- Position‹4 of 7›
- Jacqueline du Pre is the greatest cellist
- Argument
Jacqueline du Pre is master of the Elgar Cello Concerto
Her interpretation and performance of the Elgar Cello concerto electrified listeners and defines the piece for other cellists.
The argument
Jacqueline du Pre had a playing style that used body language in conjunction with music to convey the intricacies of any piece. As Daniel Barenboim said, "she was carefree without being careless." Du Pre exuded an energy that engaged the audience and took music to the next level. Her style of playing was unique and gave the music a completely different feel. When it comes to the Elgar Cello Concerto, du Pre is the best to ever perform it. Her style fits the piece perfectly. Her movements embody its intense tone and draw the audience into the piece. Du pre is not just a master cellist, she is a master of art--she conveys emotion through her craft like no other. For this reason, du Pre is the best cellist of all time.
Premises
Counter-arguments
There is absolutely no doubt that du Pre was a phenomenal cellist. However, her career lasted less than a decade. Due to this tragedy, it is incredibly hard to compare her career with that of other cellists. We cannot make any definitive claims as to her greatness, because we will never know what her career would have been. Therefore, we cannot dub her the greatest cellist of all time.
Rejecting the premises
[Rejecting P1] A remark by a close collaborator is testimony rather than argument, and body language is a fact about how a performance looked. The premise gives no account of the playing itself — phrasing, tone, rhythm, the shaping of structure — which is where a case of this kind would have to be made. [Rejecting P2] "A feel no other cellist matched" is asserted and unfalsifiable as stated. Response to a performance varies between listeners and between eras, and no comparison is offered with the recordings the claim is implicitly ranked against, from Casals and Fournier to Rostropovich and Starker. [Rejecting P3] The final step does not reach the conclusion. Mastery of one concerto — however commanding, and that recording is widely regarded as a landmark — is a claim about a single work, while "greatest cellist of all time" ranges over repertoire, chamber playing, teaching and sustained achievement. The counter adds the difficulty the argument cannot resolve: a career ended by illness before she was thirty leaves most of that comparison permanently unavailable.