We live in an age of great Beethoven piano playing, even if not of great orchestral interpretation. One series of records or discs after another has emerged of the highest quality, so that we can gain extremely varied perspectives on the same works, quite a few of them equally valid. Even so, I doubt whether I shall ever be as impressed by any future performances as I have been by the ones on the first two (Bridge 9198 and 9201) of a planned complete cycle by the American Garrick Ohlsson. His career is something of a mystery: having won the Chopin competition in Warsaw in 1970, and established himself as a great Chopin interpreter, he has never made nearly as big a reputation in the UK as he should have done, though I heard wonderful concerts from him in the 1970s here. Now, with the superb sound engineering of Bridge, we can hear him in six of the 32 sonatas, the most familiar ones so far avoided, but all these as fresh and compelling as I have ever heard them. Ohlsson commands a huge variety of tones, pays immense attention to detail, but contrives to be spontaneous and to keep each whole work always in view. The last work on the second disc is Op. 111, the last sonata of all, and given here as great a reading as I have ever heard – and as great as Ohlsson’s teacher, Claudio Arrau, gave it. I can’t give it any higher praise than that. Yet in some ways I was even more impressed by the sheer stature he finds, without going in for inflationary measures, in the ‘little’ Sonata in F sharp minor, Op. 78. Lasting only ten minutes, the effect it has is out of all proportion to that.

-- BBC Music Magazine

Also available: Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Vol 2 / Bavouzet and Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Vol 3 / Bavouzet

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas: Nos. 1–10. Piano Sonata No. 5: original finale. Presto in c, WoO 52 • Jean-Efflam Bavouzet • CHANDOS 10720 (3 CDs: 213:46)


With this launch by Jean-Efflam Bavouzet of another Beethoven piano sonata cycle, it appears that a contest between two Frenchmen is shaping up.


My admiration for François-Frédéric Guy’s nearing-completion cycle for Zig-Zag Territoires suddenly demands that attention be shared with the pianist’s slightly younger compatriot Jean-Efflam Bavouzet. Both men hail from the northwestern region of France—Guy was born in 1969 in Vernon; Bavouzet was born in 1962 in Lannion.


Bavouzet means business. He jumps in with both feet, giving us 10—nearly a third—of Beethoven’s sonatas, throwing in for good measure the original finale to the C-Minor Sonata, op. 10/1, in a reconstruction by William Drabkin, and the discarded Presto also originally intended for the same opus.


Just within the last five years the number of new Beethoven cycles to appear on the scene, either complete or still in progress, has posed an embarrassment of riches for the potential buyer and a dilemma for the critic. In 2005, Paul Lewis completed his highly acclaimed survey. As Lewis was finishing his cycle, András Schiff embarked on a new one, which is now complete. In 2010, Italian pianist Christian Leotta delivered three volumes in his not-yet-complete survey, while also in 2010 Cambria pulled out all the stops for pianist Peter Takács, recording his complete cycle in SACD and presenting it in a lavish coffee-table book format. Even more recently, we received a second volume of sonatas from Jonathan Biss in what is assumed to be the start of another cycle; meanwhile, Angela Hewitt has been working her way through the sonatas more slowly, having released 10 of them as of 2010.


All of these efforts have much to offer. Leotta’s approach was judged a bit controversial in terms of tempo choices and other interpretive decisions by three or four of Fanfare ’s contributors, including this one, but if you were to choose any of these versions, you would end up a satisfied customer.


Then within the last couple of issues, François-Frédéric Guy came along with readings of 25 of the sonatas in two three-disc volumes on his way to the finish line—actually, the sonatas were all recorded live and are already in the can, the remaining seven awaiting release by Atma. Guy’s readings really opened my ears to these works in a way they hadn’t been before. There was something about his playing that seemed utterly spontaneous and alive to the caprice of the moment, yet controlled by a perfect sense of timing and sweeping technique.


Necessarily, one has to wonder how Bavouzet would fare against such exceptional talent as Guy’s. Truthfully, it comes as a bit of a surprise that Chandos would produce a set of the Beethoven sonatas to compete directly against its previous very respectable cycle with the pianist who for so long has been practically one of the label’s house artists, Louis Lortie. But then that cycle was made more than a decade and a half ago, so it’s out with the old and in with the new.


Both Guy’s and Bavouzet’s sets present the sonatas not in strict numerical sequence, but in keeping to a general grouping of the works by their chronological periods, so that in neither instance do we get a disc containing a mix of early and late sonatas. There is, however, one major difference. Guy’s recordings are taken from live performances and, as such, the sonatas are arranged on the discs in groups of three or four in a way that reflects concert programs. The result is that on each of Guy’s individual discs, not just in each volume, you get one or more of Beethoven’s popular “name” sonatas. For example, disc 1 of Volume 1 contains the “Moonlight” Sonata, while disc 2 of Volume 1 contains the “Pathétique.”


Bavouzet’s cycle, which appears to be a studio effort, adheres more closely to a numerical sequence, though the two shorter op. 14 sonatas come before the three longer op. 10 sonatas, probably to accommodate disc layout exigencies. As a result of Bavouzet and Chandos’s strategy, on the three discs that make up Volume 1 we get only one of the popular “name” sonatas, the “Pathétique.”


As to Bavouzet’s playing, we needn’t dwell on matters of technical execution because as with so many of today’s instrumentalists we’re in a realm where perfection itself must hide her face in shame. Bavouzet has been recorded in a wide range of repertoire, from Haydn to Liszt, Debussy, Ravel, and Bartók, and almost without exception his performances have been received with strongly positive reviews in these pages.


So, accepting Bavouzet’s technical abilities as a given, what’s left to address are his interpretive approach and Chandos’s recording. Interpretively, Bavouzet is not as spontaneous or mercurial as Guy. But that’s OK. He’s a strict observer of the score, though in an extended postscript to the album’s main program note, Bavouzet speaks at great length on the performance history and recorded legacy of the sonatas, but doesn’t mention the edition he uses.


What some listeners might describe as crispness to Bavouzet’s touch strikes me more as a clipped approach which, to my ear, makes Beethoven’s staccatos sound like firecrackers going off. I need to make clear that my impression is relative to my still very fresh exposure to Guy, whose more pliant, supple way with these scores creates a very different effect. In contrast—but only in contrast—Bavouzet sounds a bit rigid and unyielding.


For some reason, Guy omits the first three of Beethoven’s sonatas, the op. 2 set, written in 1796 and dedicated to Haydn, opting instead to offer the Sonata No. 4 in E? Major, op. 7, composed two years later, as the earliest essay in his Volume 1. They’re not in Volume 2 either, so one assumes they’ll be showing up in the final volume, which negates my previous observation that no single disc contains a mix of early and late sonatas. Obviously, that will no longer be true when Guy’s final volume is released.


Bavouzet, on the other hand, begins right off the bat with the op. 2 set, taking not just the first-movement exposition repeats in the first two sonatas, but the development-recapitulation repeats as well. This is where it would have been helpful to know what edition of the sonatas Bavouzet is using, because the development-recapitulation repeats do appear in my Kalmus urtext scores and in Artaria’s first edition, as well as in the Breitkopf & Härtel edition, and possibly in more recent researched and corrected editions by Henle, Cooper, and Tecla. But in the Peters, Universal, and subsequent Kalmus editions, the development-recapitulation repeats are removed.


Most likely, later editors eliminated these second-half repeats when it became customary to omit them in performance, and composers, including Beethoven, discontinued the practice of writing them. In fact, Beethoven already omitted the second-half repeat as early as the third sonata in the op. 2 set, and returned to the practice with decreasing frequency thereafter. Soon he would begin to eliminate the exposition repeat as well. It’s in keeping with Bavouzet’s strict adherence to the urtext, or some version thereof, that he observes not just repeats but dynamic and expressive markings to the letter. Since Guy’s op. 2 has not yet been released, I’m not able to say whether he observes these second-half repeats or not.


If I have any reservations regarding Bavouzet’s readings, they come in the “Pathétique” Sonata, one of those very familiar and highly popular works about which listeners are apt to be a bit more finicky. First, in the Grave introduction, Bavouzet’s dotting is what’s often characterized as being of the “lazy” variety, meaning that the dotted 16ths aren’t quite long enough and the 32nds aren’t quite short enough, resulting in a loping rhythmic effect that tends to feel as if it’s falling into a compound meter like 6/8.


Then, second, at the Allegro , Bavouzet takes off at a tempo I haven’t experienced since Fazil Say set his piano’s felt hammers on fire in his recording of the “Tempest,” “Waldstein,” and “Appassionata” sonatas. Beethoven gave us no metronome markings for any of his piano sonatas other than the “Hammerklavier,” so we can’t really know how fast he intended the Allegro of the “Pathétique” to go, but Bavouzet’s tempo strikes me as more appropriate for the “Tempest” or “Waldstein” than for this early essay, which belongs to his pre-1800 works. At 9:45, Guy’s first movement is more than a minute longer than Bavouzet’s breathless 8:40.


At the moment, I remain under the sway of Guy, but it may be in the long run that Bavouzet’s Beethoven will wear better. The expressiveness and communicativeness Guy achieves through spontaneity and caprice may, to some extent, be at the expense of the music’s inner integrity. Bavouzet may provide the corrective to that. In a way, these two magnificent French pianists almost seem to play each other’s alter egos. It’s tempting to see them as Schumann’s Florestan and Eusebius, except that the personalities of those two imaginary characters don’t quite fit either pianist’s approach to Beethoven’s sonatas.


This may not be the clear, decisive, hoped-for conclusion, but if you were to choose Bavouzet or Guy, I think you’d end up a satisfied customer. If you can afford it, choose both.


Chandos’s recordings, made between 2008 and 2011 in Suffolk’s Potton Hall, Dunwich, are exemplary, capturing Bavouzet’s Steinway Model D in rock-solid, full-bodied sound, and the booklet essay by William Drabkin, furnished with a number of musical examples, is well written and highly informative. When it comes to Beethoven, Bavouzet is the equivalent of a strict Constitutional constructionist. His readings will withstand the test of time.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Beethoven’s three most popular and most performed piano sonatas are featured on this new benchmark release, “Moonlight Sonata,” the “Appassionata,” and the “Pathetique.” Pianist Peter Rosel recorded the works on this album in the late 1970s. Here they are beautifully remastered for optimal sound quality and presented in collector’s edition packaging. “Without wanting to seem immodest, I can say that I was pretty satisfied with the result, and I still am today. The fact that the recording will now be made available on both CD and vinyl for today’s music lovers gives me immense pleasure.” (Peter Rosel)

This release is the final volume of pianist Paavali Jumppanen’s acclaimed cycle of Beethoven piano sonatas. This volume combines the early Op. 7 and the famous Pathétique sonata together with the Last Sonatas Opp. 109-111 written by Beethoven in the 1820s. Jumppanen has collaborated with numerous contemporary composers and has premiered many solo and chamber works for the piano. He has worked personally with esteemed composers including Pierre Boulez, William Duckworth, Henri Dutilleux, as well as composers of his native Finland. In fact, on the DG recording project of the complete works by Pierre Boulez, Jumppanen recorded the piano sonatas upon the composer’s request. Paavali Jumppanen is an internationally esteemed pianist, a versatile performer equally at home as a concerto soloist, chamber musician, and a recitalist. His vast repertoire spans piano literature from Bach to the Avant-garde. Jumppanen has spent several years performing the works of Viennese Classics, in particular Beethoven. His performances of the complete cycles of Beethoven's and Mozart's Piano Sonatas as well as Beethoven's concertos and chamber music have won critical acclaim. Jumppanen’s installments in the Beethoven cycle have received thrilling reviews and, among others, the ‘Choc’ Award from the French music magazine Classica.

REVIEW:

He brings a supple, pliable touch to the Op. 7's first movement, and his attention to left-hand lines in the finale imbues it with a sharper than usual edge. The rhapsodic Vivace man non troppo of Op. 109 is a model of sensitive phrasing and timing. A superbly engineered and annotated conclusion to his Beethoven cycle.

– Gramophone

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas Nos. 27, 28, 30, 31 • Dina Ugorskaja (pn) • CAVI 8553299 (77:35)


Dina Ugorskaja, the daughter of the pianist Anatol Ugorski, is a Russian pianist and composer trained in Germany. Early in her career, she has already recorded Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier” and op. 111 sonatas, the Chopin preludes, and a disc of Handel suites. The Sonata No. 27, the first of the 32 in which Beethoven uses German to indicate the movements’ tempo and character, is the piano work in which Beethoven’s late period begins, and Ugorskaja’s playing is fully alive to the quick changes of mood in its stark, febrile first movement, with extremely sensitive pacing of the rise and fall of each phrase, and careful weighing of tone. Her tempo for the second movement is on the slow side, but the melody is patiently shaped, as if sung, never in a hurry. This is a terrific performance of an elusive work.


Ugorskaja’s well-projected, unforced sound, and instinctively rhapsodic, though tasteful, responses to the music’s changes of character, are a good fit with the predominantly lyrical sonatas Nos. 30 and 31, though there’s real grandeur in her playing in the sections that need it. How beautifully she plays the right hand melody in No. 30’s third movement’s first variation, in which Beethoven uncannily anticipates the ornamented singing line of Chopin’s nocturnes, pieces that I’d love to hear her play. No. 31 receives a properly serious, thoughtfully savored reading, with highly expressive playing in the mystical latter sections of the piece. There are one or two moments in the first movement where Ugorskaja’s impulse to move the music forward detracts from the movement’s benign, stable character, but that’s a small quibble.


In op. 101 (Sonata No. 28), I was a little disappointed in her reading of the second movement, a tricky, fast march. In it, her espressivo approach, so winning in the sonata’s first movement, isn’t always rhythmically consistent enough in the repeated dotted rhythms. (Igor Levit’s splendid performance on a recent Sony disc has more speed and better control.) Nonetheless, Ugorskaja’s late Beethoven is cognizant of the sonatas’ details and structure, and manages to sound personally expressive without being self-indulgent. Cavi’s engineering captures the depth and variety of her splendid, “open” sound. Highly recommended.


FANFARE: Paul Orgel

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

Classical Music

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata Nos. 1; 2; 3; 28; 29, “Hammerklavier” • Paavali Jumppanen (pn) • ONDINE 1248 (2 CDs: 143:37)


It has become a fairly common practice to program very early and very late Beethoven on the same recital. The purpose is obvious, but always useful; to compare and contrast the evolution of Beethoven’s style. Some pianists will point to the differences more starkly by emphasizing the strong Classical roots of the three opus 2 sonatas, as compared to the mystical Romanticism of the mighty final sonatas, including the massive “Hammerklavier.” The young Finnish pianist Paavali Jumppanen opts for an approach that seeks the commonality in the music, extracting kernels of that mysticism in the first sonatas, and emphasizing the Classical beauty and structure that still resides in the sprawling worlds of late Beethoven.


Jumppanen enhances this sense with generally leisurely tempos, which allow him to render textures with alluring clarity and balance, as well as pearly tone. The gentle pace of his playing is significant, because it flies in the face of the historicists who are keen to observe the metronome markings that Beethoven meticulously applied to his works, even years after they were composed (the metronome was patented in 1815). I am not one of those reviewers who normally lists competing timings, but in the case of Jumppanen’s “Hammerklavier” first movement, for example, the numbers are striking. He clocks in at 12: 08. No pianist in my collection comes close to such a crawl. Richter, 10: 35. Ashkenazy, 10:40. Horszowski, 11:39. Taub, 9:12. And the speed king, Schnabel, who attempts to hit the metronome marking of the composer, a remarkable 8:45.


These are not performances that carefully avoid the infusion of the performer’s personality. Jumppanen puts a certain gloss on the music that historically minded listeners might find off-putting, as I normally would. I also generally prefer this music a bit on the brisk side, although it is silly to expect performers to slavishly follow the metronome markings, which, for any number of reasons (and mere speculation) may not be accurate. But there is no denying the beauty of this playing. Jumppanen is no cookie-cutter pianist, and if my caveats do not bother you, there is much to enjoy here. Ondine’s beautiful recorded sound is no little bonus.


FANFARE: Peter Burwasser

REVIEW:

I specifically asked to review this release after receiving Mari Kodama’s previous album of Beethoven’s last three sonatas and giving it a warm welcome in 36:2. Prior to that, I’d not heard any of her earlier Beethoven releases but was sufficiently impressed by the last one to want to hear more of it. I freely acknowledge that not all my colleagues who have reviewed one or another entry in Kodama’s survey of the sonatas have been equally enthusiastic, but how dull would be if we all agreed?

Save for two sonatas, Nos. 28 and 29, the “Hammerklavier,” Kodama’s Beethoven sonata cycle is complete, and according to PentaTone’s official website, those two sonatas are scheduled for release in August, whereupon I’m sure the company will endear itself to everyone who has collected the individual discs by reissuing them in a boxed set. Here on two SACDs we have six sonatas in seemingly no particular order, either numerically or chronologically.

In general, I continue to like Kodama’s way with these works, but as suggested in my previous review, the pianist is not necessarily in touch with every sonata or every movement thereof equally. Who is? Technical mastery is never in question, but Kodama tends to be more responsive to the long line and the lyrical impulses in the music than she is to the high drama or moments of capricious quirkiness. Where, for example, Beethoven gives Kodama a menuetto instead of a scherzo and an easygoing rondo to play, as in the third and fourth movements of the B- flat Major Sonata, the pianist performs with limpid touch, fluent phrasing, and singing tone. But in a movement like the scherzo from the A-flat Major Sonata, I think she’s a bit too straight-laced, missing some of the humor of the off-beat accents.

On the other hand, Kodama hits the nail on the head in the all-but-name scherzo from the E-flat-Major Sonata. And Kodama delivers all the sonatas’ slow movements with graceful and eloquent expression.

Will Mari Kodama’s Beethoven cycle go down in history as one of the all-time greats? My guess would be probably not. But from what I’ve heard of it so far, I’d judge it to be very, very good, and I can’t imagine anyone who invests in these gorgeously recorded PentaTone SACDs being disappointed. Before snapping up this latest two-disc release, however, I’d counsel patience, for sooner or later, the complete cycle is bound to be made available as a boxed set. But whether you choose to buy now or later, Kodama’s Beethoven, with the minor reservations mentioned, is recommended.

- FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

“Some pianists seem to have been born to play Beethoven. Mari Kodama has the tools, as well as the inclination, needed to interpret this composer: a well-centered, beautiful tone, a love of the full range of keyboard colors, and a sensitivity to distinctions in rhythm both great and subtle." -- Audiophile Audition

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas , op. 10/1–3 • Mari Kodama (pn) • PENTATONE 5186 377 (SACD: 59:20)


This is the latest installment of a cycle-in-progress (though new to me) by Mari Kodama, a Japanese student of Nikolayeva and Brendel. Her playing is impressive in its refinement and control, if occasionally a little predictable. The three op. 10s make for a satisfying program, though they’re curiously presented in reverse order here (Beethoven’s own is more logical, with the biggest, most ambitious work placed last).


No. 1 in C Minor goes well, with few surprises. Kodama generally lets the outer movements speak for themselves—straight, incisive, dramatic, forceful, with effective lyrical contrasts. Tension is well maintained, with a convincing sense of real performance (vs. a recording-studio run-through). The Adagio is straightforward, perhaps to a fault—here I miss the imaginative flexibility and expressive depths others bring to the music (e.g., Schiff/ECM, Lewis/Harmonia Mundi, or the recently reviewed Ohlsson/Bridge and Ehlen/Azica). The recorded sound of her Steinway is rich, resonant, and close, but a little “plummy” for my taste, with a pronounced resonant overhang. Her playing is certainly not over-pedaled, but a real staccato articulation is in short supply.


This is a bigger drawback in the first movement of No. 2 in F where, for all the poise and polish, Beethoven’s numerous injunctions to very short articulations (e.g., at the beginning, bars 38 ff., and 47 ff.) are rarely effectively realized. The development has a slightly stolid feel (the second repeat is observed). The F-Minor Allegretto is taken slowly, to rather dour effect, with (for my taste) an insufficient variety of texture and attack; the Presto finale is kept well under control at a moderate tempo. In the last resort, I find this all a little too uneventful.


The big D Major receives the most consistently satisfying performance of the three. The opening Presto is richly varied, supple and sinuous, with an exciting surging momentum. The Largo e mesto is all dark, glinting marble, and in this instance the finale finds her relishing the music’s wide-ranging phrase and textural discontinuities.


So, a slightly mixed bag. But there’s much playing of real distinction here, and anyone wanting a high-quality version of the three op. 10s in state-of-the-art sound won’t go wrong. For the general collector, perhaps not a first choice (see alternatives mentioned above), but I’ll be keeping this in my collection, and can see returning to the first and third sonatas.


FANFARE: Boyd Pomeroy


This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

Elisabeth Leonskaya is one of today’s leading pianists and she is celebrated throughout the world. Her many recordings attest to her high rank and these have been awarded the Grand Prix du Disque, Prix Caecilia, Diapason d’Or and an international MIDEM award.

“Dina Ugorskaja...brings a heightened sensitivity to all her playing, coupled with an extraordinary facile ability to convey the complexities of this music in an easily assimilated way.” — Fanfare

Mari Kodama concludes her Beethoven sonata cycle with two of the composer’s most challenging works from both technical and interpretive standpoints. Happily, Op. 101 finds her in top pianistic and musical fettle. Following an eloquent and easily flowing first movement, Kodama navigates the Scherzo’s obsessive march rhythms, tricky balances, and difficult-to-articulate trills with impressive clarity, poise, and drama, and brings similar qualities to the knotty fugal finale.

For all of her proficient finger work in the “Hammerklavier” sonata’s first movement, Kodama tends to round off phrases, play down accents, and soften dynamic extremes. Her smooth and careful dispatch of the Scherzo Trio’s upward F major scales robs this gesture of its climactic impact. At the end of the movement the main theme briefly appears in the remote key of B minor, and by underlining it with an unsubtle ritard Kodama misjudges this effect’s sense of deadpan surprise. In Kodama’s hands the slow movement seems more of an Andante con moto than Beethoven’s Adagio sostenuto, although her nuanced handling of the right hand’s elaborate singing lines saves the day.

In the fourth movement’s opening Largo, Kodama imposes a gratuitous and dramatically ineffective ritard in the brief G-sharp minor contrapuntal outburst, and she begins the gradually accelerating syncopated chords leading into the fugue too quickly. The fugue itself begins in a crisp, characterfully light manner, yet Kodama’s basic tempo slightly decreases over time and her articulation becomes more generalized as the music grows in textural complexity (a tendency with most pianists in this movement, to be fair). In other words, more daring, leonine “Hammerklavier” performances of recent vintage by Georg Friedrich Schenck and Stewart Goodyear hold stronger appeal. No question, however, that Kodama’s outstanding Op. 101 is one of her cycle’s high points, and the sonics (in both multi-channel and conventional stereo playback modes) match the superb consistency distinguishing this series’ eight previous volumes.

-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

"Some consider Arrau’s live Beethoven sonata performances superior to the studio versions. In the later sonatas, Arrau himself alluded to the fact that an improvisatory approach was required which was difficult to achieve within a recording studio. Of op. 111, Jonathan Summers says in his booklet note that ‘as we near the close...we realise we've been transported to another world by Arrau’. This 1960 Stockholm recording, with Arrau at his career peak, is extremely rare and has never been issued."