BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 9 • Jan Willem de Vriend, cond; Annemarie Kremer (sop); Wilke te Brummelstroete (mez); Marcel Reijans (ten); Geert Smits (bar); Consensus Vocalis; Netherlands SO • CHALLENGE CC72532 (SACD: 63:14)

Jan Willem de Vriend completes his survey of the Beethoven symphonies with this exciting new Ninth. His excellent orchestra is a modern ensemble with the addition of period brass (I presume from the sound that natural horns are employed). This cycle is the latest addition to the relatively small number of sets available in SACD multichannel sound; for that reason alone it deserves some attention.

The performance begins with a dramatic, emphatic opening with timpani pounding home the punctuation. Vriend creates excellent tension through the contrasting major and minor modes, the former theme especially poignant. Philip Herreweghe, in the Ninth included in his own compendium of the symphonies, isn’t as intensely dramatic, and his touch is lighter in the percussion. I prefer Vriend, who is closer in spirit to Paavo Järvi (RCA), though Järvi employs a brisker tempo, and his orchestra hasn’t got the punch of Vriend’s full-size outfit.

The exuberant energy of the Scherzo is manifest in this performance, and the timpanist is once again an impressive presence. Repeats are observed, and the tempo seems perfect, the Trio not too fast but still providing contrast with the Scherzo theme. Vriend allows the Adagio to take its time without any sense of drag; Herreweghe is about 30 seconds quicker but doesn’t inject quite the same level of cantabile phrasing as is heard in this new account.

The clamorous opening of the finale is fast and furious; the basses and cellos then have their say—Vriend has his cellos up front to the right, with basses behind, so this episode is especially vivid. Baritone Geert Smits has the timbre of a bass-baritone, and his delivery is heroic but never brusque. The Consensus Vocalis sounds like a medium-size choir, numerous enough to add heft to their contributions. Vriend’s Turkish March allows Marcel Reijans the space to hold forth with spirit (and breath). The double fugue is truly joyful, while the four soloists are exemplary in their subsequent quartet. Vriend guides the symphony to a triumphant close with a presto that is coherent but exhilarating.

The sound is excellent, though some may prefer an aural perspective that is closer. I initially felt that the production was bass-shy, but within this mid-hall perspective, the orchestral balance is actually truer than productions that feature a booming bass sound, and the amount of instrumental detail is also notable.

With this release, Vriend’s entire cycle is enhanced, so that I would now place it on par with that of Herreweghe on PentaTone (though this Challenge set now consists of six discs to the five of Herreweghe). Given the overall excellence of the performances and sound, I can recommend this new Ninth as worthy of even the more fully stocked Beethoven collection.

FANFARE: Christopher Abbot

This selection is a Hybrid Multichannel Super Audio CD. The Stereo Hybrid SACD program can be played on any standard compact disc player. The DSD Surround and Stereo programs require an SACD player for playback.

If I were pressed, I would have to say that this series is the most consistent in an advanced-resolution format at providing excellent sound. Listen to the Beethoven piano concertos, for instance. The listener is placed in row ten, center, and the BBC Symphony Orchestra sounds rich, full, and focused. You sense immediately that you truly do have the best seat in the house. The solo piano enters and what a sound. It is like a magnificent, properly tuned piano! The overall sound is just right. And so it goes, with every release in this series. -- Rad Bennett, Radical Sounds

A welcome pairing of the two “second-string” Beethoven piano concertos in superb performances….Brent Town Hall in London was the recording site in 1974, and the phantom center image of the soloist couldn’t be better. -- John Sunier, Audiophile Audition

Mr Kovacevich was a killer interpreter of Beethoven back then, and Davis an ideal accomplice….Played with dispatch and recorded with a full-bodied sound that doesn’t lose its characters in the quietest moments, these are performances that will never grow stale. -- Dr. Phil Muse, Classik Reviews

If you don’t already have this recording in another format, it’s worth acquiring even if you don’t have an SACD player. It’s proof audibly that the best analog (and Philips were very good at it) was better than any digital until the present, and it is ironic that the SACD format shows off how good these masters were in the 70s. -- Andrew Marshall, Audio Ideas Guide

Classical Music

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

Named for violinist Wouter Vossen’s 1794 Laorentius Storioni violin and founded in 1995, the Storioni Trio seems to be making its international recorded debut with this outstanding Beethoven coupling. To say that these performances impress more for their refinement than their intensity is not to imply that the playing is in any way underpowered or underinterpreted; the musicians simply aren’t obsessed with the extreme emotional tension that can be found among the likes of the highly admirable Beaux Arts and Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson trios. Consider merely the first movement of the early but by no means daintily Classical second trio. With unfailingly warm tone, the musicians make the contrast between the Adagio introduction and the faster main section matter through characterful playing rather than extreme tempo changes or big rhetorical gestures. There’s a wonderful lightness and cheer in play through much of this disc, and while, for example, the finale of the second trio benefits from the group’s precision and energy, such qualities never seem mechanical or forced.

All this holds true for the more popular “Ghost” Trio. Here, especially, pianist Bart van de Roer calls Joseph Kalichstein to mind insofar as he expertly puts his part across without letting Beethoven goad him into bullying his partners. Later, the musicians bring weight to the slow movement without putting a drag on the performance. This is a most impressive calling card for the Storioni Trio.

PentaTone’s sonics, as usual, are absolutely free of distortion, constriction, or glare in any format, but they are especially true-to-life in the 5.0 SACD layer.

James Reel, FANFARE

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

Classical Music

Beethoven began composing the Missa solemnis in 1819, when he learned that his patron (and pupil) Archduke Rudolph was going to be appointed Cardinal Archbishop of Olmütz. The plan was for the mass to be ready for performance at the enthronement celebrations in March 1820, but one year proved to be too little time. It wasn’t until almost three years later, in January 1823, that Beethoven was able to complete the work. As might be expected, it was unparalleled in every respect – although composed for use during church services, even Beethoven’s contemporaries found that it exceeded the bounds of the genre. Beethoven himself was quite aware of both the dimensions and the importance of the work: in a letter he described it as ‘my greatest work’. It is also a work which over its course encompasses great contrasts: from the solemnity of the Kyrie and the intense excitement at the opening of the Gloria to the disturbing intimations of war during the closing Dona nobis pacem.

Originally founded with the aim of performing the choral works of Bach, the Bach Collegium Japan and Masaaki Suzuki are now taking another great leap, after their recent release of Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor. Described as ‘refreshingly open-hearted, spontaneous and natural’ their interpretation received a 2017 Gramophone Award. Joined by an eminent quartet of vocal soloists, the team now applies its expertise in period performance to Beethoven’s masterpiece.

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,/br> REVIEWS:

The performance has warmth, energy and an exact feeling for tempo. The Japanese chorus rise fearlessly to Beethoven’s demands. A memorable musical and emotional experience.

– Sunday Times (UK)

This recording of Ludwig van Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, Op. 123 offers a revelatory performance that is so clear in its textures, lively in its tempos, meticulous in its execution, and detailed in its parts that this monument of western choral music seems to have shaken off all the mossy accretions of nearly two centuries. Highly recommended.

– All Music Guide

Opera Choruses - NICOLAI, O. / WAGNER, R. / BEETHOVEN, L. va

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

Few works of art - musical or otherwise - are as firmly established in the canon of global culture as Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. The sheer size and complexity of it is daunting even today, and at the time of its composition it was a highly revolutionary work. Even so, the audience at the first performance, in 1824, was enthusiastic - as audiences have been ever since. Its appeal has not only stood the test of time, however - the Ninth holds significance for people all over the world, regardless of country: the closest we have to a truly universal piece of music. To record such a work is not a task to take lightly. In preparation for the great occasion, Osmo Vänskä and his Minnesota Orchestra paced themselves by recording two previous discs of Beethoven symphonies, both of which have been greeted with great acclaim. 'It's obvious from the first bars of the Eroica that this is something special... these are great interpretations and a true 21st century take on the music...' wrote the reviewer in Classic FM Magazine of recently released BIS-SACD-1516, while Financial Times' critic stated about the same disc: 'I choose my words carefully when I say this is the best recording of Beethoven symphonies since Carlos Kleiber's with the Vienna Philharmonic a generation ago.' The recording of the Ninth was preceded by three concert performances, and the Minnesota Chorale - one of the finest symphonic choirs in the USA - was meticulously prepared for both concerts and recording. The quartet of soloists has been handpicked and gives a final edge to this huge ensemble in the final movement's Ode to Joy, filling it with all the excitement that this exciting music invites. About a previous disc the critic of the web site Classics Today wrote: 'There's no question that Osmo Vänskä is a true Beethoven conductor.' There is also no question that Vänskä's account of the greatest of the Beethoven symphonies is something that must be experienced!

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



BEETHOVEN Symphonies: No. 5; No. 8 • Philippe Herreweghe, cond; Royal Flemish P • PENTATONE 5186 316 (Multichannel hybrid SACD: 54:16)


This disc represents Volume 2 of a set of the complete Beethoven symphonies currently in progress (the first volume, on the Talent label, included Symphonies 4 and 7 and was reviewed by Colin Anderson in 29:2). In a clumsily translated note Herreweghe refers to “nature” trumpets and “Baroque kettle drums with modern tuning”; these would appear to be the only concessions to period practice—by all accounts, the Royal Flemish orchestra employs modern instruments. This series would appear, then, to be comparable to the latest set conducted by Roger Norrington, with the orchestra of the Stuttgart Radio, on Hänssler.


Unlike Norrington, Herreweghe is unhampered by a tendency toward extreme tempos or self-conscious gestures. Though the tempos of the Fifth Symphony are analogous in swiftness to those of Benjamin Zander on his splendid Telarc recording, there is no sense of the kind of schizoid recklessness that marred Norrington’s Fifth, in which a furious first-movement exposition followed a more sensibly paced opening motto. What we hear instead is a superbly performed and exciting rendering of Beethoven’s war-horse. Orchestral execution is everything one could wish for, with crisp phrasing and spirited ensemble. The conducting illuminates the genius of the conception without in any way calling attention to itself.


In the slow movement, Herreweghe expertly conveys the sense of forward momentum without scrimping on the lyrical richness of Beethoven’s melodic invention. There is no sense of bombast in the triumphant finale, just a very satisfying feeling of rightness—for Beethoven’s creation and for this recreation of it. Herreweghe includes the first movement exposition repeat but follows Beethoven’s revision and eliminates the one in the Scherzo. The sound is resonant yet precise, antiphonal violins aiding in the natural balance. The listener’s perspective is intimate but not airless, allowing for atmosphere and impact. One interesting anomaly: the oboe extends the cadenza in the first movement recapitulation, replacing the one Beethoven wrote, but I found this to be an interesting and idiomatic gesture.


Herreweghe injects a muscular element, propelled by the timpani, into the Eighth Symphony, invigorating what has sometimes in the past been simply a lighthearted romp; there is lightness here, too, but the overall feeling is of vitality. Norrington, by contrast, tends to lurch through the first movement, so that whatever humor there is seems heavy-handed. The sound production he received possesses less resonant fullness than that on the PentaTone disc; strings, for one example, often sound thin and scrappy on the Hänssler CD.


The elegant little Allegretto, under Herreweghe’s hands, verges on the slightly pompous, while the third movement minuet becomes, for all intents and purposes, a scherzo, full of badly placed accents and miscues—all of which, in the words of annotator Tom Janssesns, “indicated that the Classical symphony now truly belonged to the past.” We are then propelled into the finale and its sprightly touches that clearly point to the future, and especially to Mendelssohn. Herreweghe and his Belgian colleagues dispatch the piece with panache.


This is a delightful and highly entertaining disc containing two fine performances of music that never sounds tired or routine. I look forward to the next installment with keen anticipation.


FANFARE: Christopher Abbot

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. There are several possible reasons for this, one being that Beethoven felt that it was below his dignity to take part in a project of this nature. What is certain, however, is that he must have found Diabelli’s theme intriguing material to work with – and against: Beethoven often seems to poke fun at the waltz, starting already in the first variation by turning it into a pompous march. But like all truly great variation works the Diabelli Variations take in the high as well as the low, jokes as well as drama – or serenity, as in Variation 24, a Fughetta, clearly inspired by the Aria in Bach’s Goldberg Variations. As the last large-scale piano work by Beethoven, the Diabelli Variations form a fitting close to Ronald Brautigam’s traversal of the complete solo piano music. Described in International Record Review as ‘a Beethoven player whose musical discernment is a constant source of wonderment’, Brautigam has through the course of this series performed works composed between 1783 and 1825, using four different fortepianos. On the present release we hear a copy of a 4-stringed fortepiano by Conrad Graf from 1822 – similar to Beethoven’s own last instrument, which Graf supplied him with in 1826, a year before the composer’s death.

Classical Music

This selection includes an explanatory commentary of this opera, written by Thomson Smillie and narrated by David Timson.

Opus 18 needs little introduction as Beethoven’s supremely confident first step in total mastery of the Classical String Quartet. From the opening bars of Quartet No. 1 which bristle with curiosity and possibility to the wit and humor of Quartet No. 2 and the suppressed energy and teasing harmonic uncertainty of Quartet No. 3, Opus 18 represents Beethoven’s only quartet contribution during his ‘first period’ and provides the listener with a tantalizing glimpse of the extraordinary music that was to follow. “The sound of the strings is warm but not overly vibrated or assertive; the articulation is clear but not didactic; the tempos are beautifully chosen, the ensemble perfect, and the intonation absolutely pure. This is music-making that reflects deeply human and attractive qualities… good humor, with, and invention.” (Tom Moore, Early Music America)

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


Beethoven’s three Op. 9 string trios are early masterpieces, every bit as fine as the later Op. 18 quartets. These performances are wonderful: there is nothing to criticize. The quality of ensemble is outstanding, perfectly balanced, always in tune, warmly sonorous, and stylish. The presto finale of the G major trio is impeccably light and fleet, all three slow movements beautifully singing and sustained. In the dramatic C minor trio these players (Frank Peter Zimmermann, Antoine Tamestit, and Christian Poltéra) offer a clinic on how to turn phrasing and accent to ear-catching account without a trace of ugliness or mannerism. The SACD sonics are every bit as fine. Don’t let this one slip by.

– David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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These three early trios by Beethoven are given brisk, lively, and well-detailed readings by the Zimmermann Trio, which was formed in 2007. Like so much of Beethoven’s music from the 1796–98 period, these pieces lie between the style of Haydn or Mozart and his own more imaginative manner, which was coming forward in those years. The addition of a fourth voice, in his early op. 18 string quartets, was obviously an extra inspiration for the composer, yet it was this set of trios on which he built those excellent structures.


If you are a fan of these string trios, this is certainly an outstanding recording to own of them. There is, really, nothing one can fault in the trio’s technical execution or musical style. Everything is there: the rhythmic spring, the little felicitous touches on the turns, the clarity in the interplay of voices. In addition, BIS’s hybrid SACD sound is simply splendid, sharp and clearly textured as a good recording of a small string ensemble should be.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

Beethoven began composing his Second Symphony around late 1800, after a successful performance of his First Symphony at a benefit concert in April that year. The hope seems to have been to perform it at a similar concert the following spring - the week before Easter was just about the only time of year when such concerts could be staged in Vienna at that time, since the orchestras were engaged mainly in operas during the rest of the season. After sketching the first movement in considerable detail, however, plans for the rest of the work were suddenly put on hold when he was commissioned to write a ballet, Die Geschöpfe des Prometheus. This was duly performed in March 1801, and Beethoven finally returned to complete the symphony the following winter, in readiness for the next opportunity for a benefit concert. When the time came in April 1802, however, Beethoven was disgusted to find that he had not been given one of the few available slots in the calendar, and that the date had instead been allocated to what he called 'thoroughly mediocre artists'. Nevertheless, this misfortune may have enabled him to make further refinements to the music before it was first performed. Certainly he did make substantial alterations to the finale at a late stage, in particular by greatly enlarging the coda. Osmo Vänskä became the Minnesota Orchestra's tenth music director in September 2003. Praised for his intense and dynamic performances, Vänskä is recognized for compelling interpretations of the standard, contemporary and Nordic repertoires, as well as the close rapport he establishes with the musicians he leads. He began his musical career as a clarinettist, occupying the co-principal's chair in the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra for several years. After studying conducting at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, he won first prize in the 1982 Besançon International Young Conductor's Competition. His conducting career has featured substantial commitments to such orchestras as the Tapiola Sinfonietta, Iceland Symphony Orchestra and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. His numerous recordings for BIS continue to attract the highest acclaim; his Beethoven symphony cycle with the Minnesota Orchestra - including a Grammy-nominated recording of Symphony No.9 - has broadcast the exceptional dynamism of this musical partnership to audiences worldwide. Meanwhile Vänskä is heavily in demand internationally as a guest conductor with the world's leading orchestras, enjoying regular relationships with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra of Washington. In May 2008, after two decades at the helm of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Vänskä was named that ensemble's conductor laureate. Among the many honours and distinctions he has been awarded are the Pro Finlandia medal, a Royal Philharmonic Society Award, Musical America's 2005 Conductor of the Year Award, the Sibelius Medal in 2005 and the Finlandia Foundation Arts and Letters Award in 2006.

In 1806, Beethoven composed two concertos - the Fourth Piano Concerto followed by the Violin Concerto Op. 61. In both cases the composer soon returned to the works to produce new versions, and it is these later versions that are presented here. At the public première of the Fourth Piano Concerto in 1808, Beethoven performed the piano part very 'capriciously' according to his pupil Carl Czerny, playing many more notes than are to be found in the printed edition. A clear indication of what Beethoven played comes from his copyist's orchestral score, in which the outer movements contain annotations in the composer's hand. These have been transcribed by Beethoven scholar Barry Cooper who, in his insightful liner notes, describes this rarely recorded 1808 version as 'strikingly inventive' and 'more sparkling, virtuosic and sophisticated than the standard one'. In the case of the Opus 61 concerto, Beethoven succeeded in writing what many consider to be the quintessential violin concerto. Less well-known is the fact that soon after the first performance, Beethoven produced an arrangement of the solo part for piano, modifying the violin part slightly in the process. When the work was first published, it was as a concerto for violin or piano. Worth noting is that although Beethoven did not compose any cadenzas for the violin, he did so for the piano version. The one for the first movement is especially striking, in that it includes a part for timpani, reminding us of the timpani solo that begins the entire work. Ronald Brautigam and the Norrköping SO under Andrew Parrott have received acclaim for two previous discs of Beethoven's works for piano and orchestra: 'These well-known works emerge as if freshly minted' wrote International Record Review about Concertos Nos. 1 and 3, while the German magazine Piano News hailed the release of No.2 and the youthful Concerto WoO4 as 'a magnificent recording in which Brautigam demonstrates his stylistic expertise, and which shows what a splendid pianist he is.'

Classical Music

With this fourth album - which features one of the best loved of all of Beethoven's works, the 'Moonlight Sonata' - Ronald Brautigam reaches the year 1800. Ronald Brautigam's ongoing cycle on the fortepiano of Beethoven's piano music has been an ear-opening experience for many a listener, as testified by the glowing reviews. The first volume (BIS-SACD-1362) raised the expectations of the critic in Fanfare for 'a Beethoven piano-sonata cycle that challenges the very notion of playing this music on modern instruments, a stylistic paradigm shift'. The reviewer on website klassik.com called Volume 2 (BIS-CD-1363) 'absolutely extraordinary' and stated that 'if this high artistic level is maintained, this Beethoven cycle is set to become an interpretative milestone. Only a select few are able to arrive at such a perfect mix of youthful fire and technical mastery.' And the recently released third instalment, (BIS-SACD-1472) has fulfilled the promise of the previous discs: 'Beethoven the revolutionary comes closer than ever in Brautigam's fiery interpretations', wrote The Times (UK) and the critic on the website MusicWeb International stated that 'these are once more thoroughly exciting, utterly musical performances that make you hear this music afresh.'

Beethoven Live: 9 Symphonies

With five discs released so far in the cycle, Ronald Brautigam now takes on Beethoven's complete works for piano and orchestra, choosing to do so on a modern piano and with a modern instrument orchestra: the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, internationally acclaimed for its many fine recordings on BIS. Conducting the series is Andrew Parrott, and together with the soloist, he brings all his expertise in period performance practise to bear in interpretations that in many ways are as fresh and revolutionary as those of the sonata cycle. The present disc, with Concertos No.1 and No.3, is the first of a cycle of four, and was recorded with solo piano, without a lid, placed in the middle of the orchestra As Ronald Brautigam explains in the liner notes: 'I truly believe that what Beethoven wanted was chamber music rather than a battle between orchestra and soloist, and this makes for a wonderfully interactive set-up-, where individual players have far m ore contact with the pianist than in a regular concert set-up'.

BEETHOVEN: KLAVIERKONZERTE 1-4

For the final instalment of his survey of Beethoven's works for piano and orchestra, Ronald Brautigam has saved 'the final crowning glory of his concerto output', as Beethoven specialist Barry Cooper describes the Fifth Piano Concerto in his liner notes. The work has become known as the Emperor Concerto, as it shares its key (E flat major) as well as a certain sense of power and grandeur with the Third Symphony, the 'Eroica'. It is coupled on this disc with the Choral Fantasia - an intriguing work scored for piano, orchestra and chorus with vocal soloists. The explanation for this unusual combination is that Beethoven wanted to provide a fitting finale for one of his mammoth concerts in Vienna. The concert, which took place on 22 December 1808, included performances of the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies as well as the Fourth Piano Concerto and two movements from the Mass in C major; the Choral Fantasia thus brought all of the evening's performers on stage once more before the end of the concert. The individual discs in Ronald Brautigam's series have received numerous distinctions, including a MIDEM Classical Award in 2010, and his performances have been weighed against classic recordings by legendary pianists. 'Brautigam's account [of Concerto No. 1] compares with Richter's for sparkle, with Pollini's for cleverness, and with Michelangeli's for liveliness... The performance of Beethoven's Third Concerto that follows is even better', wrote the reviewer on website All Music.com, while the one in Gramophone deemed that the recording of the Second Concerto was 'almost as good as Serkin's account with Ormandy, which is saying something!' In the review in International Record Review of the penultimate volume, finally, the series so far was summed up as follows: 'For my money, Brautigam and Parrott are setting a new bench-mark, and I eagerly await the final instalment.' It is of course a great pleasure to be able to announce the release of that longed-for disc, with Ronald Brautigam, the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra and Andrew Parrott in their usual top form, and with the brief but crucial appearance of the eminent Eric Ericson Chamber Choir in the Choral Fantasia.

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. On this the 14th volume in his acclaimed traversal of Beethoven's keyboard music, Ronald Brautigam performs five sets, composed between 1802 and 1809. In three of these Beethoven uses themes of his own, including the Ruins of Athens Variations, Op.76, nick-named after the play for which Beethoven later wrote incidental music, reusing the martial theme in a 'Turkish march'. The two remaining sets both use English themes Beethoven’s choice of God save the King and Rule Britannia may well reflect his often expressed respect for that country – as well as his interest in the English market for sheet music. As the final part of the programme, Brautigam includes a selection of smaller pieces, most of them of an earlier date than the preceding variations. Some of these are probably student pieces, in particular the Preludes Op.39 and WoO 55 and the Fugue in C major, fruits of the counterpoint exercises Beethoven was assigned by his first teacher, Christian Gottlob Neefe, and by Johann Albrechtsberger. Six dances close a disc that offers many opportunities to glimpse another Beethoven than the composer we all believe we know.

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 14, 23, 24 & 26

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

Classical Music

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. Ronald Brautigam has already recorded these seminal works with the Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra, in acclaimed performances released between 2008 and 2010. Since then he has also released all of Beethoven’s solo piano music on the fortepiano to universal praise. When Brautigam now returns to the concertos, it is in the company of conductor Michael Alexander Willens and Die Kolner Akademie playing on period instruments. The same team has previously partnered him in an 11-album survey of Mozart’s piano concertos and it is plain to hear that all involved clearly relish the opportunity to congratulate Beethoven on the eve of his 250th anniversary.

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REVIEW:

Textures are bracingly lean, with a lightness and transparency that seems airborne. There’s nothing pompous or heavyhanded in these readings. Both Brautigam and Willens are alive to Beethoven’s every indication on the page, and that most precious of all commodities in music, the life of the phrase, is sacrosanct. Original, stylish and authoritative, this concerto set is a worthy and thought-provoking contribution to the recordings marking the Beethoven year.

– Gramophone

Opus 18 needs little introduction and is often revered as demonstrating Beethoven's total mastery of the Classical String Quartet. The Eybler Quartet completes it's exploration of these iconic quartets in an album that showcases radiantly Beethoven's fiendishly difficult tempi and his genius for finding contrast within a single pulse as well as highlighting the depths of his humour, wit and irony. The Eybler Quartet came together in 2004 to explore the works of the first century -and-a-half of the string quartet and plays on instruments appropriate to the period of the music it performs. The Toronto-based ensemble's live performances have consistently garnered praise as "glowing and committed", "spirited" and "lively and energizing". The Eybler Quartet harnesses a unique combination of talents and skills: razor-sharp ensemble skills, technical prowess, expertise in period instrument performance and an unquenchable passion for the repertoire. The group's five other recordings feature world premieres of Eybler's Opus 1, world premieres of Backofen quintets coupled with Mozart's clarinet quintet featuring Jane Booth, Haydn's six quartets Op. 33, the world premiere of Johann Baptist Vanhal's op. 6 on period instruments and volume one of Beethoven's Opus 18 the companion to the present album.