Gordon has had a decades-long career as a Bach-specialist singer, teacher, and lecturer, performing with many of the world’s major conductors and orchestras in concerts and on recordings, noted for his Evangelist interpretations in Bach’s Passions. Bach, researched and engagingly written–“with most faithful Scholarship and a ready Wit”–by “Bach tenor” David Gordon. Here are two such books–one new, the other issued in 2017–that I strongly recommend for anyone who loves music and is curious about the life and times of the artists who make it.įirst is the nifty little book about the life and times of J.S. However one manages life in a pandemic, I suggest that the disruption of former routines and the disorienting effects of ongoing uncertainty can be at least partially ameliorated by the transporting power of a book–or two–a uniquely affecting and influential source of enlightenment, humor, escape, and entertainment, no social contact required.
The Little Bach Book David Gordon (Lucky Valley Press 2017) Rough Ideas–Reflections On Music And More Stephen Hough (Farar, Straus and Giroux 2020)