Jacqueline Du Pre: Her Life Her Music, Her Legend

Rating:
Summary: A book revelling the glamours and struggles of a musician
Review: A sensitive book on the life of Du Pre as a musician and a person. This book contains detail reviews of Du Pre's playing in concerts. The readers will be Wilson also tell us about her life and struggles apart from her performing life. Good balance biography.

Rating:
Summary: A book revelling the glamours and struggles of a musician
Review: A sensitive book on the life of Du Pre as a musician and a person. This book contains detail reviews of Du Pre's playing in concerts. The readers will be Wilson also tell us about her life and struggles apart from her performing life. Good balance biography.

Rating:
Summary: A very complete, very "British" book
Review: Du Pre-philes are going to be flush with pleasure after reading this. It's a scholarly work that seemingly pins down every concert that Du Pre ever played, often with mini-reviews of the performances. It's far preferable to the trashy "Hilary and Jackie" and does far better service to Du Pre's life and art. Thankfully, the ending segments dealing with Du Pre's illness are short and to the point.

American readers should be aware that this is a VERY "British" book. Wilson uses British spelling and grammar throughout, and assumes a knowledge of the local geography. Like many British writers, Wilson has a charming ignorance of America, and even goes as far as to "correct" our spelling - "The Lincoln Centre (sic)", "Pittsburg (sic)", "The Carnegie Hall (sic)". On page 300, a truck stop in the Midwest is hilariously referred to as a "highway transport cafe."

Recommended for Du Pre's many fans.

Rating:
Summary: A very complete, very "British" book
Review: Du Pre-philes are going to be flush with pleasure after reading this. It's a scholarly work that seemingly pins down every concert that Du Pre ever played, often with mini-reviews of the performances. It's far preferable to the trashy "Hilary and Jackie" and does far better service to Du Pre's life and art. Thankfully, the ending segments dealing with Du Pre's illness are short and to the point.

American readers should be aware that this is a VERY "British" book. Wilson uses British spelling and grammar throughout, and assumes a knowledge of the local geography. Like many British writers, Wilson has a charming ignorance of America, and even goes as far as to "correct" our spelling - "The Lincoln Centre (sic)", "Pittsburg (sic)", "The Carnegie Hall (sic)". On page 300, a truck stop in the Midwest is hilariously referred to as a "highway transport cafe."

Recommended for Du Pre's many fans.

Rating:
Summary: The Biography Jacueline du Pre Deserves
Review: Elizabeth Wilson knew Jacueline du Pre and while such a relationship may not produce a good biography, this is an excellent one. This book is much needed, particularly following the film "Hilary and Jackie." This book answers all the questions about Ms. du Pre and gives us clear insight into who she was and how she came to be the woman who was unquestionably one of the great instrumentalists of the 20th century. I found myself reading this book and listening to recordings of Ms. du Pre play; an unbeatable combination.

Rating:
Summary: The Biography Jacueline du Pre Deserves
Review: Elizabeth Wilson knew Jacueline du Pre and while such a relationship may not produce a good biography, this is an excellent one. This book is much needed, particularly following the film "Hilary and Jackie." This book answers all the questions about Ms. du Pre and gives us clear insight into who she was and how she came to be the woman who was unquestionably one of the great instrumentalists of the 20th century. I found myself reading this book and listening to recordings of Ms. du Pre play; an unbeatable combination.

Rating:
Summary: Good bio
Review: Jacqueline du Pré was a child prodigy on the cello. She made her debut at the age of 16, having been held back by her mother and cello teacher. But once she hit the stage - she became an international star. Her playing was so interpretive that she was often criticized for detracting from the music. However, she also influenced many notable classical musicians of our time with her fervent interpretations of the cello repetoire. Her career as a cellist, however, was short-lived as, at the age of 27, she was diagnosed with MS. Her cheerful demeanor and courageous outlook on life is chronicled here, as are most of her performances.

This biography, while some times reading like a discography of Jacqueline du Pré is a very biased toward du Pré's husband's point of view, but much more even-handed about du Pré than Hilary and Jackie. However, Elizabeth Wilson is herself a cellist and student of du Pré and she makes a lot of assumptions that the reader will also have a thorough understanding of certain musical terminology such as up or down bow or glissando. This is an interesting book, but may be terdious to anyone who does not have a thorough grounding in the cello repetoire, classical music or the playing of a stringed instrument.

Rating:
Summary: Good bio
Review: Jacqueline du Pré was a child prodigy on the cello. She made her debut at the age of 16, having been held back by her mother and cello teacher. But once she hit the stage - she became an international star. Her playing was so interpretive that she was often criticized for detracting from the music. However, she also influenced many notable classical musicians of our time with her fervent interpretations of the cello repetoire. Her career as a cellist, however, was short-lived as, at the age of 27, she was diagnosed with MS. Her cheerful demeanor and courageous outlook on life is chronicled here, as are most of her performances.

This biography, while some times reading like a discography of Jacqueline du Pré is a very biased toward du Pré's husband's point of view, but much more even-handed about du Pré than Hilary and Jackie. However, Elizabeth Wilson is herself a cellist and student of du Pré and she makes a lot of assumptions that the reader will also have a thorough understanding of certain musical terminology such as up or down bow or glissando. This is an interesting book, but may be terdious to anyone who does not have a thorough grounding in the cello repetoire, classical music or the playing of a stringed instrument.

Rating:
Summary: A wonderful hagiography!
Review: When looking for a biography of Du Pré, I consciously avoided the ill-reputed memoir by her siblings and opted for this "more balanced" account. However, Wilson clearly has as many stakes in her recounting of Du Pré's life as Hilary and Piers du Pré had, and whatever the merits of this book, objectivity is not among them. I guess people who knew their subject personally rarely make good biographers, and in that respect the involvement of Barenboim in this venture is worrisome. Wilson's over-the-top, sustained exaltation almost becomes the verbal equivalent of du Pré's larger-than-life style of playing. But even a performer of this stature can give only one "best ever" concert, not ten or twenty...
There can be no question about du Pré's extraordinary talent and charisma. Her 1965 Elgar disc still stands firm as one of the absolute must-haves of classical recordings. Why can't Wilson let that be enough, why the need to describe her subject as if she were a creature of all-round unearthly perfection? Du Pré has suffered much from the fact that her precocious talent set her apart from "normal" people; Wilson widens the gulf rather than bridging it, thus posthumously compounding the trauma. The fact of the matter is that du Pré was not only an extraordinary musician, but also an ordinary, flesh and blood, and therefore flawed human being.
In Wilson's rendering, however, du Pré is literally flawless. This is most evident in her reporting on less than perfect concert performances. The blame is immediately diverted from the cellist: the instrument was no good; the conductor was unsympathetic; the orchestra was sloppy... When citing some insightful critical reviews of Du Pré's New York debut, rather than using them to add profile to her image, Wilson again jumps into defensive mode, not afraid to draw the embarrassingly feeble conclusion that these 'nit-picking' critics simply weren't able to open up to du Pré's artistry. She won't hesitate either to then go on and tell us why she, Wilson, thinks it was actually a very good performance - as if her personal opinion is of any particular interest to the reader.
Worse, by letting go of objectivity, Wilson ignores the core dilemma of du Pré's playing: the overbearing presence of her personality in it, often overruling the intentions of the composer and sometimes reducing the music, as one reviewer astutely observed, to a mere "plaything". It explains her lack of interest in composers, backgrounds, or scores of the works she played; it may also explain why she chose to spend the tragically brief decade of her musical maturity playing the same, unadventurous handful of works over and over again, rather than exploring (let alone inspiring) new repertoire. She contented herself with works that were apt vehicles for her style of playing and was quick to drop pieces that did not immediately "fit" her (e.g. Shostakovich's First Cello concerto, or the Britten Cello Symphony). Wilson off-handedly explains Du Pré's narrow choice of repertoire with the extraordinary and nonsensical claim that the literature for solo cello is relatively limited. Why, even the father of her brother in law, Gerald Finzi, wrote a wonderful cello concerto she never played.
Insights into the personality and psychology of the cellist are completely absent. How du Pré's personality worked, and why, remains completely unclear. Her refusal to accept real responsibilities, exemplified by the willy-nilly cancellation of concert appointments, suggests a certain immaturity - but Wilson simply files it under "spontaneity". Baffling contradictions abound. Du Pré needed an audience to be able to play, we're told, yet she played exactly the same whether she was in a recording studio or in concert. She remained simple and unassuming, yet was very picky when it came to selecting orchestra's with which she did and didn't want to play. The marriage to Barenboim was heaven itself, nevertheless all of a sudden they are breaking up and both conducting extramarital affairs, dramatic developments that are mentioned by Wilson out-of-the-blue, and as quickly passed over.
By avoiding going into these thorny questions and glossing over du Pré's image, the book quickly becomes repetitive, even boring. We are told ad nauseam how strongly du Pré communicated through her playing, how rich her musical intuitions were, and how everybody instantly fell in love with her. Endless paeans of praise fill page after page. Claims are made that at times stretch credulity: did Muscovites really burst into tears by the dozens at hearing Du Pré play something as innocuous as Haydn's C major concerto? Was she really able to imagine the orchestral accompaniment of the Delius concerto from the solo voice alone at first acquaintance? Or are we crossing the line between biography and mythology?
The breathless adoration unfortunately also goes at the cost of accuracy. The violinist is called Buswell, not Buzwell; Gerald Finzi died in 1956, not 1959; halfway through the Moscow chapter Natalia Gutman suddenly changes into Natasha; - even musical terms are misspelled: we come across things like "spicatto" and "fermato".
By the time Wilson arrives at the harrowing final illness (dispatched very succinctly, by the way), she has put du Pré at such a distance from the reader and humanity in general that it is almost impossible to feel moved at all at this devastating tragedy. I will now be seeking out "A genius in the family", where hopefully Jackie will reemerge as a human being.


Rating:
Summary: Excellent, balanced biography
Review: Wilson's book about J. DuPre provides a balance to Wilson's and to Hilary DuPre's books. This book is a tribute to her musical genius, her inspiration to female cellists. With the author being both a cellist and a friend of J. DuPre, the depth of the book exceeds what the others pretend to offer. After reading the book, I listened to DuPre's performance of the Schumann and Elgar Concertos and marveled at her talent. The tragedies in her life and her relationship with her family should not overshadow her genius. I am eager now to view the documentaries produced by C. Nupen about this musical treasure whose life was cut short way too early.