The modern musical world offers its pleasures, strengths, and unique advantages. However, we've lost a valuable species of musician, once common in the 19th and early 20th centuries: the composer-pianist.
By this I don't mean composers who just play the piano. They all do. They have no choice; any conservatory of any worth will require massive doses of piano-playing as part of any composer's core training.
What I mean here is the composer who is also a piano virtuoso, a composer who makes a living playing concerts and/or recording as much as writing music.
There was a time when such figures were common — Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, (Anton) Rubinstein, Moscheles, Hummel, and in the 20th century, Bartók, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev, among others. But nowadays? Frederick Rzewski carries on the torch, but he's hardly a kitchen-table celebrity as was, say, Rachmaninoff.
What we are missing in particular are composers who are writing music for themselves to perform. Composers writing for themselves could explore freely, secure in the absolute and complete knowledge of their own abilities, strengths, and weaknesses. As a result, composer-pianist works are among the strongest in the repertory, the piano works which best illuminate both the composer's mind and explore the instrument in uniquely compelling ways.
Beethoven stands tall even in such elevated company. His piano technique was unusual for its day — he was an Anton Rubinstein type who emphasized color and drama over strict accuracy. His chops were a bit much for many of the lightly constructed instruments of the time, leaving a trail of broken pianos behind wherever he went.
Eventually he settled on a fine English Broadwood instrument (pictured right) that could withstand his various assaults — not only playing-wise, but also his clumsiness (he was forever knocking his inkwell into the piano), or his occasional habit of eating a late supper at the piano.
The solo piano sonatas make up Beethoven's testament to generations of pianists. If Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier makes up the Old Testament, then the Beethoven 32 are the New. (By the way, five more sonatas aren't included in the "32", being either very early or incomplete.)
Beginning one's first Beethoven sonata represents a kind of Coming of Age ritual for every young pianist. Maybe we are allowed some little sneak previews earlier, with simplified arrangements of the first movement of Op. 27 No. 2 (Moonlight) or the melancholy theme of the slow movement of Op. 13 (Pathétique).
But at some point we all enter that world, never to leave. I'll put my cards on the table right now and say that I've never considered myself much of a Beethoven pianist, even when I was still performing regularly (which I am not these days.) I got my start whacking through the Pathétique sometime around puberty; I haven't played a Beethoven sonata in public since the mid 1980s when I gave a decent rendition of Op. 28 (Pastorale). Before then, I had managed to bomb quite thoroughly with a disgracefully rushed Waldstein, while giving reasonable but thoroughly mediocre performances of various early, middle, and late sonatas. Richard Goode never had anything to fear from me.
My modest skills as a Beethoven performer do not blind me to the excellence of good Beethoven playing. I grew up listening to the legendary recordings by Artur Schnabel (pictured to the right), coming to know them well for their magnificent strengths as well as their many shortcomings. Several of my college-era teachers continued my Schnabel-ization, ensuring that I studied most of the sonatas carefully.
The Schnabel Beethoven recordings rank among the indisputable classics of the gramophone, but the performances range widely in quality. Nobody expected these recordings to stay in print from the 1930s to the present. Schnabel recorded the cycle in London during the 1930s for a small subscriber base, that being the only way one could pull off an ambitious small-market recording project in the Depression-wracked 'thirties. He was neither a big technician nor particularly inclined towards recording. As a result everybody concerned let some major gaffes slip by: the mess he made of the finale of Op. 101, for example — and let's not even talk about the finale of Op. 106.
Still, the Schnabel performances set a standard against which, for better or worse, later complete Beethoven sonata cycles have been judged — either in concert, or on record. You can pick up the Schnabel set in its original EMI incarnation from iTunes (albeit DRM-locked and low-quality), or in remastered versions from TIM Cz, in higher audio quality. Here's a link to the first volume. Amazon carries them on CD, and in download format as well.
A fair number of pianists have recorded complete cycles of the sonatas. (Others have recorded individual sonatas; ArkivMusic lists 204 Moonlights, 210 Appassionatas, 97 Hammerklaviers, and 182 Pathétiques, just to give a sense of the catalog's vastness.)
Here are a few complete cycles you might consider:
- Alfred Brendel, who recorded the cycle several times. Here's a link to the 1996 set.
- Daniel Barenboim, also several times. Here's a link to his 1981-84 set. You can also get a Barenboim on DVD.
- Richard Goode, in a set remarkable for its control, beauty, and sheer elegance. (It's my personal favorite.) Here's a link to the CD set, and here's the download from Amazon, non-DRM.
- Wilhelm Kempff's signature renditions, from 1965, on Deutsche Grammophon. Here's a link to the CD set, and here's the download from DG, at a very reasonable price for mp3/320, non-DRM.
The superb, musicianly pianist András Schiff (left) has launched a complete Beethoven set, the first volume of which is available here.
Schiff has been traversing the Beethoven cycle here in San Francisco, and in October he continues the journey.
On Sunday, October 12 at Davies Symphony Hall, at 7:00 pm, Schiff will perform middle-period sonatas: Nos. 16, 17, 18, and 21. Two of those sonatas are nicknamed: No. 17 (Op. 32 No. 2 "Tempest") and No. 21 (Op. 53 "Waldstein").
One week later on the 19th, same time, same place, Schiff continues with Sonatas 22 through 26. This set includes the popular Op. 57 "Appassionata" in F Minor, as well as the only truly programmatic sonata in the cycle, Op. 81a "Das Lebewohl".
We can all listen to Beethoven sonatas on records whenever we want, but the opportunity to hear a great pianist perform the cycle live is rare. Tickets are available from the San Francisco Symphony box office.
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