Ludwig van Beethoven - Piano Sonatas Nos. 28 & 29 (Emil Gilels)

Information

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven

1. Piano Sonata No. 28 in A major, Op. 101: 1. Etwas lebhaft und mit der innigsten Empfindung (Allegretto ma non troppo)
2. Piano Sonata No. 28 in A major, Op. 101: 2. Lebhaft, marschmäßig (Vivace alla marcia)
3. Piano Sonata No. 28 in A major, Op. 101: 3. Langsam und sehnsuchtsvoll (Adagio ma non troppo, con affetto)
4. Piano Sonata No. 28 in A major, Op. 101: 4. Geschwind, doch nicht zu sehr und mit Entschlossenheit (Allegro)
5. Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 - "Hammerklavier": 1. Allegro
6. Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 - "Hammerklavier": 2. Scherzo (Assai vivace - Presto - Prestissimo - Tempo I)
7. Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 - "Hammerklavier": 3. Adagio sostenuto
8. Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 - "Hammerklavier": 4. Largo - Allegro risoluto

Emil Gilels, piano
Date: 1972 (1-4), 1982 (5-8)
Label: Deutsche Grammophon
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/cat/4636392

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review

There is in this performance a real sense of the meeting of minds, of great issues imaginatively addressed. Beethoven's conception is a seamless whole; and the CD presents that whole with flawless ease.

On CD the music has an electric physical immediacy; in the first movement the piano sound is at once as luminous and as physically solid as the marble out of which Michelangelo hewed his masterpieces. Having listened to the performance many times since I first reviewed the LP last December, I am more and more convinced by the integrity and probity of Gilels's—in some ways, highly personal—way with the sonata as a whole and its first movement in particular. There the sense of travail is not so much physical (for all one's heightened awareness of the physical fact of the piano) as imaginative. Musically, there's no racing or ranting. Instead there is a sense of Beethoven's striving for some moment of transfiguration (Gilels's playing is endlessly satisfying in lyrical passages) which never actually arrives. It is glimpsed, perhaps, in the slow movement, with its lofty, disburdened beauty. Here the sheer clarity of the recording may be a slight drawback, though all recordings suffer to an extent from their inability to convey a sense of distance; the sense one has in the concert hall of really quiet music coming from afar. As I said in my original review, Gilels doesn't use his virtuosity to conquer or tame the final fugue. The sense of disorder is not minimized; rather, it is provisionally challenged by Gilels's unerringly lucid sense of Beethoven's own massive intellectual and imaginative achievement in presenting us with so searing and desperately beautiful a glimpse of purgatory itself. As Rodney Milnes aptly observed in the end-of-year "Critics' Choice" on BBC Radio 3's Record Review, there is in this performance a real sense of the meeting of minds, of great issues imaginatively addressed. And how good it is to be able to go from one unresolved movement to the next without the need to turn over the disc. Beethoven's conception is a seamless whole; and the CD presents that whole with flawless ease.

-- Gramophone [2/1984]
reviewing the original release, which won the Gramophone Award for Best Instrumental Recording of 1984.

More reviews:
http://www.classicstoday.com/review/review-11208/
http://www.allmusic.com/album/beethoven-piano-sonata-no-29-hammerklavier-op-106-mw0001575793
http://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Hammerklavier-Sonata-Gramophone-Collection/dp/B0001CKQZQ

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ludwig van Beethoven (baptized 17 December 1770 – 26 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential of all composers. Beethoven is acknowledged as a giant of classical music, and his influence on subsequent generations was profound. His best-known compositions include 9 symphonies, 5 piano concertos, 1 violin concerto, 32 piano sonatas and 16 string quartets. Many of his most admired works come from the last decade of his life, when he was almost completely deaf.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_van_Beethoven

***

Emil Gilels (October 19, 1916 – October 14, 1985) was a Soviet pianist, widely regarded one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century. Gilels studied at the Odessa Conservatory with Bertha Reingbald, whom he regarded as his true teacher, mentor and lifelong friend. Gilels is universally admired for his superb technical control and burnished tone. His interpretations of the German-Austrian classics formed the core of his extensive repertoire, which range from from Baroque to late Romantic and 20th century. He also performed and recorded chamber music with Leonid Kogan, Mstislav Rostropovich and his daughter Elena.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Gilels

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FLAC, tracks

Links in comment

Enjoy!