Paul Jacobs

Among American pianists Paul Jacobs ranked among the most outstanding for sheer brilliance. An intellectual orientation toward music never diminished the emotional depth or sincerity of his readings, which stood out equally for their precision of execution and their lucid projection of structural outlines. Debussy’s output remained the repertory most closely identified with his transparent interpretive manner.

Raised in the Bronx, Jacobs had already attained considerable command of the keyboard by age ten. He devoured scores voraciously, borrowing armloads of piano music from every branch of the New York Public Library system and playing through them at once. Formal training began at the Third Street Music School Settlement and continued at the Juilliard School under Ernest Hutchenson. While still in his teens he presented important New York recitals and took part in leading contemporary-music groups, among them the Composers’ Forum.

In 1951 he relocated to Europe, where he stayed for nine years. He quickly became a central participant in the serialist avant-garde, appearing at the Darmstadt summer courses and performing regularly with Pierre Boulez’s Domaine Musical. He gave the first complete traversal of Arnold Schoenberg’s solo piano works, committing them to disc for the Véga label.

His programs centered on the newest compositions, yet he also performed Baroque repertory on the harpsichord, an instrument whose sound had captivated him while preparing Elliott Carter’s Double Concerto for harpsichord and piano with two orchestras. Premieres formed a regular part of his activity; the list includes scores by Stockhausen, Boulez, Berio, Henze, Messiaen, Sessions, Carter, and numerous others. Late Beethoven and Schubert sonatas likewise benefited from the same combination of clarity and expressive force he brought to contemporary works. In New York he collaborated with the leading ensembles devoted to new music, including Gunther Schuller’s Contemporary Innovations series, the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble, and the Fromm Fellowship Players.

Leonard Bernstein named him official pianist of the New York Philharmonic in 1962 and added the title of official harpsichordist in 1974; Jacobs held both posts until his death. Teaching occupied him no less steadily. Although he returned often to Tanglewood, the Mannes School, and the Manhattan School of Music, his primary institutional home was Brooklyn College of the City University of New York, where he began teaching in 1968 and remained until his death. Contemporaries remembered him as tireless, forever arranging concerts and lecture series. He preferred to remain in New York rather than pursue the itinerant existence of a touring virtuoso.

Fifteen LPs issued on the Nonesuch label stood among his most valued recordings; they encompassed music by Schoenberg, Debussy, Stravinsky, Carter, Messiaen, Ravel, Thompson, Bartók, Mozart, and Beethoven, with special emphasis on the original piano works of Ferruccio Busoni taped between 1976 and 1979. Although Nonesuch later reissued some of these performances on compact disc, rights to the acclaimed Busoni cycle passed elsewhere and stayed unavailable for nearly twenty years until Arbiter released them in 2000 together with additional, previously scarce recordings. Jacobs died in 1983.