Whether you're a musician, a newbie, a composer or a listener, welcome. Please turn off your phone, and applaud between posts, not individual comments.
I currently have Wilhelm Kempff's versions, but the recordings are old and lacking a little in sound quality, although he does play them very close to perfection. I'm looking for the best of both worlds: both great playing and sound quality. Anyone got suggestions?
Sort by:
Best
Open comment sort options
Best
Top
New
Controversial
Old
Q&A
It's general consensus that there's no one cycle that is completely and undeniably better than others. With such a range of sonatas, it's easy to see how one performer will excel in some and be lacking in others.
That said, cycles that are generally well regarded and I enjoy:
Annie Fischer - very intense, very ferocious playing. Great in Beethoven's more tempestuous sonatas.
Alfred Brendel - much less lyrical and emotional, but superbly played. "Cool" is a term often describing Brendel's playing; very intellectual and matter of fact, offers a good contrast to Kempff's lyrical/flowing playing.
Emil Gilels - broad, expansive, in full romantic style. Sweeping in its grandeur and scope. A great set, but a huge pity that it was left incomplete at the time of his death, and is missing Op 109 - 111 (30, 31, 32).
Those three, along with Kempff's, are my favorite Beethoven sonata cycles. The sound quality is pretty good in all three of these. There are of course many other amazing cycles out there, along with individual performances =]
Personally, I prefer my Beethoven to be a little dark, and little intense, and a little emotional. There are also more "mellow" cycles, "lighter" cycles, and "warmer" cycles out there if that's your cup of tea. Barenboim (any) is warm and romantic; Backhaus (mono) is "lighter," and Ashkenazy is also light and straightforward, though a tad boring in my opinion.
Caveats: music is subjective, so your mileage may vary. In addition, it's hard to give good descriptions of music, so if you disagree with my terminology and descriptions, apologies :3
I find that Brendel excels on the lesser-known Sonatas (love his Pastoral, as well as the one following it, No.16).
I've only listened to a few Backhaus recordings of Beethoven sonatas, all of those were from the 1959 recording.
I found it quite the opposite of light. Backhaus was 75 at the time and he seemed to have maintained perfect mastery of his astonishing technique. And because he always played Bösendorfer, his sound is a tad darker and "juicier" than most of his colleagues who preferred Steinway. His Appassionata demonstrates this well.
I have however only listened to three or so of the sonatas played by him. Based on that alone and the other things I know of him I am quite tempted to get the complete 1959 recording. I can't imagine it would disappoint.
What do people think of Arrau's recordings?
these are the ones i have, and i would recommend them, though it's true that this is the only cycle that i know very well. sometimes i feel he gets a bit too romantic, but he still gives very convincing interpretations. i would definitely check them out. and the recording quality is excellent.
My teacher says he thought Beethoven pretty monotonous until he heard Arrau, who cut right through to the heart of his sonatas. I don't agree, but I do find them to be quite great. There are only a few I don't care for, and I think that may just be preference or prior imprinting.
I gave up on cycles. I had Barenboim's and I disliked it so much that I gave it away. I also had Brendel's on vox and that one was kind of cold and curious.
It's really not fair to expect one performer to be inspired by and to perform all of them adequately. If there's only one who came even close it's Gilels who is more consistently satisfying than any other set but his set omits a few.
Generally, for a given sonata, there are a few outstanding performances but there is nobody who does all of them to perfection or at least my idea of it. I like Pollini's late Beethoven, anything by Sokolov, usually like Richter and Michelangeli, but usually you don't find pianists of this caliber doing the entire set.
Adding sound quality to the criteria throws a big monkey wrench in things. It's hard enough to find the better performances. I generally find my piano recordings to be desiring something in sound quality with few exceptions. You might try late 80s or more recent. You might really like Jenő Jandó's set on Naxos. My understanding is that Jandó' will record anything if you buy him a beer but he's actually quite good!
I can't say I agree with all of these, or any of them for that matter, but it's a place to start your search. http://www.classical.net/music/comp.lst/articles/beethoven/psonatas.php
There's the complete recording of the 32 sonatas by Friedrich Gulda. Note that those were recorded in 1968 so those are not exactly contemporary but recording-wise still considerably better than anything I've heard from Kempff. Here's the last movement of the Appassionata from this series as a sample.
Gulda of course sounds very different from Kempff. He is most certainly going to play each sonata considerably faster than Kempff but unlike others who've played them fast, he never had to sacrifice Beethoven's markings and a piano never degraded into a forte.
I'd say the two complete recordings with the most cohesion and consistency were those by Gulda and Schnabel but Schnabel predates Kempff and the sound quality no longer holds up so that leaves Gulda.
Has there been an HIP movement for the sonatas? I once listened to the piano concertos played on a Beethoven-era piano and I don't need to hear any more of that, but does anybody incorporate some sort of HIP-style while playing on a modern piano?
Here is a performance as Beethoven would have heard it.
Why don't you want to hear more? I have his last sonatas (30-32) played by Penelope Crawford on a period pianoforte. It's awesome. She does so much with the pieces - and things that were actually written like change to 1 string, which you can't do on a modern piano really. Soft pedal is a lot. I can't listen to them any other way now. It's also on my professor's music label, so I do have a bias. I have to say that.
Well I'll give those a try--I see they're on the Naxos library.
I'm going to have to get this from you.
You got it Chas. They are awesome. I'll bring my laptop over the next time we brew.
The classic choice is Schnabel. I've never heard anybody get as much musicality out of the late sonatas as Schnabel. The sound quality, while not modern, is still fairly good considering the age (look for a good remastering, such as Naxos).
What about András Schiff? Has he recorded all of them? I'm currently working my way through his lectures on all 32 sonatas and his insights and understanding are impressive.