting edge instruments very virtuosically, but in, in much more traditionally minded ways so that essentially the, the ordinary folks could actually, um, get, get a handle on, on, uh, what these instruments were like and, and begin to get used to them. David: Well, we were into it all, I'll tell ya. And this is the beautiful thing about those earliest days of electronic music, was because we were essentially creating a new language. There was no established vocabulary. There was no established, uh, compositional, uh, doctrine there. There was, it was, it was tabula rasa. It was, it was up to you to create, uh, the, the elements of the language you were going to be working with. And I mean, I, so I mentioned, you know, that we would drag these instruments out of the studio. Uh, eventually you, you mentioned the Moog, the Arp, the, the Synclavier, uh, the, the EMS Synthi A, made in Putney, England, was, was housed in a little Samsonite. Like a briefcase. And a very charismatic and innovative gentleman named Otto Joachim, a composer, a performer, based in Montreal, he was It's the first Canadian to secure a franchise for the importation and the marketing and sales of the EMS Synthie A. Uh, and so I think within six months of these instruments arriving in Canada. We somehow managed to get our hands on the first one. So there were four of us. There was Jim Montgomery, David Grimes, Larry Lake, and me. And so we had, by being together in the studio and around the studio, and sharing our excitement, About the opportunity to, to create a new language, uh, with these instruments, we decided, well, the Canadian Electronic Ensemble would be a logical next step. And so we did form this group. We, we, we made the decision, I think, in 1971, and we actually held our first live performance outside of the studio in 1972. So, you know, last year, uh, 2022 was our 50th anniversary, uh, because we're still, we're still, uh, an established group. Uh, Larry Lake has passed from this mortal coil. Uh, David Grimes now lives, uh, in Massachusetts. Uh, Jim Montgomery and I are original members, still with the group, and we have added, we call it, you know, the, the, the, the, the new guys. Paul Stilwell, who's been with the group now for 30 years. Brian: the kids, David: yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. yeah. David Sutherland actually is the most recent, uh, adherent, uh, and, and he's only been with us for about, about five years. But, um, but anyway, so yeah, uh, it just seemed to be the next logical thing to do. And, um, whereas people like Mills Cockle, people like, uh, Wendy Carlos, Uh, uh, focused on maybe the more, well, in the case of Switch John Bach, I must say, I don't believe Wendy Carlos, it was Walter Carlos at the time, but, became Wendy Carlos. Uh, his work, her, his, their work, Brian: Yes. David: was. Pretty much a studio product. I don't think there was ever a live performance, uh, aspect because, because it was so tightly controlled. It was, it was basically perfected and finished in the studio and, and revealed at that time. But, , but Mi Mills cockle, definitely. Uh, and Peter German is another name I will just throw into the mix. Uh, Peter German actually played the sack butt. The, the Heli Kane invented sack butt. Uh, uh, you know, when he, when he started his, his prof. performance. When we met Peter Chairman, he had become, uh, like a, a jingle composer and, and, and he, and he would, he would have the latest, uh, synthesizers. I remember he sold us a synthesizer because he had bought the Jupiter 8, which was the last, uh, analog Roland synthesizer before this, this, uh, development called MIDI. Brian: Yeah, David: And he had bought it like six months and then MIDI was introduced just after that. And, and, you know, he wouldn't, you, you know, uh, he wanted to move on. So I think we got a bargain on our Jupiter 8 from, from Pierre. And it's a beautiful instrument, a really lovely, lovely analog synthesizer. Uh, we, we used it extensively, but, and that's, of course, the thing is, The instrumentation was constantly changing, not just the synthesizers, but also the processing gear, things like vocoders, Brian: Oh, yes David: yeah, and, uh, and sequencers and, uh, uh, and, uh, uh, all manner of, uh, eventually, you know, samplers and, uh, as you mentioned, um, So, and the, I think the, the, the, the thing we noticed was with every addition to the, you know, the instrumentation there, you would, these would spawn a whole, a whole series of new pieces. And so, you know, the relationship between the gear, you know, the musical mind, the creative force within the people working with them and, and, and the technology, technological innovation, it all interacted. in complex, wonderful and complex ways, to Brian: as you say it was constantly on the move because the technology was constantly on the move and So when you when you perform as an ensemble now Do you ever use any of the old instruments David: We, we do, we do, especially Jim Montgomery, actually Jim and, and David Sutherland that both have, uh, Cynthia a's, um, Jim has a, an old, the original Cynthia A. David Sutherland has a, what's called a a, Cynthia a KS, which had a, a builtin sequencer was a, a later generation of the, the Cynthia a, uh, and then of course, you know, the Cynthia. It was just one example of, of one of those historical instruments, but you know, these, these instruments all exist now in, as what we call soft sense. So, so, you know, software emulations of, of the Brian: For David: And, and we, and we use those too, Brian: Well, you know, it's interesting, uh, just, uh, a few months back, the Toronto Symphony programmed, uh, the Triangle Lila Symphony, and of course, they, they brought and owned the Martineau, but they didn't have to. I mean, you just don't need to do it anymore, but it's so much nicer when you do. It feels so much more right. David: Well, it's authentic. Brian: It's authentic. Exactly. David: and actually using the word authentic, let me just, again, it's a digression, but it's an important one that in those days, you know, immediately, uh, while I was a graduate student at the Faculty of Music and immediately after when I entered the broadcasting, uh, career, you know, the, the, the whole early music, uh, thing Brian: Yeah. I was going to, I was going to say that, you know, when you play your hulicane sack, but you are part of the period instrument movement, whether you like it or not, in every possible way. David: And I remember, I remember talking to people over at Tafu Music, for example, and people in other early music groups, uh, you know, the Toronto Consort and, uh, you know, you know, the thing we have in common, both of us, uh, is we're both interested in authentic performance, Brian: Yeah. David: even though, you know, the, the details are vastly Brian: Yeah, different, different, indeed, indeed. Well, let's, let's move to the CBC, because here you are, and while I know that you're, you're a lovely person, not everyone involved in, in the, sort of, the avant garde of music has been a lovely person. You know, Pierre Boulez was famously pugnacious, for example, and, and there have been a few of those who not only wanted to be revolutionary in the music they created, but just like the idea of, you know, the, uh, the idea of a good knockdown drag out fight with conservatives and so on. Uh, but here you were, I'm sure that from the standpoint of the people at more traditional classical music, organizations like the Toronto Symphony, you were a group of wild men way out in the fringe. And there's the CBC with their board of governors, very, very conservative folks drawn from, you know, the hangover of, uh, shall we say those, um, good old post colonial quasi Victorian days, uh, of Queen and high tea and, uh, saluting the flag. Uh, what did they make of you? How receptive. to Experimental Music, as it was sometimes called. Were they at the CBC? And why the heck did they let you through the door? David: Well, first of all, um, I, I wasn't doing experimental music in my first couple of years. I was hired because they needed a guy who would come in every bloody morning, uh, and, and program four hours of classical music for the, the, the morning drive show, you know, that range. from six to 10, uh, Monday through Friday, six to nine on Saturday and six to eight on Sunday before choral concert, you know, and this was a lot of programming. This was a lot of hours of programming and they needed a reasonably knowledgeable person with a lot of energy and willing to, willing to, you know, show up. at any hour of the day. And so it wasn't actually until, uh, I got sort of settled. Actually it was, Glenn had a role to play in this because I started in 73. Uh, 74 was the approaching, uh, Schoenberg centenary. Um, he never explained how he had arrived at this point, but you know, John Peter Lee Roberts, who was head of music. He's the man who hired me. Brian: And he was our our founder and our first president. David: exactly, exactly. Uh, and remains an enthusiastic, uh, participant. Um, uh, you know, I, I'm sure that Glenn had gone, Glenn and John, of course, we're, we're, we're great, great friends and, and, uh, uh, I'm sure that before I even set foot. on the office floor. He was probably already working on John, you know, this anniversary is approaching. We're going to need to celebrate this. This is important to me, Glenn Gould. You know, one of my avatars is about to uh, Reach a centenary. And John probably said something like, uh, well, yeah, we could probably arrange some place maybe late at night in the schedule or, or at some point. And, you know, but we're going to need, Brian: notice it. David: well, it turned out to be, you know, uh, I think Wednesday night at eight o'clock. So it wasn't so late, but, um, Um, uh, maybe it wasn't originally in the conversation quite like that, but however it happened, he, he, he, he had management behind him that fateful day when he strolled into my office and, and introduced himself, not by saying, you know, Hi, I'm, I'm Glenn. Uh, excuse me, sir. If, if I asked you, if you could think of a piece of music, uh, was composed in the 1920s and it was meant to be, uh, it was a private, uh, occasion where, uh, chamber ensemble and, and dancers, uh, composers and choreographers would, would be gathering and, uh, and he described the, the orchestration that, you know, for, uh, five winds, uh, five strings, piano, uh, And you know, as luck, as fate would have had it, I had just programmed, the week before, on my morning classical music show, the Poulenc Obade, Brian: Uh huh. So David: which was precisely the work that he was quizzing me about, and when I, when I came up with the With the proper answer, uh, I think I passed the test. I think I, I, I, I I proved that I was worthy of being the guy who would be the, the, the person to arrange studios and, and, and, and book guests and technicians and do the editing and, um, We, we were, we were in, basically, at that point, and I will say, just to harken back to my days at the electronic studio, you know, in the 1970s, uh, the medium, aside from live electronic, which, you know, we, we hastened to, to add to the, to, to, to the roster, uh, Tape music was the medium of early electronic music, and one of the first things we learned in an electronic music course was splicing tape. So, tape on a splicing block cut with an electric saw. A razor blade, and then spliced with splicing tape. I tell you, by the time I arrived at CBC Radio as the junior member of the, uh, of the music department, um, the technicians found the technicians, by the way, in 1973 still had jurisdiction over tape editing. So, it was a unionized shop, and technicians had jurisdiction. Uh, it wasn't long before they found out. I was a heck of a tape editor, and most technicians who got to know me, they would say, Here, you just take it. You'll have it done in half the time. Brian: Right. David: So, Brian: great. That's great. David: I was allowed, after we taped our scripts, the technician would hand me the tape, and Glenn and I would make our way off to the editing room, and I would put the tape on the machine, and he insisted we, even though all the edits were marked in the script, we knew exactly where we would have to make the cuts. Uh, cuts. Uh, he insisted we start from the very beginning, play the tape, and as we approached the first edit, he started conducting, and he would say, And there! And I would stop the machine, and mark the tape, and we would spool it forward and find where it rejoined in the proper place. You know, Glenn, Glenn was all about, uh, Uh, you know, the, the action, the, uh, involvement in, in, in the creative act and, uh, uh, Brian: always been this, I would say, a bit of a debate between, let's say, the Gould skeptics or the Gould poo pooers, which To the effect that all that sort of thing was kind of an act, an affectation, you know, that he didn't really need to do that. It was just an act to put on a persona. My gut feeling is that it was a hundred percent authentic, that the gestures, the singing, the conducting one hand with the other, all of that stuff was, well, that he was in debtorness when he said, If I could do it and get the same results without doing that, I promise I would. Uh, he just couldn't help himself. It was part of his process. Do you agree with that? Was that your experience? David: He was completely involved. He was all in. Yes, I totally agree with you and, and I witnessed this on so many different, different levels. And um, And, you know, eventually, you realized it was just, it was part of the culture. It was part of, of him, his process, his thinking, his world, as it were. And, and you were, I would say, fortunate enough to be, to be included as, as a part of it. Brian: right. So let's, let's back up and talk a bit about that series. This is the Schoenberg Centennial. Now, for those of you who are not deeply involved in music of the 20th century and beyond, Arnold Schoenberg is One of the pivotal figures in the entire history of music, a man who stood at a certain point in the evolution of the, particularly the harmonic language and its evolution, came to the conclusion that as they used to say about Kansas City, it had gone about as far as it could go, and that it needed to basically be rethought and taken in a completely different direction, a, a much more, I won't say, well, it was pre, from structure for a little while until he decided that he needed a system and came up with the idea of the tone row, but he created a new organizing principle for all of music. And this has had a revolutionary impact. The 20th century was a period that it was full of musical revolutionaries, but most of them did not leave a legacy behind them. There isn't a natural Stravinsky school, for example, there isn't a, um, There definitely isn't a Harry Parts school, and there definitely isn't a Moondog school, and there isn't a Conlon Nancro school. These are all really wild individualists who were experimenting in really dramatic and fascinating ways. I recommend you investigate all of their music because it's exciting and it's wild and weird and crazy, but Schoenberg was the one who basically. changed the entire musical world and also created a rift between his way of seeing the world and those of his descendants and those who really believed, as Schoenberg himself confessed, that there's still a lot of great music to be written in C major and wanted to continue down the, the path of traditional music, compositional harmonic structures. That's a very gross and crude way of saying it, but Schoenberg was the man. And consequently, uh, Gould, who was no, um, no dull, He, he, he understood and he idolized Schoenberg, particularly because he saw Schoenberg not as a complete break with the past, but as a way of reaching back into the past. The, those who believed in music as a form of, uh, kind of sonic architecture like Bach, his other, as you say, avatar. Um, but. Basically creating a new kind of structure, a new way of organizing and thinking of music. But he still saw Schuberg as a structuralist, as a, uh, contra, punctual list to a large extent. Um, so the basic things that he most valued in music were there in Schoenberg's music. Consequently, he idolized him, whereas your. The average person raised on Mozart and other, shall we say, tuneful composers would listen to Schoenberg and be horrified by the fact that there were no, as Tom Lehrer once said, tunes that you could hum. Uh, so, so, Schoenberg to this day remains a, a very polarizing figure. And, uh, but Gould was all in for, for Schoenberg, and the opportunity to say this was the man, this was the, the creative force who, um, revitalized the entire Western musical canon, um, Must have been irresistible for him. I'm sorry for that, that digression, but some of our, our listeners come from a, um, a less technically oriented background and, and may not be quite as familiar with this. So I, I thought I'd throw that in. And if I've committed any gross errors, please correct me. David: I think your, your, your thumbnail summary is, is spot on. And, uh, uh, you, you, you really, uh, you really kind of paint a picture of, of, of what, what, what was involved in this. And of course, I mean, Schoenberg, came from the late Romantic. He came out of that. Uh, his Gura Lieder are, uh, a monument, monumental piece, examples of, of late Romantic music. He knew, he knew what he was doing. And, uh, and he was friends with Mahler. He and Mahler, they hung out together. They, they admired one another. Um, and, um, and, and Glenn, I guess, you know, because Glenn had the kind of mind that he had, uh, super organized, uh, super fast, I think, uh, you know, he just gobbled this up because this was the sort of approach to music that, um, I think he accepted it as, you know, as, as, as much of a challenge as, as it might be, but, but, but it, it, it played to his strong suit was that music contained, uh, information, that it, it, it communicated, uh, with us, uh, and, um, in ways that no other art form could or can. Um, and. I mean Glenn's own compositions, uh, you can trace the roots, uh, to the, the 12 tone, uh, technique, uh, in his, in his, uh, early pieces for, for solo piano, clearly, uh, Right in the camp of, of late Schoenberg, post Schoenberg, uh, serial writing, um, and, uh, his, his famous string quartet, uh, also, well, actually the string quartet is a pretty interesting example of, of a kind of Straussian slash Schoenbergian, Brian: I think you'd, you, today you'd call it a mash up. David: yeah, Brian: a, it is a, uh, what would you say? A mash up between the metamorphosis and Veklartinov perhaps. David: Yes. Yes. And, and so, uh, I mean, Glenn made no secret of the fact that, that he, he, uh, he loved this music. He had recorded everything that involved the piano. Uh, and, um, and so he had, he had mapped out a series of 10 programs, uh, which would be one hour long programs, and they were, they were scripted. in a conversational style. So Ken Haslam, who was the staff announcer, in those days, again, you know, a unionized shop, uh, the, the announcers had their union. Uh, you had to have, you had to book a staff announcer on, on every series that, You brought in an external host for, and, and, and Glenn was fine with this because, actually, what, what, what he wrote in his script, he wrote both parts, he, he wrote not only what, what he felt, but he told Ken, Ken had the script to, to show what he felt, and even when Ken was saying, Oh, wait a minute, Glenn, I'm not so sure, I quite agree with where you're going with this. Well, that was in the script. Brian: right, which of course suggests that rather than being traditional radio documentary where you're trying to capture a slice of reality, it is really a form of drama. And so it's essentially a radio play in which the parts are fully mapped out and in which Glenn was, was always prepared to at least, um, acknowledged that there were naysayers who would see the world differently. If you remember a famous article that he wrote in which he interviewed himself and his, uh, uh, interviewer, uh, the little GG versus big GG in the, in the dialogue was quite antagonistic. So he, he didn't mind having a devil's advocate figure, uh, even though of course you could be pretty sure that the Glenn Gould point interview would always get the upper hand. David: Yes, for sure. And, um, and then he would make fun of, uh, of his producer too, in his script, you know? And I remember, I remember, I think in probably, I think the last of these 10 programs, it was a kind of a, a, you know, summary. And, uh, he made this statement that he, he admitted that the name Sheinberg. would probably never, ever become what you would call a household term, a household word. And, and so he was, he was on side with that. You know, he understood. And, um, but he covered the whole, uh, gamut of Schoenberg's work. And in the course of doing these programs, also interviewed a number of people. A lot of people who had known and who had worked, uh, with, with Schoenberg, including John Cage, we mentioned already. Another was Eric Leinsdorf, Brian: Oh, the great Austrian conductor. David: yes, yes, and, uh, who's, who's, who regaled us with, uh, Marvelous stories, uh, from the old days in, in Vienna and, and, uh, uh, and you know, the thing was, he would use these interviews in the program, but he would also use much more. I think we talked to Leinsdorf in his penthouse apartment, uh, for, uh, at the Windsor Arms for about two hours, two and a half hours, and you know, I think maybe, maybe 12 minutes made it into the program, but, but the larger. Uh, portions of the conversation were, uh, were, uh, used in the documentary, which he also made on Schoenberg. So, so not only did we make 10 radio programs, which were sort of, you know, Constructed to, to let the national radio audience in on what all the fuss was about this, this music. But then the documentary really was Glenn's personal statement on, on the impact, the significance, the history, the, the, you know, the, the, the story of Arnold Schoenberg and, and what he did. So, um, um, yeah, we did these programs, uh, uh, weekly. He came in with, uh, it was all scripted, and he came in with his, his own LPs, you know. Most of them played to Dickens, you know. Because he had, he had, he had fine, you know, oftentimes we would cue into the, into the middle of a piece and he had made these little strips with a marker on them, where he pointed to exactly the groove where you would put the, the, the stylus, uh, to, to cue in the, the, the exact spot. And, uh, yeah, I had said, I had said to Glenn, you know, well, we probably have fresh copies in the record library. You know, let me, let me just go. Oh, no, no, no. I've, I've worked with these and, you know, I, I know where it is. Fine. You know, Brian: he, he was a creature of habit and I'm sure that those specific tics and pops were very familiar to him and gave him a sense of comfort, uh, like, like a good old pair of slippers. Uh, David: yeah, Brian: very interesting. It was speaking of, of Schoenberg, just parenthetically, I still remember a sequence from one of the early. Documentaries that might have been Glenn Gould off the record, in which he's having a conversation with Heinz Unger. I think it was Heinz Unger who was, um, an expat who had been part of that whole circle around Schoenberg came to Canada. I think that he ended up being somewhat bitter. Uh, he'd been at CBC, as I recall, and been part of the pedagogical world. And, uh, they're arguing over whether Schoenberg or the, whether 12 tone music was a bit of a dead end. And Glenn was taking the position that it's just a matter of what you get used to, particularly when you're very young. And he created the thought experiment that if you, if you got a bunch of children and, essentially kidnapped them when they were just infants and took them to a desert island, and you played them nothing but Schoenberg, that when they got to the age where they were doing little sing song nursery rhymes of their own, they would be doing them all in tone rows. David: Yes, yes, for sure. And, uh, I mean, I think a lot of Glenn's thinking was, you know, You know, external to music. It was more societal. He kind of understood the place music had in, in society and saw the potential of where it might be taken and certainly through the work of a great artist such as, such as himself. I mean, I think he, he felt that, uh, You know, he was, he was, uh, creating, well, I know he, he saw himself as the interpreter, as, you know, the, the, the recomposer of the music. And, and, and, uh, and I'm sure he, he felt this was a mission of sorts, uh, you know, a life's work to, to, to be totally devoted to. Brian: Yeah, absolutely. But I think that one thing about Glenn, when it came to music like that of Schoenberg, and also to a certain extent Strauss, is that he had the advantage of being someone who was born after the First World War, because the composers who were there and lived through the First World War, who saw the transition from the old Austro Hungarian Empire, that great age of, um, of an ordered, hierarchical, comprehensible society with music that fit within the same kind of framework, then saw that world collapse around them. And along with the, the sense of the new and the adventurous, you also get the sense of loss and regret and saying goodbye and disorientation, alienation. Those are all, and those of course are. Almost defining emotions of modernity, the, the alienated human being, the alienated, uh, society, the, um, the feeling of those roots that, that nurtured us in an earlier age, being cut off and severed forever. Glenn was born at a time when All that was behind him. So he was able to see it in an entirely positive light in a very optimistic way. And so I think in some ways that feeling of, of loss and sorrow, grief, that was not part of his, the way that he confronted Schoenberg's music. David: No, not at all. Not at all. He saw it as enabling, in fact, and Brian: yes. David: a way forward. One of the Schoenberg followers, Ernst Krennic. Uh, who was, you know, after Schoenberg, remained a very strong proponent and, and, and gave lectures about 12 tone music, wrote, wrote a book about it, uh, uh, Glenn idolized Ernst Krennic as well. And I remember we, at CBC, we, we brought Ernst Krennic, uh, to do a, a guest appearance during the CBC Toronto Festival. And, and Glenn, Glenn was, was delighted. Brian: Mm hmm. I can imagine. In fact, I think that he played his music on his first European concert tour, including his performances in Russia. David: Yes, I think you're right about that. Yeah. Brian: Yeah. So, here you are. This is a monumental task. You're doing a tribute to the you know, perhaps the defining musical figure, at least in the classical music world of the 20th century. Someone who, in terms of the impact, could be ranked alongside Bach and Beethoven as really defining figures. So you've got a huge responsibility there, and you're also working with a bona fide eccentric genius, who you want to make happy with the end results. You've got a lot of pressure there. Uh, you didn't develop an ulcer during this process, did you? David: No, I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it, to be honest. Even the late night phone calls. Brian: Well, tell us about this. I mean, I think people are really interested in Glenn as a personality. They, for so many years, the idea of the austere last Puritan, the hermit, the, you know, possibly asexual, uh, loner, uh, nocturnal, strange, proliferated. And yet his friends and the people who worked with him talk about someone who is warm and kind and playful, endlessly, uh, you, you know, doing these, uh, guessing games of all kinds, uh, a great reader, someone really involved in the world, even though at a bit of a remove, uh, can, can you fill in that picture just in terms of some of the, the encounters and experiences David: Yeah, for sure. For sure. I mean, the, the, the, the Gould paradox is that, that such a reclusive person could have in through his work could have been such a great communicator. If you see pictures of Glenn as a, as a boy, you find there's almost always a dog. In the picture, he, he loved dogs. He loved, uh, he had pets, but when he became a world famous, uh, uh, artist, I think his hands were insured by Lloyd's of London, and there was a, a writer, a condition of the, of the policy that said he may not have pets. Because of the risk that they might scratch him or bite him or somehow might lay a claim, uh, as a result. So, so he, he loved our dog Lamb. Uh, he loved to come and, and play with Lamb. He, he, she had a, she had a long snout. Uh, she was very, very, uh, curly. Mendelssohn. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. And, and when we finished our 10 programs on Schoenberg, um, I had a print made of, of lamb and put it in a little plastic frame and, and gave it to him and, and he thanked me and, and he said, well, he put it by his bedside and, Brian: sweet. David: and, but he loved, he loved to come over and, and, and, and play with lamb. And he once brought Roxalana Rosluck when they were recording Hindemith songs. She had recently, uh, lost her dog. And the conversation had gotten round to this and, and he said, Oh, if you're going to get another dog, you can't choose a dog until you've, until you've, you've got to meet Lamb because she is the perfect dog. And he arrived late one night with Roxy and, uh, you know, he had a, was one of the first people to have a mobile phone in the car. You know, it was this big console with a lock, a key, and you had to connect with the mobile operator who would then put you through, well, he pulled up out front and called, and said, is it okay, I've got, I've got Roxana Rosluck here, and she just really needs to meet Lam. And so, you know, and so he was capable of that kind of spontaneity, you know, that just, you know, that only like a fun loving, you know, real human being, a real, you know, a true friend, a collaborator. Uh, would do. So, no, we, we related to Glenn as, as a, as a very close friend and, and we, we loved his visits, even if they, they sometimes happened at odd hours or unexpectedly, but, um, so, yeah, so she came and she met Lam and, and, and, and he's, you know, isn't she perfect? Like, how can you choose a dog in, you know, without, without, you know, first figuring out what a perfect dog could be, could be like. Anyway, Brian: Because every other dog will have to be assessed on the LAM Index. David: That's right. Yes. Right. The Gould Standard, Brian: The Gould Standard, exactly right. So when you were in this, the, the, this, uh, professional relationship and friendship with him. Did he talk about his other projects, the things that he was working on that he wanted to do? Did you ever hear him play, uh, practice, rehearse, uh, do a spontaneous opera transcription, singing five parts? Uh, David: He did, he did talk about his other projects. Um, I remember when he was doing the, uh, the piano four hands, or the two piano versions of, of Wagner. Uh, I remember, I think he was very proud of the fact that he had used, multitrack tape, uh, to make these. And, uh, uh, he, he, he loved to come around and just play things for people, uh, before they were released, uh, because he was so fired up and so enthusiastic about them. And with the Sibelius recordings, for example, where, where he zoomed in and out of the perspective, the audio perspective, uh, You know, he, he thought he was really onto something, uh, pretty special there. And he, he liked to get people's reaction. He didn't necessarily want you to, to, uh, uh, critique. In fact, he was quite averse to criticism, you know, like criticized at your peril. Uh, but, but he wanted, he wanted you there. To, to be with him, to be, to be a co listener, uh, and, and, and to confirm that what he was hearing was what you're hearing, and yeah, that's it. And, uh, uh, I remember once, uh, when he played, he was, playing the, uh, the Bizet, uh, piano pieces that I, I had, I made the mistake of saying, I can't imagine why anybody would want to record Bizet's piano music. And you know, like the airwaves went silent for probably three months, you know, Brian: Yeah. David: thou, thou shalt not criticize or, or Brian: think, I think he was very thin skinned, very, very sensitive about David: He is a very sensitive person. Absolutely. Yeah. Brian: And he, from everything I hear, he wouldn't fight. For example, if I show someone my favorite movie and they tell me they think it stinks, I'll have a fight with them. It can actually become quite, quite heated, quite personal. But I don't think that his way of dealing with that feeling of disappointment was like that. I think it was to retreat because I, think he couldn't stand conflict and he also couldn't stand suffering. He couldn't stand the idea that that by raising his voice or showing disapproval overtly that he would, he would hurt you, but he might feel hurt himself and simply withdraw. David: You know, I think he just felt that, you know, as intelligent beings, we should be smart enough to figure out how to get along. Brian: Yes, David: And, you know, that was, yeah, very much, very Brian: there's there's a revolutionary idea, isn't it? Um, yeah, yes, exactly. So, uh, what were some of the last experiences. What were more the last times you, you saw him or spoke with him? David: Actually, I remember when Howard, the death of Howard Hughes was reported, another famous recluse. Walked around in Kleenex boxes, Brian: Yes. Yes. David: hypochondriac. Brian: Mm David: I said once on the phone to Glenn, I said, uh, I said, you know, I wonder if you've been following this story about Howard Hughes and he says, Oh yes. He's very well aware. And. He, he was not, um, uh, he was not without perspective, I guess you would say. I think he, he knew what he was about and, and maybe he knew that at that time, maybe he knew he had ventured into some maybe more extreme behavior than, than he'd been involved with before. But, uh, uh, no, he, you know, he followed the news. He kept, he kept his mind on, on world affairs. And, and, and of course the stock market, Brian: Yes. Right. Where David: uh, where he did very well. Yes. Um, uh, so, but I think there were places you, you couldn't go, you know, um, and, um, I mean, for example, um, uh, another example was when he was writing the, the Padula Clark article, you know, I remember getting a, a late night phone call and, you know, and he, he just, he just wanted, um, To read it, the draft that he had at the time, probably not the final draft. He just wanted to read it to somebody. He didn't want your comments, really. Just say, be that other pair of ears Brian: Right. David: to share with. Um, and um, yeah, a complex person, but aren't we all? Brian: Yeah, exactly. And you know, by the way, that Petula, She is very aware Glenn had this particular fondness for her work, not unmixed, but fondness for her work and it's meant a great deal to her and she has said to me that there are times when she was touring and it became overwhelming and she just felt the need to stop, be away. She would go into her dressing room, lie on the floor. And play the Goldberg Variations and think about Glenn. David: Nice, Brian: Yeah. It says she's very sorry that she never had a chance to meet him in person. David: yeah, yeah. Brian: I'd like to talk as we finish up, and I do want to talk about your own work again and, and your compositions and some of your recent projects, but before we, we get to that, uh, I want to ask about two other things and, and whether, uh, Glenn discussed those with you. First of all, um, the, third pole of his, of his tripod of, uh, of, um, avatars and that's Richard Strauss and how someone who I think in the minds of the average person who loves classical music, couldn't be more different. Then Schoenberg, because here's someone whose music really sounds romantic right down to the very end, to the four last songs and the, you know, the, uh, the clarinet concerto and, and, and those late works, the, that, you know, the, uh, the woodwind works, the, how did he reconcile that love of Strauss, particularly because some of, you know, Strauss's music has qualities that I think of as being almost antithetical to Glenn's character. For example, bombast. David: You know, again, it's conscious, it's highly, highly contrapuntal music. Brian: Right. David: I, Glenn, I think his mind was engaged by the interplay of, of, uh, contrapuntal lines, and I think, um, he, he connected to the process very effectively and very efficiently, and, and I think it, you know, if there was Bombast and Strauss, perhaps, for Glenn, I'm just speculating now, um, I, I think it might have simply translated as ecstasy, um, because I think with Strauss, there's no gratuitous bomb, gratuitous bombast, I don't think. I think it's all, it's all prepared and resolved and it's, it's the, the, the, the through, the through line of, of what's going on in the music and, and in the, in, in the, in the counterpoint. I just think it probably, for Glenn, was intensely satisfying. Brian: And of course, his, uh, his, um, approach to opera clearly, uh, was a different beast for Glenn than just about any other opera and particularly Verismo or, um, anything that was really part of the 19th century Italian tradition. which for which I think it must have been a bit of an anathema to him. David: Perhaps, yes, yes. Um, but I don't think, to be honest, you know, coming back to Bizet and the piano pieces, I remember his answer when I asked him, you know, why would you do this? He said, well, I thought he's the most Wagnerian of the French Romantics. Wagnerian. Okay, Brian: He probably needed to put on the Chausson Symphony. That's pretty pretty pretty Wagnerian too. But anyway, the last bit just in terms of his musical taste and this really, he must have been aware of the world that you came from and my sense is that as with his wandering through 19th century music, Um, His relationship with 20th century music was also very, very selective. So I think of him in some ways as being, um, open to the new, but also in a way, conservative. It's hard for me to imagine him, you know, grooving to, you know, Sabatnik or Babbitt, Boulez, Stockhausen, Dalla Piccola, you know, those, those kinds of, of, uh, David: would be a, would it be a different case, Brian: Yes. David: And I remember playing in one of my pieces, one of my electronic pieces, and it had, it had, uh, like oscillators glistening Brian: Mm hmm. David: over three octave range, you know, and, and he referred to those as chromatic scales, you know, I don't care for chromatic scales, he said. Uh, But I once prepared a, I prepared a list of my, and this is, you know, 1980 ish, a list of my, my works to date, and he had a look at it and he said, Oh, oh well, it's, uh, I guess comparable to about the same, uh, list, uh, came Total Duration, Oppenwebern. Because it was, of course, not terribly long at the time. Brian: Right. David: But, but I think that was his way of giving a kind of a backhanded compliment. Um, or, Seeming to feign positive reaction. Brian: Perhaps. Perhaps. Well, one thing's for sure. He seems to have loved Shostakovich, but he loathes Stravinsky. Mm hmm. David: Yeah, well, because Stravinsky was largely homophonic, I mean, uh, you know, the Symphony of Psalms notwithstanding, um, uh, and, well, other pieces too, but, uh, I think he probably lumped Stravinsky in, in with the French Impressionists, you know, that it was narcissistic, that it was, you know, it had to sound brilliant in order to be effective. Brian: Right. It was coloristic. I still remember him talking about being traumatized by being taken to see Fantasia. All that color. David: Yeah, yeah, yep. Brian: Right. So perhaps the same thing in a, in a sound world. So before we, we, we close, we haven't really done justice to your own work as a composer. And at the very least, I'd like to find out about some of your recent work and some of the things that you've been, you've been up to and what you have on the, on the horizon. David: You know, just yesterday, uh, a review appeared. I don't know if you read the blog, textura. org. Brian: No, I, I, I'm not familiar with it. David: it highly. It's an extremely well written blog and they cover all kinds of music. And, um, the, the author pointed out, he said, this has been a pretty good year for David Jaeger, the composer, because not only has he had, uh, in March, uh, a complete album of his viola music, really. Well, he's just had another one, uh, on, on another label and, uh, having written 18 pieces for the viola, you know, to have two albums released in a given year, uh, entirely devoted to your work, uh, and on different labels. And then he pointed out that, uh, Plus, one of my productions, uh, on a Spanish label, uh, KNS Classical, of the emerging, the brilliant young prodigious cellist, Noemi Raymond Frize, who not only played Poulenc Sonata and the Schnittke First Sonata, also played an unaccompanied cello piece of my own. Brian: Oh, that's wonderful. Congratulations. And, uh, uh, do you have a particular relationship with the viola? David: I do, I do, uh, I mean, I've. You know, it's only one aspect of my work, but it's a very significant one. Uh, my mother was a violist Brian: Oh, nice. David: and, but, but, you know, I'm the second of six children in my family. And when my mother started raising her, her, her family, she made the decision. She put her instruments away, you know, and I. Covered them. I tell this story time and again because it's a fascinating story. I, as a kid, uh, maybe not a toddler, but, but as a youngster, I, I, I stumbled into this closet and I saw these boxes and you know, if you, if you put a, a, a bow away in the box for a long, like the, the bow hair will unravel and eventually the, the, the threads of hair will find their way out, out of the box, you know, right? It's like, like a snake or something. It's, I discovered these boxes with this, this hair coming out. Brian: great hairy mess. David: yeah. And I asked my mother, I said, Oh, those are my violas. And, um, you know, I never heard her play. Uh, but, but, but the viola always held a kind of a mystery for me. And then I started meeting the great violists of this world, and most particularly Rivka Golani, Brian: yes. David: who asked me for my first piece, and she asked it on very short notice. I think I had about 10 days to compose the piece, which turns out is one of my most Performed works to this very day. Um, but Rivka then came back. I've written for her probably, uh, nine or ten pieces just specifically for, for Rivka. We have a very trusting relationship. But then, now, the younger violists are coming along and they're discovering this. and are keen to do it. So, you know, I think for any composer, aside from the fact that the single most important thing for them is to hear their music played, like the second important thing is to hear different interpretations. And, and, and, you know, You know, I was at CBC as a music producer for 40 years, and I like to say if I learned one thing in those 40 years, it is the value of the interpreter. The value that the interpreter brings to the music is very high. And, you know, we obsess about composers, we obsess about repertoire and historical periods, and I think we sometimes forget. That it's the interpreters who breathe life into those dots on the page. And I've, you know, I've been very vocal in saying to the people who've given me the privilege of interpreting my music, You know, I just want to believe you. What you play, play it your way. Like, I'm not going to tell you how to play it. I want it to be authentic you. I want to hear how that music works through your, your creativity as a performer, as, as an interpreter. Because I want it to be real, and I want it to be believable. And, you know, I've been lucky that I've had a number of my works, uh, interpreted. more than a few times. And it's such a great thrill for, for, for me as a composer to see how, how varied this, this can be, you know, and, and, and the hands of, of beautiful players, you know, really creative, uh, wonderful musicians. And it's been a real treat for me. Brian: that's great. Well, I've certainly been in my experience that if you look at some of the, what I'd call the, the major works of the 20th century, works that came along when recording existed, and you hear the first recording, especially if those recordings happened very close to the world premiere, and you realize they sound very different from the The way we hear those pieces now, the, the pieces haven't settled in. The ideas of interpretation, it's still new and unfamiliar. So it's moving in a lot of different directions than, um, than the same piece as we've become accustomed to it. So there is an evolution that happens. It reminds me of something that Philip Glass said when we. when we, uh, gave him the Glenn Gould Prize. And he got up on the stage and he said, uh, I never met Glenn Gould, but he was a towering presence in my life as an interpreter. I was always aware of him. And some people have said, well, he was so wayward in his interpretations. He, it's a good thing he never played any of your music because he would have changed it around, to which I say, he would have been extremely welcome to do so, to have a musical mind like that, alter my music would have been a privilege. It would be like being a partner. David: absolutely. You know, and I think I'm very fortunate that I did have a career as a producer and my producing life has definitely informed my composing life and my composing life. point of view is always with me when I'm in the studio producing. You know, I think like a composer and I think like, how is this music supposed to work? Like what, what's the most effective? What's, what's going to make it visit in recording? They make us strike people as being exceptional and special and, and so I'm happy to be that second pair of ears for the artist to say, you know, well, I hear it this way, uh, you know, come in, come in the studio, listen to playback, let's, let's see what it, what it's actually sounding like. And I say to each artist, um, like listening to playback, you, you can tell by putting a little more weight on the tone, you, you understand what the effect is going to be in the, in the final, in the final product. And so I love those conversations. I love the engagement of, of, of the dialectic, the, the conversation about, about how it's going and how it could be and what its potential is. Brian: And as the producer, you understand the medium, which the interpreter doesn't always, whether it's the radio medium or the recorded medium. So it's, well, believe me, having spent 20 years in the record business, I can say it just don't happen without the producer. David: Yeah, that's right, Brian: Anyway, with that, I just want to thank you so much, David. We have barely glossed over the incredible lifespan of two new hours, which is a legend in itself. It's a, an era in our Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that I'm afraid we regret to say there doesn't exist an environment for that level of inventiveness and experimentation and creativity anymore, but maybe one day it will come back. Uh, we can always hope. And for the help and friendship and the experiences that you've shared with us with Glenn, I just want to thank you for, for being with us today. David: It's been a great pleasure, Brian. Brian: Thank you so much. Michael: The Glenn Gould Foundation is a registered Canadian charity and we rely on the support of arts lovers like you. To keep bringing inspiring stories to life, please consider giving by visiting our website, Glenn Gould dot ca, and follow us across social media at The Glenn Gould Foundation. Thank you so much for joining us for this episode of The Gould Standard. ​