The Goldberg Variations: The Project

I've had my eye on the Goldberg Variations by J. S. Bach for some time.  I have recordings of individual variations that I made in 2013, and I was working on the Quodlibet as far back as 1998.

Right now, when there's so much general craziness, and I'm staying home more than I otherwise might, is a great time to go back to them, and you're invited along for the ride.  Hopefully, the journey will be entertaining and instructive; you'll learn from some of my mistakes.

The Goldberg Variations are, among other things, a big piece; a complete performance, with repeats, takes around an hour and a half.  These days, it seems to be common to leave out one or both repeats in the Aria and some, or all, of the variations.  This is a practical move; an intermission really doesn't work with this piece, and an hour and a half is a long time to sit without a break.  If none of the repeats are taken, the piece becomes a manageable forty-five minutes long, more or less.  Getting through the whole thing is still a feat of endurance.  My athletically-inclined friends fill my social media feeds with accounts of the marathons they run and the weights they lift, and exhortations to take on big projects.  Here's mine.

A big project needs a work plan, and I'm tackling this in stages.

• Locate, and listen to, a number of recordings of the work, on piano and on harpsichord. 
• Beginning from the end, more or less, make individual recordings of each variation, and two of the Aria.  For now, I'm recording them without repeats.
• Put my recordings onto a CD and listen to the whole set several times, taking note of things such as the relative loudness of the different tracks, the effectiveness (or not) of using noise reduction and other recording technology, the relative tempos of the different variations, and so on.
• Re-record anything that seems to need it at this point, using the best-practice information from the previous step.
• At this point, there will be an end product: a CD.  But it won't be done.
• Record the variations in sets of two or three, and gradually increase the numbers of variations in each set.
  
• Eventually, play the whole thing start to finish.
• Then do the whole thing over with the repeats.  Or not.

There is considerable overlap between stages.  Right now I'm on the first two.

These are some of the results I'm hoping for:

• Better playing, especially on this keyboard
• A recording I can give to my family, friends, etc.
• Thorough knowledge of this wonderful work
• Improvements in my recording technique, especially editing with Audacity

So far, I have recordings of Variations 21-22 and 25-30, and I'm working on 23 and 24.

More news as it happens.