This comparison of performances (whether of those by the same player spread over a given length of time, or of performances of the same works by about equally qualified players, massed within a short period) should be one of the self-imposed tasks of all conscientious critics. I don’t quite know how they could manage it; perhaps by attending contests, examinations, and the like, taking a kind of post-graduate course in performance-criticism. As far as my own experience goes, my duties as member of the jury at the Paris Conservatoire contests and at the Brussels Concours International provided me with invaluable object lessons in the field of critical listening. On an active practitioner such lessons are wasted, of course, whereas for a critic…. << less