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Rating: 
Summary: be careful now....
Review: A book which was produced in conjunction with Bruno Monsaingeon's magnificent film (well, 2 films really) 'Richter - the Enigma', which is available on VHS and DVD. If you've seen the film, I can recommend this book as a wonderful supplement. Some of it duplicates information from the film, but much of the content is new.The first half of the book comprises Richter's thoughts on his career: hardly an autobiography, more a series of reminiscences and opinions of his musical career. Fascinating stuff. The second half is his a reproduction of his journal from 1970 onwards. This is all new information which did not appear in the film. Richter writes succinctly and often bitingly about his colleagues, and reveals his muscial likes and dislikes: a fondness for Mahler and Debussy's 'La Mer' (especially in Desormiere's recording) feature repeatedly. Strongly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Very interesting, but after 200+ pages, he's still an enigma
Review: I recommend this book, whether or not you've seen the companion documentary. However, as the film's title states, Richter is an enigma, and he still will be after you've read this book (or seen the film). With every page you get the impression he's keeping out as much as he's letting us know--and that's certainly his right. I'm not saying I'm looking for a "tell all" book about SR and frankly wouldn't want one. But there are times he stays frustratingly superficial about things: he denies he likes smaller venues for performing (I think it's kind of obvious he does), says repeatedly he does not like America "because everything's so standardized." Am I to believe that there's less variaty from Los Angeles to Maine than there is from Moscow to Odessa? He never really explains his beef with America or Americans, yet says being here made him "nauseous." His relationship to his wife and, of course, his homosexuality remain undiscussed. That's fine, except there's a lot of footage in the film where you find yourself wondering who took pictures of Richter that way, and why. (The scene of him wrapped in bedsheets running about is particularly interesting and humorous.) The potential reader should also be forewarned that he reveals virtually nothing about his own art and insights. Anyone who enjoyed Joseph Horowitz's Conversations With Arrau and is looking for something similar will be disappointed. It very well may be that Richter was incapable of explaining or comprehending his talent. Or perhaps it was pretty much as he said, that it was pretty obvious to him how a piece should go because "all one has to do is read the score." He summed himself up with Kurt Sanderling's remark about him, "Not only can he play the piano, he can read notes too." To many such as myself who have been at times overwhelmed by Richter's mastery, that may seem too simplistic, and even like a veiled statement (deliberately simplistic, in other words), but that's what he says. And listening again to some of his greatest recordings, maybe it really was as simple as that. He also clearly became a sadder and sadder man as life went on. There is some discussion in the foreward of health troubles and lengthy hospital stays, but this too is not really talked about in any detail, and we are left with a very incomplete picture. So if you buy this book you will have a fuller picture of Richter, but we are still seeing him through a veil, and I have a feeling the author wants it that way to protect some things he may not want to reveal, or that Richter may have asked him not to reveal before consenting with his cooperation. At any rate Richter is still an enigma after this book and the video, but a fascinating enigma nonetheless!
Rating:
Summary: Very interesting, but after 200+ pages, he's still an enigma
Review: I recommend this book, whether or not you've seen the companion documentary. However, as the film's title states, Richter is an enigma, and he still will be after you've read this book (or seen the film). With every page you get the impression he's keeping out as much as he's letting us know--and that's certainly his right. I'm not saying I'm looking for a "tell all" book about SR and frankly wouldn't want one. But there are times he stays frustratingly superficial about things: he denies he likes smaller venues for performing (I think it's kind of obvious he does), says repeatedly he does not like America "because everything's so standardized." Am I to believe that there's less variaty from Los Angeles to Maine than there is from Moscow to Odessa? He never really explains his beef with America or Americans, yet says being here made him "nauseous." His relationship to his wife and, of course, his homosexuality remain undiscussed. That's fine, except there's a lot of footage in the film where you find yourself wondering who took pictures of Richter that way, and why. (The scene of him wrapped in bedsheets running about is particularly interesting and humorous.) The potential reader should also be forewarned that he reveals virtually nothing about his own art and insights. Anyone who enjoyed Joseph Horowitz's Conversations With Arrau and is looking for something similar will be disappointed. It very well may be that Richter was incapable of explaining or comprehending his talent. Or perhaps it was pretty much as he said, that it was pretty obvious to him how a piece should go because "all one has to do is read the score." He summed himself up with Kurt Sanderling's remark about him, "Not only can he play the piano, he can read notes too." To many such as myself who have been at times overwhelmed by Richter's mastery, that may seem too simplistic, and even like a veiled statement (deliberately simplistic, in other words), but that's what he says. And listening again to some of his greatest recordings, maybe it really was as simple as that. He also clearly became a sadder and sadder man as life went on. There is some discussion in the foreward of health troubles and lengthy hospital stays, but this too is not really talked about in any detail, and we are left with a very incomplete picture. So if you buy this book you will have a fuller picture of Richter, but we are still seeing him through a veil, and I have a feeling the author wants it that way to protect some things he may not want to reveal, or that Richter may have asked him not to reveal before consenting with his cooperation. At any rate Richter is still an enigma after this book and the video, but a fascinating enigma nonetheless!
Rating: 
Summary: My favourite book from 2001!
Review: I've enjoyed this book enormously and don't mind that, as Monsaingeon tells us in the introduction, this is not exactly a biography- the title of the book also makes that clear.
The style and tone of the book are wonderfully simple and direct, and many passages are very humourous. I especially liked Richter's description of Maria Yudina and the accompanying photo's (in the second photo she looks like a tramp in sporting shoes). It tells also of the eccentricity and powerful personalities (especially Yudina) that today would, I'm afraid, be ridiculed. The whole atmosphere of Russia, despite it's enormous injustice, seems ages ago from today's streamlined concerts, planned a year or more in advance, where pianists receive enormous salaries.
There was some discussion in Holland when the documentary came out about the title (the enigma). The original title in French was "l'insoumis", which, according to a French friend, means somebody (especially a soldier) not obeying the rules and following his own path (the dictionary gives the translation "unsubdued"). I think the original title is more in line with the book also.
Rating:
Summary: not a writer but his fascinating life comes through
Review: If you are a devoted pianist this book will ring inside you, the daily arduous burdens of practice of interpretation, learning music,traveling. Richter was a fabulous deep thinking pianist,he knew how to tame/channel his emotions,serving the music but this lifeworld complexity hardly comes through between-th-lines for he was not a writer.If you are a performing musician you can finish Richter's thought. We cannot be all things to all people. He reports on concerts, his own and recordings,his own(largely he was always displeased) The incredible scope of his career,traveling much after 1960 spanning decades,living through the darkest pages of Soviet Russia, all this comes through his directly functional words. His power as pianist was not forcing his career, allowing himself time to develop a repertoire and more importantly reflect upon it.His first teacher Neuhaus said his tone was brittle, to concentrated, it needed to "breath" more, and he learned this.His Schubert for example(a "breathing" composer) was come to very late, as the G major Sonata that befuddles many pianists. There is no substitute for what time and duration does to one's playing, this is something hardly ever learned by cigar-chomping agents. Make a quick Buck! Hell with interpretation and Hell! with music as it should be. Richter had incredible power as a pianist, many conductors will reveal how he can consume the work,as Gennady Rozhdestvensky will reveal. The orchestra must hold its own, as in the Brahms Bb Concerto, or Tchaikovsky.Although Richter to my own ears, only found great interpretive conviction in Rachmaninov and Prokofiev, two composers he felt were very close to each other, and to himself. (although Prokofiev would never openly admit this. Scriabin and Chopin as well Richter had great strength under the surface ornamentations,extended colouful harmonies and brooding darknesses. He claimed he only practiced three hours a day unless he was given a work to learn quickly as Prokoviev did with his late Sonatas. But given Richter's incredible memory I doubt this. There is chronolgy(almost day to day) of Richter's life beginning in 1970 given here in concerts. There are also nice vintage photos of his travels.
Rating:
Summary: Unique Insight into the Life and Mind of a Reclusive Genius
Review: The epic documentary film "Richter, the Enigma" was his crowning moment as a visionary, and this book is a bewitching companion-- a beautiful summation of Bruno Monsaingeon's life's paean to Art. 'Notebooks and Conversations' is a powerhouse! great in its subject, its inventiveness, and achieving a seamless framing of one of life's peerless musicians. Richter reveals himself and his art subtly - without fanfare, contrariness, with no bother at all-- it's an astonishing act made the more affecting by its silent invoking of a kind of perfect resignation with no bitterness. The opening pages are beautiful...Richter speaks of how the opera taught him everything about music, about the piano-- for musicians especially, reading his thoughts are a trove of consolation. The last half of the book with its neat arrangement of Richter's journal 'topic/notes and observations' on each page is as fulfilling as a second book! Richter makes observations about recordings, concerts, artists and composers, with joy, insight and reserve mingled in equal parts, and equal footing is afforded both the kind and the provocatively distant Richter; here Monsaingeon's unerring artistic sense provides editing as wise as it is subtle. Monsaingeon's love for this project is palpable throughout, as with the film, and he talks a bit in the Introduction about that love. His legacy as a documentarian is enhanced, if possible, even more with this invaluable book. Photos are frequent, sometimes almost unexpected -- and Richter, his face and bearing often resembling Jean Genet's, seems free and sad, resigned, responsible for a life of immense gifts, immense burdens, yet strangely indifferent to it all. At the end of the Introduction, Monsaingeon tells of finally deciding to edit out of his Richter film an 'ending' where he beautifully manages to 'thank' Richter, believing, as he says, that, after all, "it goes without saying." If you have any interest at all in books of this kind, your pleasure over this book will be rich and glad indeed, it goes without saying. Don't hesitate!
Rating:
Summary: A gift from a legend.
Review: This is a fascinating and insightful look into the thoughts and history of one of the undisputed greats of interpretive art. Richter is considered by many to be the greatest classical pianist of the twentieth century, and so it is to our great fortune that he entrusted his memories and musical insights to Bruno Monsaingeon for posterity at the end of his life. The first half of the book consists of his life story, a mixture of fascinating encounters with genius and dark personal turmoil, recollected with a vividness of memory which he considered to be a curse of sorts. The second half consists of quick notes and impressions on recitals (his own and others'), opera productions and concerts, and recordings, and he is unabashed in his praise and/or criticism. There are many familiar names in this section (I'll let him surprise you by not mentioning them) and it is fascinating to get his take on these performers. What I found surprising about this book was its engaging, humorous tone. After seeing the wonderful documentary, "Richter, the Enigma," I was expecting something perhaps more morose, but Richter had such an odd, nonchalant wit about him that this book was a great pleasure to read, and not at all the downer I was prepared for. All in all, a fantastic book in itself and a must-have companion piece for the documentary.
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