The Most Important LvB Piano Sonata Cycle Comparison in the History of the World

[Todd]

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[Todd]

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[Conrad Veidt fan]

An onerous task for you!!

What do you think of Igor Levit's complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas?  Also, Ronald Brautigam on fortepiano?

[AnotherSpin]

An onerous task for you!!

What do you think of Igor Levit's complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas?  Also, Ronald Brautigam on fortepiano?

Funny

[Mandryka]

Richter, and Solomon in op 2/i maybe.

[Todd]

What do you think of Igor Levit's complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas?  Also, Ronald Brautigam on fortepiano?

Levit is third tier and Brautigam fourth.

[Todd]

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[Brian]

Q. How does your brain handle listening to 14 versions of the same work in succession? Are multiple sittigs required?

I've been having fun in the two posts so far trying to guess the ranking based on the write-ups. Easy with the ones where you find fault, but very hard with the others, perhaps because all of the performances are so darned good that it's a game of inches. Millimeters, even. Now (as in right now!) listening to Lucchesini's 2/2.

An onerous task for you!!

What do you think of Igor Levit's complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas?  Also, Ronald Brautigam on fortepiano?

Todd described three volumes of Brautigam here 17 years ago (!!) and has a short summary of Levit here.

[Todd]

Q. How does your brain handle listening to 14 versions of the same work in succession? Are multiple sittigs required?

Oh, yeah, multiple sessions were required.  For short sonatas like Opp 49, 78, and 79, I got through all recordings in one day each, though multiple listening sessions were required.  For Op 106, it took a little over a week to work through them all. 

I've been having fun in the two posts so far trying to guess the ranking based on the write-ups. Easy with the ones where you find fault, but very hard with the others, perhaps because all of the performances are so darned good that it's a game of inches. Millimeters, even.

There are some real clunkers in this survey, and those will be obvious, but with most recordings of most sonatas, the qualitative differences between performances are small.  Sometimes, a pianist's overall style all but guarantees a great recording, and there are also some surprises, where in the context of a survey, a pianist delivers a reading that stands out more than expected based on style and memory.  Some of those will become obvious, as well. 

[prémont]

Todd described three volumes of Brautigam here 17 years ago (!!) and has a short summary of Levit here.

These links just lead me to the main page.

[San Antone]

Oh, yeah, multiple sessions were required.  For short sonatas like Opp 49, 78, and 79, I got through all recordings in one day each, though multiple listening sessions were required.  For Op 106, it took a little over a week to work through them all.

I'm retired, and still can't imagine spending the time needed to do this kind of thing.  But I appreciate the results of your efforts. Thanks - very entertaining.

[Brian]

I'm retired, and still can't imagine spending the time needed to do this kind of thing.  But I appreciate the results of your efforts. Thanks - very entertaining.

I'm trying to go through every Dvorak symphony cycle, and it's taken (checks Word file properties) 3.5 years. What a slacker   

[Leo K.]

I've been in a Beethoven sonata period, actually following Todd's top tier list, so this is great!

[Todd]

I'm retired, and still can't imagine spending the time needed to do this kind of thing.

It took about three months with ~75% of my listening being the sonatas.  It helped reset my personal baseline.  I don't think I need to do anything like this again for fifteen or twenty years.

Last year, I started in on a massive survey of the first book of Debussy's Preludes, which is my second most collected set of solo piano works, and I stopped after forty-four versions were written up.  I also pulled the plug on LvB's G Major concerto around fifty to sixty recordings in.  I don't even know if I kept those write ups.  Sometimes I just get an urge to do me some comparative listening.

[Brian]

I can't pretend that that's unthinkable to me, because I am in the middle of taste testing all 30 of Dallas' and Fort Worth's pastrami sandwiches. After lunch today, there will be only 7 left!

[Todd]

I can't pretend that that's unthinkable to me, because I am in the middle of taste testing all 30 of Dallas' and Fort Worth's pastrami sandwiches. After lunch today, there will be only 7 left!

[Conrad Veidt fan]

Levit is third tier and Brautigam fourth.

I read your review from 2007, having recently tried to buy this set from Brautigam in Australia but finding it NLA.  Your review mostly discusses the qualities of the fortepiano, to which you say you're antipathetic.  I love the instrument and I hear what Beethoven would have heard - if he could.  The instrument perfectly matches the musical aesthetic and I've no doubt that if Beethoven had heard (well, anything) the modern concert grand his music would have been composed differently;  for example, pedalling and a more impressionistic style.  A different palette of colours.

Most of the pianist you've mentioned in your comparisons I've never heard of, except for the more famous ones from the past.

To each his own and these reviews are highly personal and subjective after all.  I enjoy Levit, despite your suggestion that he hasn't anything 'new' to say about the Beethoven Sonatas.  It's his intensity that I appreciate;  his suggestion that this is 'fearless' music is what initially caught my attention.  My one criticism of Levit is his speed which is often of Argerich-inspired proportions in its rapid momentum.  A little less is more - with Levit and Argerich.

[(poco) Sforzando]

I'm really pleased that Minsoo Sohn is getting such favorable attention. I had the honor of hearing him live a few months ago in New York doing an all-Liszt program, and his Transcendental Etudes were - well, transcendental. At this point he's probably best-known as the teacher-mentor of some upstart 20-year-old South Korean who won a minor competition or two. But I'd really like to know where to find Sohn's Beethoven set on CDs. Fortunately one can download all his LvB sonatas for free from his website, but I like physical product.

[Todd]

But I'd really like to know where to find Sohn's Beethoven set on CDs.

Before I bought the downloads, I scoured North American, European, Australian, and East Asian online retailers for a physical copy.  It was nowhere to be found even at GMarket, so it appears to have been a digital only release.

[Holden]

I'm listening to Sohn only because I'd never heard him play anything before. So far his Op 2/2 is very impressive. While I like the idea of finding the best of the best I also like the idea of doing this on an individual basis - what is the best overall Op 2/1 out all the recordings? Needless to say there are not enough hours in the day to even begin to start such a mammoth task. Just deciding on one sonata would be hard enough.

Looking forward to Op 2/3