Brautigam Beethoven

Following on from Volume 11 which has a superb Eroica Variations, Ronald Brautigam’s excellent journey through Beethoven’s complete works for solo piano continues in volume 12 with further variations. This time it’s a group from earlier in his career. The Dressler Variations were Beethoven’s first published work, and are pleasant enough though pretty light-weight stuff, as are the almost aphoristic Sechs Variationen über ein Schweizer Lied.

The 32 Piano Sonatas by Ludwig van Beethoven are often referred to as the ‘New Testament’ of the keyboard literature, following on the ‘Old Testament’ of J.S. Bach's 48 preludes and fugues in the Well-Tempered Clavier. Composed over a period of almost three decades, from 1795 to 1822, the sonatas constitute a fascinating panorama of an artistic career which underwent numerous changes – not to say upheavals – but nevertheless remained remarkably consistent.

Following his highly acclaimed Beethoven ‘Moonlight’, ‘Pathétique’ and ‘Waldstein’ Sonatas release, Hyperion’s Gramophone-award-winning artist Steven Osborne turns his talents to Beethoven’s complete Bagatelles. Though the composer himself referred to these thirty short piano works, which he penned throughout his life, as ‘trifles’, these are nonetheless trifles from the mind of a genius. In this polished album, Osborne lends his remarkable artistry to everything from the Six Bagatelles of Op 126, which at times occupy the same rarefied spiritual world as the late quartets and were the very last works Beethoven ever wrote for the piano, to the composer’s most famous stand-alone piano piece, the mysterious little A minor Bagatelle known to all the world as ‘Für Elise’.

Ludwig van Beethoven - Ronald Brautigam - Hammerklavier Sonatas Opp. 81a, 90 & 106
SACD ISO (2.0/MCH): 3,12 GB | 24B/88,2kHz Stereo FLAC: 1,02 GB | Full Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: BIS # BIS-SACD-1612 | Country/Year: Sweden 2009
Genre: Classical | Style: Viennese School, Piano

…Until I heard Brautigam on this SACD. This is for me his greatest achievement over the 7 Beethoven discs. A breathtaking feeling for everything on the right place. His tempo, speed, accents, volume, absolutely everything is combined to 1 unique reading. Yes, this is a Beethoven sonata! I experienced how Beethoven’s genius, Brautigams insight & virtuosity & the sound of the instrument blended to one grasping, divine moment of beautiful music.Then for artist & listener a demanding fugue is heavenly presented, the complex structure comes out crystal clear. Add the marvelous sound of the SACD medium & one can consider this SACD as a new reference in recording history. I hope we don’t have to wait another year for the Last Sonatas…" ~sa-cd.net

In eight previous volumes Ronald Brautigam has traversed what is often called 'The New Testament of Piano Music', namely Beethoven's 32 numbered sonatas. The present disc may be regarded as an appendix to these, as it explores the composer's first attempts in the genre. It opens with the three Kurfürsten Sonatas from 1783, in which Beethoven - at the tender age of twelve - demonstrates a remarkable maturity.

As smooth and delicious a performance of Beethoven's First Piano Concerto as has been released since the turn of the century, Ronald Brautigam's account of the work with Andrew Parrott and the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra compares with Richter's for sparkle, with Pollini's for cleverness, and with Michelangeli's for liveliness. Brautigam's opening Allegro con brio has velocity and control, his central Largo expressivity and refinement, and his closing Rondo wit and whimsy.

Ludwig van Beethoven’s first printed work was a set of variations – published in 1783 when he was only twelve years old – and his final keyboard composition was the massive set of thirty-three variations on a theme by Anton Diabelli, composed almost four decades later. Not counting the several movements in variation form included in the sonatas, his twenty-one sets of piano variations thus trace a line of development in his production, parallel to those formed by the 32 piano sonatas or the 16 string quartets.