Luogo e data di registrazione		-
	Original Editions		Telefunken | 6.35596 FK - Vol.3 | 3 LPs | LC 0366 | durata: 53' 24" · 41' 14" · 49' 53" | (p) 1982 | ANA | stereo | (Nr. 16) Telefunken | 6.35472 FK - Vol.1 | 3 LPs | LC 0366 | durata: 46' 29" · 43' 17" · 46' 12" | (p) 1981 | ANA | stereo | (Nr. 17, 18)
	Edizione CD		Teldec | 8.43334 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | durata: 65' 00" | (c) 1986 | DDD/DMM | stereo
	Executive Producer		-
	Recording Engineer		-
	Cover design		Holger Matthies
	Note		-

THE 32 PIANO SONATAS (10 CDs DMM)		Piano Sonatas Nr. 17 d-moll, Op. 31 Nr. 2 "Der Sturm Beethoven wrote the three sonatas of op. 31 in 1801/02, during a period of upheaval marked by his personal crisis, the first signs of his deafness (”Heiligenstadt Testament," 1802); but it was also a period of artistic upheaval. “I am not very pleased with the works that I have written to date. As from today, I shall embark on a new course” is what, according to Czerny, Beethoven said to the violinist Wenzel Krumpholz (presumably in 1802). This new course manifested itself most clearly in the ”Eroica,” written in 1803, and representing an entirely new symphonic style; but it is also evident in his piano works, such as the Variations op. 35 (1802) and not least in the Sonatas of op. 31, particularly in Nos. 2 and 3, which in many respects appear to continue the experiments in form contained in the two sonatas ”Quasi una Fantasia” of op. 27. Czerny: "Shortly after this event” (the remark quoted above) "three sonatas appeared, in which can be observed the partial realisation of his resolve.” Exceptionally, the Sonata in D minor has only three movements. The middle movement is a broadly conceived Adagio with vast sonorities, fanning out in an almost orchestral fashion, in which various registers answer one another and a sublime, slow melody is embellished by remarkably detailed figurations. The last movement is an Allegretto, clearly developed from the broken chord; its form is a mixture of rondo and sonata. According to an anecdote related by Czerny, Beethoven got his inspiration for the kinetic energy which infuses the movement from watching a horseman who rode past his window one day. But when Schindler questioned the composer about the significance of this sonata and of the ”Appassionata," he is said to have replied, quite casually: “Read Shakespeare’s ’Tempest’!" Piano Sonatas Nr. 18 Es-dur, Op. 31 Nr. 3 The Sonata in E flat has four movements ; the second, however, is a Scherzo in duple time, of a humorous character which in the case of Beethoven means grotesque, full of surprises and constant dynamic and rhythmic changes. The third movement is a brief Minuet, which appears from its grazioso strain to be intended as a substitute for the missing slow movement. But even more than in these deviations in form from the accepted rule, the “new course” can be discerned in what may be described as the developmental character of the form: the manner in which the thematic material not only continues to change, but is presented not as a structure which is complete in itself but as one still in the process of evolution. Thus the first subject of the opening movement of op. 31, No. 2 is only recognised as such when at long last the key and the basic tempo are established in bar 21: after a rudimentary introduction one does not, as one might expect, encounter the subject but rather its continuation and elaboration. The “subject” - it barely accords with the accepted definition of the term - has been more or less concealed in the seemingly improvisatory interplay of the largo broken chords and violinistic scales of the opening. In the recapitulation the “subject” is even more completely obscured by recitativic interpolations, rather as though it were a development section; there is no corresponding D minor passage (as in bar 21), but in its place there appears a passage in the contrasting key of F sharp minor, the opening key of the development, which gives an impression of being entirely new. No less improvisatory is the beginning of the Sonata in E flat, opening with a bird call in the subdominant and thus strictly dissonant, as though it were an answering phrase replying to a question that has not actually been posed. The same device is again employed in the last movement of the same sonata: the first figure is not like a beginning, but is a turn of phrase which is a typical ending. Piano Sonatas Nr. 16 G-dur, Op. 31 Nr. 1 The G-major sonata op. 31/1 - probably the second sonata composed by Beethoven - is remarkable in its first movement above all for the rhythmic trick of “anticipation”, whereby the right hand literally comes in a semiquaver earlier than the left, thus artificially producing an upward beat. This device is expounded so protractedly in the opening bars that the “normal” chords in bars 10/11, played simultaneously by both hands, somehow seem wrong! Beethoven plays nothing short of excessively with this rhythmic idea in the development and in the expansive coda. (Sketches show that this device was obviously the central idea for the movement, which Czerny accurately described as ”energetic, humorous and wittily lively”.) The finale also has a similarly long coda, with witty distortions of the subject and sharply contrasting adagio insertions. (Czerny: “very humorous, somewhat Baroque in character”.) In the first movement, the first subject contrasts with the second rhythmically as well as harmonically: rhythmically, in that it proceeds as smoothly as possible, with steady quaver basses, almost in the manner of a simple contredanse melody, harinonically, one is surprised by a third-related B-major, which returns in the epilogue in an utterly Schuhertian interplay with B-minor. While the first movement consists to a large extent of ”exploitation” of a rhythmic device, the second, with the unusual tempo marking adagio grazioso, gives the impression of being a variation on types of attack and phrasing (legato, non legato, portamento and above all staccato), which affects all the main parts of the movement, and, together with the trills and nimble figurations, lends it rather the character of a gracefully performed serenade. The last bars of the movement, however, deviate unexpectedly from the serenade mood, with their intimate sound.
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