Peter Ostwald, an American violinist and psychiatrist who died of cancer shortly after completing this book, had an off-again-on-again friendship with Glenn Gould that lasted a quarter of a century after the two met on-stage in California. Ostwald’s portrait of Gould is concerned with the private artist, not the public persona, and, as a psychiatrist, he has some interesting things to say about the great pianist and the “divergent aspects of personality” he often exhibited.

Gould, a super-hypochondriac, suffered from massive anxiety, acute stress, hypertension, constriction of the throat, cramping sensations, and various psychosomatic fears. Ostwald finds it tragic that Gould “couldn’t simply admit himself to be emotionally ill and seek help from an appropriate professional,” a surprising view for a fellow musician. He does not explore the idea that the particular neuroses of an artist often serve as a wellspring for his or her creativity. The artist doesn’t wish to “understand” the mystery; he or she simply wants to eternally draw from it.

Ostwald is best when writing of the private Gould, whether it concerns the pianist’s religious tendencies (Sufi) or his sexuality. Gould’s close friends reveal that, far from being asexual, he had several lovers over the years. But why is it still necessary – 15 years after the pianist’s death – to refer to Gould’s most significant relationship as being “with the wife of a well-known pianist, composer, and conductor from the United States,” when it is commonly known (as Ostwald states) that she moved to Toronto with her children for a time? Gould coached her son in mathematics, and attempted domesticity. But according to Ostwald, his highly narcissistic personality made the relationship impossible.

Ostwald also explores the reasons for Gould’s artistic idiosyncrasies. Gould’s shyness and legendary fear of confrontation were because he believed that anger killed incentive and dulled one’s sensitivity. The breakdown of control the pianist experienced in his hands in his last few years – a lack of co-ordination frequently referred to in his private diaries – was one of the reasons he engaged in so much facial movement while playing. According to Ostwald, he felt it gave him better motor skills.

Ostwald writes with feeling of Gould’s last years: the severing of old friendships, the death of his beloved mother, the pianist’s immersion “in doing things so far removed from musical performance.” Long suspected to have suffered from a variant of autism, the child who hummed before he cried was, in the end, tragically disturbed, consuming a wide variety of habit-forming drugs for years before his fatal stroke at age 50.

What we are left with is the genius of a technical wizard whose interpretations were often revelatory. As Ostwald’s book makes clear, it is more than enough. Glenn Gould’s great talent led him to the ecstasy of his art – and to his own tragic end.