A Letter From the Archives
October 6, 2022
In September 2022, just before our celebrations of Glenn Gould’s 90th birthday, we received a wonderful and surprising message from a follower. Included were some pieces of memorabilia: pictures of Gould’s 1955 Goldberg Variations, and a letter to a fan, discovered by Jules Hoffman.
Jules Hoffman writes:
“I inherited my Grandmother’s record collection after she passed away. I finally had a chance to look through it and found a particular album of great interest – Bach: The Goldberg Variations (Glenn’s first disc with Columbia Records). Inside the album (in addition to an insert with a mini biography of Glenn) was a 65-year-old letter, still in its envelope. It was from Glenn, writing back to a fan of his. The letter was sent by Glenn’s manager, Walter Homburger. I can only assume my grandmother purchased this album from a used record store back in the day, and the letter just happened to be inside it! With Glenn’s 90th birthday coming up this month, I thought how wonderful to have stumbled across this find, and I wanted to share it with you all. Enjoy!”
The letter is dated February 8, 1957 and reads:
“Thank you for your letter of January 9th. I am delighted to hear that you have found some pleasure from my recordings and I hope that I shall have the opportunity to meet you when I am in Pasadena.
I am distressed to hear of the surface noises on your copy of the Beethoven sonatas. Some of that distortion may well be my own voice in the background. I have an unfortunate habit of singing sotto voce when I play and regrettably some of it does come through on the recording. However, I have also heard of bad surface noise on the copy itself, quite aside from my own mutterings. Many thanks for your kind comments.”
Our resident Gould expert, Kevin Bazzana, provided some context:
“The discovery of a new bit of archival Gouldiana is always welcome, and all the more delightful when the item turns up so unexpectedly. The newly discovered letter is an interesting one, confirming that concern about Gould’s self-described “mutterings” at the piano dates back to the very beginning of his recording career.
Though typed on his manager’s stationery, the letter was clearly dictated by Gould; the secretary’s note says as much, but the letter also has the distinctive Gould ‘tone.’ Unfortunately, however, he did not sign it personally. The signature is clearly not authentic (compare one of the many genuine autographs that can be seen online), and the additional handwritten notation below it is, one presumes, the secretary’s indication that she signed on Gould’s behalf.
Incidentally, the secretary’s carbon copy of this letter survives among Gould’s papers in the Library and Archives Canada, in Ottawa, along with the original January 9, 1957, fan letter from William Hitch of Manhattan Beach, California. Two subsequent letters from Hitch also survive, dated February 13 and March 4, 1957. In the former, according to the LAC’s online database, Hitch mentions other musicians who sang while they played, and in both he hopes to meet Gould at his first-ever concert in nearby Pasadena, on March 8. (Manhattan Beach and Pasadena are both in the Los Angeles area.) No replies to these letters survive, and we do not know if the two men did meet.
Gould performed again in Pasadena on January 9, 1959, and the last concert he ever gave was in Los Angeles, on April 10, 1964.”
