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Views from the Choir Loft

Does Your Choir Sing Perfectly?

Jeff Ostrowski · December 2, 2016

HAVE SOMETHING to say about perfection—as it relates to directing a church choir—but it will have to wait for another day when I have sufficient time. For now, I would simply point out how rarely we encounter true perfection. Even the greatest musicians made mistakes. Alfred Cortot made mistakes. Edwin Fischer made mistakes. Sviatoslav Richter made mistakes.

Today I stumbled across a recording I listened to often in high school. It’s a transcription by Liszt (with additions by Horowitz) of an orchestral piece 1 by Camille Saint-Saëns, who was himself a remarkable pianist. This 1942 performance by Horowitz is absolutely perfect as far as I’m concerned—and I don’t say that lightly:


I have more to say about great pianists like Josef Hofmann, Ignace Tiegerman, Vladimir Horowitz, Edwin Fischer, Sviatoslav Richter, Leopold Godowski, Sergei Rachmaninov, Alfred Cortot, Benno Moiseiwitsch, Josef Lhevinne, Glenn Gould, Dinu Lipatti, and so many others. I usually hesitate to mention them on our blog because their ocean of greatness is so vast I don’t know where to begin. It reminds me of how we often fail to tell our loved ones how we feel about them—I suspect because words cannot do our feelings justice.

For the record, Horowitz hits a wrong note at 5:48. But there’s so much more to musical “perfection” than the avoidance of wrong notes…



NOTES FROM THIS ARTICLE:

1   It’s amazing how much the piece is improved when transferred to piano, but that’s another story.

Opinions by blog authors do not necessarily represent the views of Corpus Christi Watershed.

Filed Under: Articles Last Updated: January 1, 2020

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About Jeff Ostrowski

Jeff Ostrowski holds his B.M. in Music Theory from the University of Kansas (2004). He resides with his wife and children in Los Angeles.—(Read full biography).

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Corpus Christi Watershed

Quick Thoughts

    Vespers Booklet (4th Sunday of Lent)
    The organ accompaniment booklet (24 pages) which I created for the 4th Sunday of Lent (“Lætare Sunday”) may now be downloaded, for those who desire such a thing.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    Vespers Booklet, 3rd Sunday of Lent
    The organ accompaniment I created for the 3rd Sunday of Lent (“Extraordinary Form”) may now be downloaded, if anyone is interested in this.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    Weeping For Joy! (We Hope!)
    Listening to this Easter Alleluia—an SATB arrangement I made twenty years ago based on the work of Monsignor Jules Van Nuffel—one of our readers left this comment: “I get tears in my eyes each time I sing to this hymn.” I hope this person is weeping for joy!
    —Jeff Ostrowski

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“What really matters in life is that we are loved by Christ and that we love Him in return. In comparison to the love of Jesus, everything else is secondary. And, without the love of Jesus, everything is useless.”

— Pope John Paul II (1979)

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