To what extent to musicians depend upon image?, To what extent is this a new development? Options

[corenfa]

I assumed that she was probably not actually playing the Beethoven, but rather miming to a recording of herself. I don't think that a pianist would actually be able to play while doing that bizarre whatever it was that she was doing.

Unfortunately, they can. I had a classmate who could (not necessarily up to Alice Sara Ott's level though). At least in his case he wasn't acting for the camera; he used to do that even practising alone, but it made me (not just me) feel uncomfortable watching him. Someone once said: it looks as though you ought to leave him alone in the room with the piano (they used rather less delicate words than that though).

I was fortunate to see Alfred Brendel's last London performance, and I thought him a great performer with charisma, though not of a kind that detracted from the music. In a similar category I think I'd probably include Vladimir Ashkenazy, Evgeny Kissin, Maurizio Pollini, Andre Previn, Mitsuko Uchida, and Krystian Zimerman. I love Andr?s Schiff's playing, and I think that he looks like, and has something of the manner of, a teddy bear! I always find Daniel Barenboim a bit big and brooding, a kind of monolith of the concert platform. Yefim Bronfman and Arcadi Volodos are rather the same, though Volodos at least manages to look happy when it's all over. One of my favourite pianists, who has sadly never really got the profile that he deserves, is Piotr Paleczny (see this, and he has also made a very fine CD The Best of Fryderyk Chopin, which I had to buy direct from Dux in Warsaw). Professor Paleczny is, I have to admit, one of the least charismatic performers I have ever seen: he likes to come onto the stage, play, and walk off, with very little communication, but his live performance is magnificent. One of the pianists who shows the most emotion when performing is Llŷr Williams, whose technique, intelligence, and musicianship are outstanding. I believe that his emoting is absolutely genuine; the depth of experience with each note that he plays is very clear to the listener.

Absolutely agree about Llŷr Williams - I saw/heard him a couple of weeks ago. I thought he was rather good. I didn't think his emoting was excessive, like I described about seeing Brendel earlier, it seemed in keeping with what was physically necessary to play the instrument. As a sometime pianist myself I know that sometimes you need to give a bit of "follow-through" when lifting hands off the piano for certain phrases. Many of my favourites are also on your list above.

[StradiVarious]

I wonder how this grumpy old devil genius would survive in today's image obsessed world?

(IMG:http://www.ipl.org/div/images/mushist/beethoven.gif)

Wasn't he described as a ladies' man? He must have had something going for him! Image is a curious thing. Some rather plain and ugly men attract the most beautiful women don't they? Personality and wealth can go a very long way to becoming a chick magnet.
(Goes off to become wealthy and ugly! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )