UBC Reports | Vol. 47 | No. 06 | Mar.
22, 2001
Ten-CD set conveys composer’s magnificence in black and
white over 11 hours
For the record, Music Prof. Robert Silverman is not the Toronto
actor for whom he once received a cheque from CBC Television. Nor
is he dean of Arts at Queen’s University or “Bicycle Bob” Silverman,
also from Montreal, who once got arrested for painting his own bicycle
path on a city street.
A faculty member since 1973, who served as director of the School
of Music from 1991-95, Silverman is the renowned pianist who has
arrived at the peak of classical music after performing live and
recording Beethoven’s 32 sonatas.
Comprising 103 individual movements and more than 11 hours of
music, the 10-CD set is on the Orpheum Masters label.
Silverman has performed with the world’s greatest symphonies.
He has made more than 15 winning recordings.
But after serving as the school’s director he says he was looking
for something big to get him back in the swing and keep him off
the streets.
“I spent four years on this project, but have been living and
teaching this music for a lifetime.”
“The sonatas embody the core of the piano repertoire, in which
Beethoven’s immense expressive range, limitless powers of invention
and technical mastery are revealed,” he explains.
Silverman, who scaled his personal Everest on a high-tech Bosendorfer
290SE piano, only one of 32 manufactured, says his life has changed.
“The sense of any work is so much clearer to me now. I feel totally
gelled artistically.”
He describes his current UBC class as the best in 35 years.
“We pass on what we know and that helps develop ideas. I am a
much better pianist because I teach and a much better teacher because
I perform,” he says.
A pianist and professor whose 10-disc set of the sonatas sold
out in two months and is being reissued, Robert Silverman is enjoying
the view.
See also: Genetics in
book’s makeup, More
authors than ever honoured at annual event, Author
flies high, UBC
Authors 2000.
