Presentation of the Discography

Kenneth Gilbert is one of the most important Canadian musicians of his generation. Recognized internationally, he is known as a concert artist (harpsichord and organ), musicologist, pedagogue, editor and historical keyboard collector. Among many teaching appointments, he was for a few years associated with the McGill University Music Faculty. Kenneth Gilbert played a key role in the mid- to late 20th Century early keyboard music revival. His recordings, which span from 1962 to 1993, are important testimonies of his musical ideas and direct illustrations of his contributions to the early and baroque music revival. The Kenneth Gilbert Discography, presented here in a database form, complements the book chapter entitled “Kenneth Gilbert’s recording legacy” that I published in Perspectives on Early Keyboard Music and Revival in the Twentieth Century (London and New York, Routledge, 2018, 230-269) edited by Rachelle Taylor and Hank Knox. In that contribution, I give an overview of his recording career and provide a list of his original recordings which are presented chronologically and in a short form version. This site complements this work in giving access to a comprehensive database of all Kenneth Gilbert’s original recordings and their hundreds of known reissues. We can find him as soloist, chamber musician and accompanist.

Methodology

• The database includes two key record types:
  • Original recordings
  • Reissues

• A database record describes one unique sound recording (original or reissue) using the following fields:
  • Title
  • Recording Type
  • No. in Published Version (only for original recordings)
  • Record Label
  • Place of Publication
  • Publisher Number
  • Media Type
  • Reproduction Ratio
  • Track Type
  • Size
  • Date of Issue
  • Collection Title
  • Collection Number
  • Recording Date (s)
  • Recording Location (s)
  • Sound Engineer (s)
  • Instrument (s)
  • Composer (s)
  • Performer (s)
  • Recorded Repertoire
  • Accompanying Documentation
  • Notes / Reissue (s)
  • Availability
  • Streaming Source

• Different types of searches can be performed:
  • In free text search on all the database fields
  • A link can be used to obtain a detailed list of all original recordings as published chronologically in the chapter quoted previously
  • Search by the specific entry number in the published version of the discography

• Search results are listed chronologically in the following order:
  • Original recordings (which also provide a list of specific reissues in short form)
  • Reissues (which also refer to their original recordings)

The description of the different sound recordings derives from the information available on the record sleeves or CD covers as well from the accompanying documentation. Therefore, some of the information is presented in the original language of the documents. However, for now the rest of the information provided in the database is only available in French.

Comments and questions

Antonio Lechasseur
Historian and Archivist