Luogo e data di registrazione		-
	Original Editions		Telefunken | 6.35596 FK - Vol.4 | 3 LPs | LC 0366 | durata: 55' 39" · 42' 47" · 65' 59" | (p) 1982 | ANA | stereo Teldec | 6.42761 AZ | 1 LP | LC 0366 | durata 66' 00" | (p) & (c) 1984 | DDD/DMM | stereo
	Edizione CD		Teldec | 8.42761 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1984 | DDD/DMM | stereo
	Executive Producer		-
	Recording Engineer		-
	Cover design		Holger Matthies
	Note		-

THE 32 PIANO SONATAS (10 CDs DMM)		Piano Sonata Nr. 28 A-dur, Op. 101 With this sonata, completed in 1816, Beethoven's creative work began to flow again after several years of sluggish production, not unconnected with the political confusion of the period. One of the most striking innovations of his late period style, which is generally acknowledged as beginning with op. 101, is an emphatic move towards contrapuntal writing, towards fugues, particularly in his final movements (piano sonatas opp. 101, 106, 110, cello sonata op. 102, No. 2). In op. 101 the finale, as in so many others of his late  works the most weighty movement, completely envelops the sonata form in contrapuntal notions: in the exposition all thematic figurations are presented fugato, the development and later, by analogy, the coda begin with a genuine four-part fugue on the main subject in the tonic minor. An adagio, highly expressive in spite of being a mere twenty bars, is headed ”langsam und sehnsuchtsvoll”, i.e. ”slow and yearning”; (in op. 101 Beethoven continued the practice started with op. 90 of using German headings, although he added Italian markings.) It is somewhat reminiscent of the ”Introduzione” in the Waldstein sonata, which also ushers in the tremendous final movement. In between, before the ”attacca” of the Finale, there is a brief quotation from the first movement, a device intended to emphasise the cyclical unity of the whole concept, which is later encountered on several occasions, notably in the Ninth Symphony. The first movement is lyrical and sensitive throughout, really more in the style of a central slow movement; here the differentiation of form and theme which is inherent in the sonata movement proper has all but disappeared. (The particular rhythm of the movement, tied quavers on the weak beat resulting in syncopation, is later frequently to be found in the works of Schumann and Brahms.) Beethoven described this sonata as very difficult to perform; he dedicated it to one of the most accomplished pianists in Vienna, the Baroness Ertmann (“Receive what I have often intended for you and which, I hope, will prove my devotion both to you and to your artistic talent.”) Both Reichardt and Mendelssohn considered her interpretation of his works to be perfection itself, and Anton Schindler, Beethoven’s confident and subsequently his biographer, praised her in the following terms: “Her achievements were simply unique. She sensed intuitively even the most arcane intentions in Beethoven’s works with such certainty as though they were written out and in front of her very eyes.” Piano Sonata Nr. 29 B-dur, Op. 106 "Große Sonate für das Hammerklavier" This sonata, written in 1818, is practically the only major work of that year and the longest and most difficult of all Beethoven's piano sonatas; it almost strikes one as a gateway leading to the tremendous edifice of the ”Missa Solemnis”, which he started immediately afterwards. (The epithet "Hammerklavier” Sonata, derived from the original title “Grand Sonata for the Hammerklavier” has no significance other than that in place of the customary term ”pianoforte” he used the equivalent German name, as he did for example in op. 101.) The publication of the sonata in 1819 was greeted with comments such as these: ”Thus we can observe, after only a few lines, that this work does not just differ from the master's other creations in its abundant and vast imagination but that, by virtue of the artistic perfection of its unified writing” (this refers to the counterpoint of the fugue in the last movement) “it appears to mark a new period in Beethoven's piano works.” This is his last sonata in the grand, four-movement structure, though the largo which introduces the finale almost achieves the status of an independent movement, thereby creating a roughly symmetrical structure of five movements. The longest movement, the adagio, lies at the core, with two shorter movements (scherzo and largo) separating it from the huge outer movements. As in the “Waldstein” and “Appassionata”, the first movement is of truly symphonic proportions, abounding with changing harmonies, furious contrasts, extraordinary tonal effects, exploiting the extreme registers of the piano and demanding a degree of virtuosity that is not merely an end in itself. By contrast there follows a fleeting yet somehow constrained scherzo and a strange trio with colourless broken triads leading to a wild cadence, marked presto; after the repeat of the scherzo there is a coda with an oppressive conflict between the last note, the tonic B flat, and the “wrong” B natural. The adagio, marked “appassionato e con molto sentimento”, with its very free formal structure and its tremendous dimensions (Beethoven’s longest sonata movement along with the “Arietta” of op. 111) is one vast “espressivo” of movingly intoned sounds of grief and isolation with its climax in B minor, the key which Beethoven in 1816 described on a sketch as the “black key”. — The largo, a completely free fantasia written in part without bar lines, is followed by the crowning edifice of a “fuga con alcune licenze” (a fugue with some degree of freedom) taking up 400 bars, a worthy counterpart to the “Grosse Fuge” op. 133, originally planned as the last movement of the string quartet op. 130. Its counterpoint is executed with every form of sophistication, yet the overall concept is one of tremendous freedom; the part-writing is complex, the rhythm and metre extraordinarily difficult; one way and another the whole “Hammerklavier” sonata was virtually beyond the capacity of performers of the time. To his publisher Beethoven wrote: “There’s a sonata for you that will give pianists trouble, and will only be played in fifty years’ time.” In the event it did not take quite as long as that: it was probably Franz Liszt who first managed to play the “Hammerklavier” sonata at a public concert in Paris in 1836. Hector Berlioz was full of enthusiasm: “The ideal performance of a work reputed to be unperformable; by rendering a work which had until then not been understood, Liszt has proved that he is the pianist of the future.”
1 CD - 8.42761 ZK - (c) 1984 1 CD - 8.43027 ZK - (c) 1984 1 CD - 8.43206 ZK - (p) 1985 1 CD - 8.43415 ZK - (p) 1986 1 CD - 8.43477 ZK - (p) 1987	1 CD - 8.42913 ZK - (c) 1983 1 CD - 8.43111 ZK - (p) 1985 1 CD - 8.43334 ZK - (p) 1986 1 CD - 8.43476 ZK - (p) 1987 1 CD - 8.43478 ZK - (p) 1987