Performance strikes Goldberg

Author: Sara Jameson

Skillful and expressive, pianist Kathryn Ananda-Owens performed Bach's Goldberg Variations on Sunday Oct. 2 in the Concert Hall. The Goldberg Variations are often regarded as the most serious and ambitious composition ever written for harpsichord, with captivating grace and emotion.

With a clear command of the piano, Ananda-Owens commenced the opening aria, and for the listeners gathered an impressive concert ensued. Ananda-Owens played with an unquestionable understanding of the works, delivering them with fluidity and fervor. Her technical skill was apparent to all, but it was the subtle emotion infused into the music that was truly remarkable.

Jack Cuneo '09, a music student, expressed his appreciation of Anada-Owens calling her an "amazing pianist."

The heavy-duty piece could easily have been too much and too long, yet under Ananda-Owens's skill, it captured the concert hall for its duration. "Bach for an hour?" Cuneo said, surprised. "She did a very good job at keeping my attention."

Another satisfied member of the audience, Chuck Bradley '09, also praised Ananda-Owens's performance. He described her playing as "fluid" and "harmonious." "[The piece] definitely served its purpose! I nearly fell asleep," he said, adding that this was not due to boredom but to the soothing beauty of the performance itself.

Ananda-Owens excels as a performer, but also has a career teaching and lecturing. She won first prize in the 1993 Neale-Silva Young Artists Competition, and her concerts have been broadcast on radio and television on three continents. She is a graduate of the Oberlin and Peabody Conservatories of Music and now works as a member of the St. Olaf College faculty. She is currently writing a book on the keyboard cadenzas of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

It is no surprise, then, that Ananda-Owens was able to capture her audience with her rendition of the Goldberg Variations. The masterpiece, published in 1741 under the title "Clavierübung" (Keyboard Practice), was the largest of all clavier pieces published during the Baroque period. The entire work, which is famously difficult to play, consists of 32 pieces built upon the same 32-note ground bass and its implied harmonies. The same aria appears at the beginning and the end, and are separated by 30 variations. Perhaps one of Bach's most personal compositions, it is admired for its elegance and imagination, despite its formal restrictions.

The Variations are believed to have been a gift to Count Kayserling, an influential musical devotee who had secured Bach an appointment as official composer to the Saxon court. He commissioned the work as a cure for his recurrent insomnia. The pieces were performed for the Count by Johann Gottlieb Goldberg, after whom the work was ultimately named.