Piano Sonata n° 5 Sharp

Masterpieces of Baroque piano literature, in critically acclaimed recordings by pianists with a fine sensibility for the 18th century. Recordings made between 2005 and 2023; new booklet essay; an ideal budget introduction to the world of the Baroque keyboard, full of elegant dances and virtuoso playing.

S’il fallait donner une définition au romantisme du début du XIXe siècle, la simple écoute de ce disque rendrait toutes autres explications superflues. Tout ce qui caractérise ce célèbre mouvement de pensée artistique et intellectuel est présent au sein de ces chef-d'œuvres du plus imprégné de ses compositeurs. On y trouve intimement mêlés la passion et l’amour mais aussi le doute et l’espoir sans oublier la poésie, puissante inspiratrice de l’œuvre de Schumann. Murray Perahia y brille de tout feux et ce n’est pas la prise de son qui me démentira. Le piano est d’une richesse harmonique qui nous laisse pantois. Des graves profonds et charpentés aux aiguës aériens et cristallins, l’instrument est restitué dans ses vraies dimensions. Ce disque est un condensé de ce qui se fait de mieux en la matière.

The three sonatas Stephen Hough has selected for this recital not only reveal Johann Nepomuk Hummel as a plausible "missing link" between Beethoven and Chopin, but also as a formidable, creative force in his own right. Maybe he's not so memorable a melodist as Chopin nor a protean architect on the level of Beethoven, but Hummel's piano writing still sounds idiomatic and invigorating to modern ears. It's also quite difficult. The F-sharp minor sonata's dramatic finale, for instance, allows little respite from its unrelenting broken octaves, taxing runs, and double notes, while the gnarly dotted rhythms, imitative writing, and thick chords permeating the D major sonata's Scherzo evoke the Schumann to come. No matter how difficult the music, Stephen Hough's effortless technique and eloquent, characterful musicality make everything sound easy. What's more, he never sacrifices power for speed. Listen for example to the way he gives the challenging, spiraling triplets in the F minor sonata's finale their full dynamic due, maintaining a full, tonally varied sonority with virtually no help from the sustain pedal. In sum, it will take a heap of work and tons of inspiration for future pianists to match Hough's reference standards here. This is a valuable release and a joyous listening experience all in one: don't miss it.

An Original Jackets treasury of analogue-era pianism by legendary and lesser-known names from the catalogues of American Decca and Westminster.

Wilhelm Backhaus recorded Beethoven’s complete piano sonatas in mono for Decca in the early 1950s, and with the advent of stereo he began the process anew in 1958. Although he managed to finish 31 out of the 32, the pianist died before he got around to remaking the Hammerklavier (Op. 106). Consequently, the mono Hammerklavier fills out Backhaus’ stereo cycle that Decca now reissues in its Original Masters series. Although numerous piano mavens hold Backhaus’ Beethoven in high, nearly iconic esteem, I’ve always had mixed reactions to these recordings. In general, the pianist’s cavalier attitude toward Beethoven’s dynamics, articulation, and phrasing obscures the composer’s clearly specified linear trajectory and implicit drama.

Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter was born on March 20, 1915 (Julian: March 7) in Zhitomir in present-day Ukraine. His father Teofil (Theophilus) came from a German commercial family. The famous Russian piano teacher Heinrich Neuhaus (of German origin) recognized his huge talent and enrol led him in his piano master cl ass at the Moscow Conservatory in 1 937. Profil Edition Gunter Hanssl er is progressively releasing all the recordings that the great Soviet virtuoso made between 1945 and 1963. Most of them were largely unknown in the West during the Cold War, as Richter could only perform til I 1960 behind the ""Iron Curtain"", that is to say, in the Soviet Union and the sate I lite states of Eastern Europe.

Claudio Arrau was past his prime when, in the mid-1980s, he offered these final thoughts on the late sonatas, but he was still a sovereign interpreter, with a sense of line and grasp of form few other exponents of this music have possessed in comparable degree. Where an interpreter like Pollini emphasizes the energy in Beethoven’s writing for the piano, Arrau conveys its mass, giving these sonatas a symphonic treatment.

Often named the supreme pianist of his era, Sviatoslav Richter (1915-1997) was a poet of the keyboard and an enigmatic, sometimes eccentric figure. These 24 CDs span three centuries of music – repertoire for solo piano and piano duo, chamber music, song and concerto – and bring Richter together with other great artists of his time. As the New York Times wrote, his pianism “combined astonishing technical mastery with bold, wide-ranging musical imagination. His control over the colorings of piano tone was incomparable.”

In 2017 Decca published the 10-CD Box "Mendelssohn Complete Piano Works”. The recordings (2005-2014) include 59 World Premieres.