Luogo e data di registrazione		-
	Original Editions		Telefunken | 6.35581 FK | 3 LPs | LC 0366 | durata: 53' 24" · 41' 14" · 49' 53" | (p) 1981 | ANA | stereo
	Edizione CD		Teldec | 9031-71719-2 | 8 CDs | LC 3706 | (c) 1990 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonaten Nr. 1-32 Teldec | 8.43206 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1985 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonaten Nr. 4, 26 Teldec | 8.43476 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1987 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonate Nr. 5, 6 Teldec | 8.43111 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1985 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonate Nr. 11, 27 Teldec | 8.43334 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1986 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonate Nr. 16 Teldec | 8.43027 ZK | 1 CD | LC 3706 | (c) 1984 | DDD/DMM | stereo | Klaviersonate Nr. 31
	Executive Producer		-
	Recording Engineer		-
	Cover		Ludwig van Beethoven, Gemälde von J. W. Mähler, 1815
	Note		-

BUCHBINDER BEETHOVEN 32 KLAVIERSONATEN 3 LPs - 6.35472 FK - (p) 1980 2 LPs - 6.35490 FK - (p) 1981 3 LPs - 6,35581 FK - (p) 1982 3 LPs - 6.35596 FK - (p) 1982

RE-RELEASE ON COMPACT DISC (DMM) 1 CD - 8.43206 ZK - (c) 1985 (Nr.4,26) 1 CD - 8.43476 ZK - (c) 1987 (Nr.5,6) 1 CD - 8.43111 ZK - (c) 1985 (Nr.11,27) 1 CD - 8.43334 ZK - (c) 1986 (Nr.16) 1 CD - 8.43027 ZK - (c) 1984 (Nr.31)

Piano Sonatas Nr. 4 Es-dur, Op. 7 The E-flat major sonata was composed in 1796/97, shortly after Beethoven’s first three “essays” in the medium, op. 1, and is among the least often played sonatas, although it is, after the Hammerklavier sonata, the longest. Op. 7 was given the nickname - subsequently forgotten - “Die Verliebte” (In Love), perhaps because of Beethoven’s supposed reverence for the dedicatee, Countess Keglevics (one of his noble pupils), or perhaps on account of the “gran espressivo” of the slow movement. In any case, this largo, which opens with such simple “question-and-answer” phrasing, has such a wide scale of expression, that it quite surpasses the largo appassionato of op. 1/2, though the latter is quite comparable in terms of the type of movement. The dynamic contrasts are blunt yet refined, the rhythmic and articulatory differcntiations are subtly calculated against considerable harmonic breadth. (However, the extravagances of key in the largo produce a link with the first movement - a connection between two sonata movements, in other words, which has nothing to do with thematic relationships.) The first subject of the first movement is one of those Beethovenian themes which play on the listener’s uncertainty as to where “the subject” actually begins - with the four-bar block of the E-flat minor chord, or with the figuration that follows? (A similar dilemma occurs in the Eroica and the sonata op. 22.) Right up to the end of this lively, virtuoso movement, which reintroduces the opening bars, this time piled up on one another in inverse order, these contrasting elements (which also appear in new combinations) and the simultaneous close linking of the different subjects result in a dialectic interplay loaded with tension. The third movement is, formally speaking, a schcrzo, but does not appear to be one - nor is it described thus. With the melody hidden in its stormy middle section, the movement recalls Schubertian characteristics from a distance. Piano Sonata Nr. 5 c-moll, Op. 10 Nr. 1 Almost exactly contemporary with the op. 7 sonata and the three string trios op. 9, the three sonatas of op. 10 appeared in 1798. They are dedicated to the wife of Count Browne, whom Beethoven lauds in the grandiloquent dedication of his op. 9 as ”a gentleman of fine feelings and boundless generosity”, as ”the first Maecenas of my music”. (The Count had, among other presents, given Beethoven a horse, Beethoven - the anecdote was passed on by his pupil Ferdinand Ries - ”rode the animal a few times, but soon forgot about it”.) The order of the three sonatas distinctly recalls the op. 2 trios: in op. 10, too, the first work is an energetic, intense piece in the minor, the second a cheerful, decorative work in the major, here, too, the first two sonatas are fairly light-weight, as if preludes to the last and most important sonata. Indeed, the parallels can be taken further: while op. 2/1 opens with an universal motif (the so-called ”Mannheim rocket”), the first movement of op. 10/1 recalls an earlier composition, Mozart’s sonata KV 457, which is also in C-minor. The similarity is so striking that it can hardly be coincidence, and even holds for details like the suprise effect of the use of the major variant of the main subject for the exposition. Yet Beethoven’s sonata movement possesses a previously unheard bizarre furore, an outbreak shaken by rash impulses which makes contemporary critics’ ill-concealed resentment of such ”wild thoughts” quite understandable, if one takes the tempo indication allegro con brio at face value. It is hard to imagine that this sonata could be so degraded and disembowelled that near beginners are expected to stumble through it! After the calm cantabile of the A-flat major middle movement - into which only an occasional reminiscence of the first movement seems to infiltrate (in the unexpected forte cascades) - the finale resumes the furious character of the opening movement. Here once again is an extreme tempo, and abrupt dynamic and thematic contrast,- all the richness of a sonata movement is compressed into the most meagre dimensions - the development, closing with a hammering 4/8 motif that anticipates the Fifth Symphony and the Appassionata, numbers only eleven bars. The sonata finally expires in an unreal major passage, piano on the lowest bass notes. Piano Sonata Nr. 6 F-dur, Op. 10 Nr. 2 Something of the ”fantastic humour” that Carl Czerny (in his notes to the Beethoven sonatas) found in Beethoven's work appears in the finale of op. 10/2: It is a movement which begins like a three-part fugue, then switches immediately to the character of a scherzo in even time; nevertheless, a second subject is introduced, in the manner of a sonata movement, which in fact only comprises a variant of the fugal subject - a wanton, genial game of perpetuum mobile with various musical characteristics. If the scherzo model is, as it were, incorporated into the finale, then the allegretto of the middle movement, albeit written in the 3/4 time of a scherzo, really represents the missing slow movement in its contemplative D-flat major central section: the harmonies are already quite Schubertian. (Op. 10 nos. 1 & 2 are both three-movement works: the slow movement is ”missing” from the first sonata, while the second sonata lacks the scherzo. These are but two instances of Beethoven's individual reorganization of the conventions of external form; in his piano sonatas there is no “normal” order of movements, in contrast to those of Mozart with their regular three-movement plan.) Elements of mischievous good humour are also to be found in the first movement of op. 10/2: almost the entire development is based on the simplest possible motif from the three notes of the last bar of the exposition, which span an octave. If, however, one starts to analyse, it turns out that the same three notes also correspond to the beginning of the second subject, which is, in turn, clearly derived from a phrase in the first subject. Again, in the "false reprise” (D-major instead of F-major), the characteristic second triplet phrase is also "falsely" written - one note too high - and the “wrong” key is framed by too many - and thus metrically “wrong” - pauses that the listener cannot help but notice. Great artistry appears herr - in contrast to the fury of op. 10/1 - with smiling nimbleness. Piano Sonatas Nr. 11 B-dur, Op. 22 With the sonata op. 22, composed 1799/1800, and with the First Symphony, which appeared in 1802 and was dedicated to Count Browne, Beethoven returned to the great four-movement cycle, the “normal” form, which had in the meantime established itself for the symphony and the string quartet, but which Beethoven only used now and again for his piano sonatas. “This sonata is a real humdingerl”, he wrote to his Leipzig publisher Hoffmeister, and by this he meant the virtuoso demands of the first and last movements. The character of the first movement is determined by triumphant élan, unbroken kinetic joy which lets the different subjects proceed almost on their own in ever new variants og the initial triadic arpeggio. Some of the figures, taken on their own, could very well have been borrowed from an organ work by Bach, with their marked characterization and their tendency to polyphonic constructions. The menuetto is also market by a middly anachronistic intrusion, with an almost archaic sound which only in the minor central section turns without warning into a scherzo. The expansive adagio, on the other hand, is, in the strongest possible contrast to the dazzling virtuosity of the first movement, one of those slow movements of Beethoven's that convey a whole world of musical sensations in an overflowing wealth of timbres, of harmonic nuances, variations and decorations - one seems to hear a "piano orchestra", 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, harmonically, 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. Piano Sonatas Nr. 26 Es-dur, Op. 81a "Les adieux" The sonata was composed in 1809/10, directly after the sonatas op. 78 and 79, and at the same time as the string quartet op. 74, the Piano Concerto no. 5 and the Egmont music. It is Beethoven’s only sonata which - in contrast to the many sonatas to which a particular content or context is attributed, or which have been given titles felt to be appropriate, like the Moonlight or the Appassionata - has a “real” programme. And it is this very sonata which we fail to call by its correct name! The publisher Breitkopf brought out two different editions of the sonata - one with the original German title, and another on his own initiative with the title in internationally fashionable French. The latter came in for harsh criticism from Beethoven: “Why on earth change the title? ”Lebewohl” (farewell) is nothing like ”Les Adieux” - the former is an intimate goodbye between two friends, while the latter would be used with a group of people.” The correct title is ”Lebewohl, Abwesenheit und Wiedersehn. (Farewell, Absence and Reunion.) Sonata for Pianoforte dedicated to his Imperial Highness Rudolph of Austria.” Archduke Rudolph, the son of Emperor Leopold II, later Archbishop of Olmütz (Beethoven belatedly composed the Missa Solemnis for his enthronement as Archbishop) had been Beethoven’s pupil, patron and friend since 1804, and the composer dedicated a number of his most important works to him in gratitude. In May 1809 the Imperial family, including the Archduke, fled from Vienna before the approaching Napoleonic troops, and did not return until January 1810. This, then, was the inspiration for the sonata op. 81a, as is stated quite unambiguously in the manuscript: “The Farewell/Vienna, 4th May 1809/ at the departure of His Honourable and Imperial Highness the Archduke Rudolph.” The adagio introduction to the first movement (the Farewell) begins with a descending three-note motif, beneath which the composer inscribed “Le-be wohl” in the manuscript. This motif also dominates the extended coda, similar to a long drawn-out farewell, and is the springingpoint for the descending scales from which all the subjects of the allegro section are formed. The second movement (Absence), which takes up where the adagio introduction of the first movement left off, is a musical image of a long, painful parting, while the third movement (Reunion) conjures up touching happiness. Piano Sonatas Nr. 27 e-moll, Op. 90 The op. 90 sonata of 1814, the next one to be written after op. 81a, belongs to these years of violent political turmoil in which - and this surely had something to do whith the disturbances - Beethoven’s creative powers deteriorated somewhat. In any case, the composer had hardly written any large-scale works since 1810, apart from the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies and the final version of Fidelio (1814), though not a few occasional pieces of a patriotic nature had appeared. "All lovers and connoisseurs of music", the Wiener Zeitung reported with relief in 1815 "will more than welcome the appearance of this sonata, since nothing for pianoforte has flowed from Mr. Beethoven's pen for several years." Count Moritz Lichnowsky, to whom Beethoven dedicated the sonata in gratitude for his mediation in a matter of fees, was on a friendly footing with Beethoven; likewise his brother Carl (died 1814), who was one of Beethoven's most important patrons. In both movements of this short sonata it is striking that an as yet unknown importance is given to the cantabile: quite simply, it is the basic posture of both movements, rather than being confined to particular thematic areas as it used to be. (Only in the development of the first movement does a more energetic manner come through.) The second movement in particular, a rondo with echoes of sonata form, is eminently "singable" (as Beethoven specified in his performing directions, written, unusually, in German) - the music flows softly and uniformly in Schubertian fashion. Czerny commented specifically on this novel “bel cantabile”, which also plays a most central rôle in the following sonatas, op. 101,109 and 110. Piano Sonatas Nr. 31 As-dur, Op. 110 The three sonatas op. 109, 110 and 111, written down "at a stroke" as Beethoven said, were the only large works that the composer had the strenght for alongside his lenghtly struggle with the Missa Solemnis (1819-23). (Beethoven described the sonatas as "bread-and-butter work" which he need for his "subsistence".) In op. 110, composed 1821/22, the first movement falls in with the free fantasy-like form of the first movement of op. 109 in that it resembles a free variation on a single theme rather than the classical sonata model. (The second sonata theme is there, formally speaking, but it remains an episode of just a few bars; the first two bars of the main theme undergo varying harmonic illumination in the scanty development section; in the reprise, which follows without a break, characteristic rhythmic accompaniment figures are variously interchanged vis à vis the exposition.) The character of the movement is determined here, as in op. 90, by the prevailing cantabile - "con amabilità" (tenderly), Beethoven elucidates at the beginning of the movement. The final movement - which is preceded by a scherzo middle movement in even tempo - carries great weight in this sonata. Like the third movement of the string quartet op. 132, which is similarly constructed, the finale of op. 110 follows a quasi-psychological course: introduction with a highly expressive recitative ("arioso dolente - plaintive song"); the first part of a fugue, breaking off at an arpeggio; variation of the arioso ("weary, plaintive"), a half-tone lower than before, ending in a faltering of the music; "gradually coming back to life", the second part of the fugue, beginning with the inversion of the theme, then combining this inversion with the form of a conclusion in ever greater movement until the end of the sonata. One cannot rule out a connection between this music and the composer’s serious illness of 1821. In Novembre of that year he wrote to a friend: "I feel somewhat better now, thank God - at last, good health seems to be flowing back into me, to be reviving me so that I can dedicate myself to my art as has not been the case for two years. This because of ill health and so many other human afflictions...". Jean Meuchtelbach (Translation: Clive R. Williams)