Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
Complete Works for Solo Piano - Volume 9
3 Sonatas WoO.47 'Kurfürsten Sonatas' [40:54]
Zwei Sätze einer Sonatine WoO.50 [2:34]
2 Leichte Sonatinen, Kinsky-Hahn Anh.5 [8:38]
Zwei Stücke für Klavier (Orphika) WoO.51 [7:29]
Ronald Brautigam (fortepiano)
rec. August 2008, Österåker Church, Sweden, DDD/DSD.Stereo/Surround
BIS-SACD-1672 [60:54]
Ronald Brautigam could easily have overlooked these early unpublished works
in his survey of Beethoven's piano music, but his fans will be grateful that
he didn't. It's not the greatest music in the world, but that hasn't stopped
the pianist preparing and presenting the works with the same level of care
and dedication that he brings to the mature music. And the high-end audio
is put to good use reproducing the nuanced textures of the fortepiano.
The three 'Kurfürsten Sonatas' are the main offering here. The musical
language of each of them is well within the rigorous formulaic conventions
of the late 18th century, so if continual use of Alberti bass and
whimsical cadential ornaments makes your teeth grate, this might not be for
you. On the other hand, the sheer life that Brautigam brings to this music
transcends all the conventions. He finds wonderful humour in many of the movements,
as if they were the work of a younger and less self-conscious Haydn.
The dynamic range that the fortepiano offers is surprising. Sure, it doesn't
have the very loudest sonorities of a modern grand, but it has just about
everything else. Brautigam really makes the most of these dynamic possibilities,
often articulating the structure of a movement through the subtlest of gradations
in crescendos or answering phrases. The bass end of the instrument is a little
boxy, as you might expect, but Beethoven never demands more from his left
hand figurations than the instrument can deliver. And again the high quality
audio ensures that nothing in the middle or bass register is every obscured.
The 'Zwei Sätze einer Sonatine' may be familiar to former piano students,
who'll have come across them at about the grade 6 level. I did myself, but
they never sounded like this when I played them. Brautigam again delivers
a performance filled with bounce and vitality. So too in the '2 Leichte Sonatinen'
and the 'Zwei Stücke für Klavier (Orphika)'. The justification for
skipping these last two works in a Beethoven piano survey is even stronger,
the former are only tentatively attributed to the composer, while the later
was written for a completely different instrument. (The orphica was apparently
a kind of small spinet.) Again, the performances are first rate. The music
of these fragments and short movements is slightly more liberated from the
stylistic conventions, at least in terms of texture, which ranges from the
monophonic to the heavily chordal. There are no memorable melodies to speak
of though, and it is easy to find yourself marvelling at the sound of the
instrument and forgetting all about what is being played on it.
And you really can't forget that this is a fortepiano. The sound is as civilised
as you could hope from such an instrument, but it still has a certain rustic
colour. Brautigam is conservative with his pedalling, or rather with his kneeing,
as he is using a sustaining knee lever under the keyboard. But even with more
knee, I suspect the instrument would produce a fairly dry sound. Fortunately,
it is in the safe hands of the BIS engineers, who by volume 9 of this project
have really mastered the instrument's recording potential. In lesser hands,
the sound could seem distant and uninvolving, but here the fortepiano has
a real presence. It's almost like having the instrument in front of you. Repertoire-wise,
this wouldn't be my first choice from the Brautigam Beethoven cycle, but in
terms of performance and recording it is the equal of any of its predecessors.
Gavin Dixon
Repertoire-wise, this wouldn't be my first choice from the Brautigam Beethoven
cycle, but in terms of performance and recording it is the equal of any of
its predecessors.