>no getting around his voice Are you referring to his vocal musings heard on the recording? To me, this is what makes these so very special - it is as if he is

>no getting around his voice Are you referring to his vocal musings heard on the recording? To me, this is what makes these so very special - it is as if he is in the same room with me, humming away as if playing to himself with no-one listening. On that note, I'm listening to Kimiko's recording at the moment and she's playing with a distinct Gould influence yet it's almost too clean for me - a piece so exquisitely structured as the Variations can cope with a little less precision in terms of the rhythmic attenuation. I also think it's fair to say that Gould brought so much to this piece that we can't play it anymore without reference to him. OP: you may find the Rachmaninov piano roll recordings interesting, my personal favourite the Prelude No.10: http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=650 http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=650