If these private recordings of our own performances help us to obey the injunction “Know thyself,” our commercially released records fulfil another role besides the more obvious ones: that of allowing us to get to know each other. No regular concert fan can have failed to notice the comparative rarity of the presence of our important virtuosi at their confrere’s performances. Is it fear of being buttonholed at intermission time and of being forced to make pronouncements on performances just heard? Pronouncements that later on can be quoted, misquoted, distorted? Whatever the reason, the conspicuousness of their absence is undeniable. How, then, account for the fact that virtuosi on the whole are pretty well informed about each other’s accomplishments, interpretations, techniques? The answer obviously is that they listen to records in the privacy of their own homes, or to broadcasts of recorded music and (in a lesser degree) to “live” broadcasts. << less