Frédéric Chopin: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1-3

Idil Biret, the Turkish pianist who masterfully performs the three piano sonatas by Chopin in this 1991 Naxos release, has recorded prolifically for the label including complete works by Chopin, Beethoven, Brahms and Rachmaninoff, much of which this blogger owns and greatly enjoys,

Her technique and sensitivity to the material is obvious, even to a true amateur listener such as this blogger, though the fact that the emotional expression in her work comes through so that it can be felt by anyone who pays due attention is testament to her remarkable abilities.

Biret, a native of Turkey, studied from a young age and learned under the legendary Nadia Boulanger in Paris, becoming a soloist in major concert halls from the age of 16.  Her work with Chopin led her to receive Poland's highest civilian honor, the Cross of the Order of Merit as well as a Grand Prix du Disque Frédéric Chopin award for her complete recordings of the composer.

The best known of the three sonatas presented here is, of course, the second, known as "The Funeral March" of 1837 with its very familiar dirge theme, but the third sonata from 1844 is excellent. The first, completed in 1828, when Chopin was still in his teens, was not published until after his death and may be seen as a student's experiment, albeit of a student of a genius level.

As stated in the notes and elsewhere, Chopin's music was not the bombastic, concert hall ready type exemplified by his flashy contemporary, Franz Liszt.  It was more nuanced and was very delicate and elegant and, as Ulrich Spratte states in the notes, was "in the more refined ambiance of the fashionable salon" rather than the grand hall.

In the hands of a peerless interpreter like Biret, this gorgeous music is given its fullest expression.  Biret and Naxos proved to have had a remarkable and rare partnership in presenting music like this that is a fantastic experience to hear.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Complete Piano Sonatas

Any appreciable amount of time spent listening to Mozart is an awe-inspiring experience considering how short a time he lived, the amount of varied music he wrote, and the fact that, as the notes to this great box-set indicate, "Mozart had little or not need to write down sonatas: he improvised them, making an impression on his audience on the spur of the moment . . . [he] only wrote down what he had to."  Obviously, he was a total prodigy--a performer and composer whose gifts come only on the rarest of occasions--and much of what made him such a legend in 18th-century music circles was done for the moment and then lost.

There were, in all, twenty-two sonatas by the master for solo performance on the keyboard, the four earliest, starting from when Mozart was ten years old, having been lost, leaving eighteen.  The last of the sonatas came in July 1789, a little over two years before the composer died.  This set, released in 1996 by the British Nimbus label and totaling a little over six hours on as many discs, is performed by the excellent Bulgarian-born Marta Deyanova.  The recordings were largely made in 1989 and 1990, with one track laid down in 1995 and the sound is superb.

The notes by David Threasher compactly and succinctly discuss the eighteen sonatas and a nice touch are quotes from letters written by Mozart to his father Leopold.  One of these is from 1777, in which the 21-year old informed his father that "I played all my six sonatas today" and then quoted from a Count Savioli who told Mozart that "I hear that you play the clavier [a precursor to the modern piano] quite passably."  The composer then merely stated that, "I bowed."  These six works came from two years prior to the letter.

Threasher pointed out that Mozart's earliest piano sonatas were influenced by a set of six sonatas published in 1774 by the great Franz Josef Haydn, although he also noted that Mozart's improvisatory powers were dominant in at least the first of the sextet.

In a letter to his father written four days later than the one quoted above, Mozart wrote that he had just composed a rondo for a sonata, this being a Sonata in C Major and for which he had totally improvised a rondo "full of din and sound" a few weeks prior.  This work was dedicated to a young pupil, Rose Cannabich, with a pretty andante which may have reflected strong feelings the composer had to his charge.  His next set of sonatas came, then, in 1777-78, during which time Mozart experienced difficulties working in Paris, where he was underappreciated and in which his mother died during a visit to him.

A few sonatas were written in 1783, just after his marriage to Constanze Weber and while the pair were living in Salzburg with his father.  Threasher wrote that "Mozart was aware that he would need a fund of new music for the purposes of performance, pedagogy and perhaps publication, and composed these three sonatas to fill such a need."  One of these, in A major, is among the composer's most-beloved pieces, featuring the stunning Rondo alla Turca finale.

Further works came later in 1783 and during the following year, including the famed C minor sonata and a stand-alone fantasia in that key that usually proceeds the other in performance.  This fantasia, even amongst the greatness of the other solo piano works, astounds with its jaw-dropping technicality and its beauty.

Finally, a quartet of sonatas came in 1788 and 1789 and characteristically at least one of these, the F major was written to pay off one of his chronic debts--in this case to his publisher.   Another, a C major, was intended for teaching and bore the title "Little Sonata for Beginners."  The final two, coming in 1789, remained unpublished until after Mozart's death and one, a B flat, appeared as a work for piano and violin, with the latter assumed not to have been the master's work.

As to Deyanova, who has recorded many albums of piano music for Nimbus, including works by Schubert, Scriabin, Chopin and Rachmaninoff, she was a prize-winning performer as a child in her homeland and then won international competitions in Italy, Paris and in Sofia.  After a 1969 prize-winning performance, Yehudi Mehunin wrote that "I wish Marta Deyanova the international career she so richly deserves."  Fortunately, that did happen, as she has toured the world over and, from 1978, recorded her extensive solo piano work for Nimbus.

Ludwig von Beethoven: Favourite Piano Sonatas

This post highlights a very impressive double-disc package of Beethoven piano sonatas issued by the German record label, Philips, and consists of performances recorded between 1970 and 1977 by Alfred Brendel, born in what is now the Czech Republic and who lived for many years in Austria.  At around 40, he finally received recognition outside of Austria and later moved to England where he still resides, at age 81, though arthritis ended his performing career four years ago.

Brendel was known as a skilled performer of works by Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert and others from the 18th and 19th centuries, though he is also highly regarded for his performances of twelve-tone row serialist composer Arnold Schoënberg.

Beethoven, of course, had a long and varied career filled with staggering works embracing his nine powerful symphonies (to be featured in a "For Fanatics Only" post one day), dynamic string quartets, and a catalog of excellent concertos.  In the liner notes essay "A Spiritual Journey:  Beethoven Piano Sonatas" by Julian Haylock, a musician who has written biographies on such figures as Puccini and Rachmaninov, worked as a critic and penned a great many essays for liner notes, the writer notes that "the piano was Beethoven's natural expressive outlet" and the composer was a virtuoso on that instrument, especially in physical performances that had a profound impression on audiences and often physical ones on the battered pianos, to boot.

The seven sonatas featured on this impressive 150+ minute set feature some of Beethoven's most beloved and timeless works, such as the "Appasionata," "Pathétique," "Pastoral," and "Moonlight."  The latter, titled the Quasi una Fantasia by the composer when completed in 1801, has generally been considered the best, or at least one of the finest, of Beethoven's works for piano, though some have taken issue with the popular title of "Moonlight," pointing out, with ample reason, that the "Fantasia" is more appropriate because of the great range of emotions, tempo, and coloration embodied in the three movements. 

The power of the final movement is such the Haylock quotes a friend of Beethoven and composer Anton Reicha regarding his role in Beethoven's rendition of this astounding movement: "He asked me to turn the pages, but I was too busy wrenching the strings out of the piano as they broke, while the hammers got jammed . . . I worked harder than Beethoven!"

Another nice little anecdote, touching upon Beethoven's often-prickly personality, deals with his "The Tempest," which opens disc 2 of the set.  When asked about the inspiration for the sonata, the composer is said to have burst out with "Read Shakespeare's The Tempest!"  There doesn't appear, evidently, to be much directly in common between the two works, so it is assumed the composer was applying a caustic sense of humor that may not have caught on particularly well.  While there is much passion and energy in this work, there are also beautiful moments of contemplation and calm, as is often the case with the great composer's best work.

Meanwhile, the "Pathétique," which was finished in 1798 was a highly-successful work from its release and its middle movement, the Adagio cantabile, is famed for its melody.  The work has often been viewed as being directly influences by Mozart's 14th piano sonata from about fifteen years before.

The "Appasionata," finished in 1805 or 1806 as Beethoven's hearing had greatly deteriorated, begins solemnly and stately enough, but is soon transformed in its first movement into a propulsive and driving force of nature with crashing cords from both hands complemented by some gorgrous lyrical themes.  The second movement, as is often the case with "middle passages" in classical music is a more soothing, calming exposition of a theme and several variations.  Intensity returns full throttle during the closing movement with ends in a staggering coda of great power.

This set of seven of Beethoven's thirty-two piano sonatas is an excellent cross-section of his works in that genre and Brendel plays exquisitely throughout.  Amateur listeners, such as YHB, can benefit greatly from Haylock's concise and clear discussion of these works, and this essay is an excellent example of liners that strike a solid balance between being too technical or worshipful and being too general or vague.  Philips has put out a disc that seasoned Beethoven lovers and newcomers alike should appreciate.