Brautigam Beethoven

In 1819 the Viennese music publisher and composer Anton Diabelli sent a short waltz to a long list of composers. These included Schubert, Hummel, a very young Franz Liszt and, as the most prominent composer of the time, naturally Beethoven. Diabelli was proposing to compile an anthology of variations on his own waltz, one from each composer. Beethoven responded in a characteristic manner: first there was nothing, and then there was nothing … and then, in 1823, there was an entire, and monumental, set of no less than thirty-three variations.

After eight discs with the 32 numbered sonatas, and a ninth comprising the early sonatas and sonatinas, Ronald Brautigam now embarks on the second leg of his traversal of Beethoven’s complete music for solo piano. In this volume he gives us the complete Bagatelles, and includes not only the three sets published during Beethoven’s life time, but also thirteen further pieces composed throughout Beethoven’s career, between 1795 and 1825. Some of these pieces, most famously ‘Für Elise’, are sometimes referred to as Bagatelles, others simply as Klavierstücke and several of them are only known by their tempo markings.

Ludwig van Beethoven - Ronald Brautigam - Eroica, Variations (1796-1802)
SACD ISO (2.0/MCH): 3,60 GB | 24B/88,2kHz Stereo FLAC: 1,19 GB | Full Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: BIS # BIS-SACD-1673 | Country/Year: Sweden 2012
Genre: Classical | Style: Classical Period, Piano

"…Like the previous releases in this series, BIS's sound is excellent. All I can say are the usually adjectives of praise. Since I received this disc a month and a half ago I've probably listened to the Eroica Variations nearly 20 times – like the previous releases, it's Beethoven played to perfection." (sa-cd.net)

Ludwig van Beethoven - Ronald Brautigam - Eroica, Variations (1796-1802)
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 299 MB | Full Artwork: 99 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: BIS # BIS-SACD-1673 | Country/Year: Sweden 2012
Genre: Classical | Style: Classical Period, Piano

"…Like the previous releases in this series, BIS's sound is excellent. All I can say are the usually adjectives of praise. Since I received this disc a month and a half ago I've probably listened to the Eroica Variations nearly 20 times – like the previous releases, it's Beethoven played to perfection." (sa-cd.net)

Ludwig van Beethoven - Kurfürsten Sonatas WoO 47, 50 & 51
Complete Works For Solo Piano Vol. 9 - Ronald Brautigam, fortepiano
SACD ISO: 2,8 GB (Stereo + MCH DSD) | FLAC @ 24bit/88.2kHz: 950 MB | Full Artwork | 5% Rec. Info
Label/Cat#: BIS # BIS-SACD-1672 | Country/Year: Sweden 2010
Genre: Classical | Style: Classical

…Brautigam's interpretations have a directness and urgency to them that far surpasses such considerations - as summed in a review in Classic FM Magazine of a recent instalment: 'Brautigam has more to say about the music than any recent cycle recorded on modern instruments. An outstanding disc of an outstanding series.'

Ludwig van Beethoven - Kurfürsten Sonatas WoO 47, 50 & 51
Complete Works For Solo Piano Vol. 9 - Ronald Brautigam, fortepiano
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 250 MB | Full Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: BIS # BIS-SACD-1672 | Country/Year: Sweden 2010
Genre: Classical | Style: Classical

…Brautigam's interpretations have a directness and urgency to them that far surpasses such considerations - as summed in a review in Classic FM Magazine of a recent instalment: 'Brautigam has more to say about the music than any recent cycle recorded on modern instruments. An outstanding disc of an outstanding series.'

If the 32 piano sonatas and the great works in variation form (Eroica, Diabelli) form the weightiest part of Beethoven's legacy to pianists and lovers of piano music, they by no means tell the full story. In his highly acclaimed survey of the complete music for solo piano, Ronald Brautigam has previously recorded the early, unnumbered sonatas, the Bagatelles and the earlier sets of variations. He now treats us to a disc of rondos and piano pieces, spanning from one of the very earliest surviving works – a Rondo in C major composed by a 13-year old Beethoven – to what is often referred to as the composer's ‘Last Musical Thought’, an Andante maestoso in C major.

As one of the finest pianists of his era and an improviser of genius, Ludwig van Beethoven’s preferred vehicle for musical exploration was the piano. His earliest composition, from 1782, was a set of piano variations and he continued to compose for solo piano until the last years of his life. His interest in the concerto form diminished as his deafness forced him to retire from performing. Nonetheless, with his five piano concertos composed between 1788 and 1809, Beethoven not only achieved a brilliant conclusion to the Classical piano concerto, but also established a new model for the Romantic era: a sort of symphony with obbligato piano which remained a reference point well into the beginning of the twentieth.

The apparently insatiable Dutch pianist Ronald Brautigam continues to gobble up standard and not-so-standard Beethoven with this 2009 disc featuring the composer's Fourth Piano Concerto and the piano transcription of his Violin Concerto, a recording that should please fans of the pianist's previous Beethoven recordings. Performing on a modern concert grand rather than the fortepianos he had favored in some earlier releases, Brautigam delivers readings that sparkle in the outer movements, sing in the central movements, and never resort to technical or emotional grandstanding to make their points.