Beethoven: The Late Piano Sonatas

An older friend of mine (who was an accomplished artist) and I used to go to university art department graduation shows. So often he would look at technically polished works and comment "Know how, but no soul.". So it is here. Polished, precise, but no hesitation. No nuance. No inflection. On to the next note... full speed ahead!!! True, he doesn't stoop to what I call Gould's "Dragnet" flatness: " Please, just the notes mamm." With the greats so often what you hear is lived experience. At 24 how much lived experience can you bring to a piece? The gap between 24 and 44 can be measured in light years. And make no mistake we've all been there in our own way. Who doesn't in their twenties think they've got their head around Eliot's Quartets, Picasso's Guernica, Chartre's labyrinth, or the Mysterium Coniunctionis? But, you have to start somewhere. And this is a brilliant (technically) start. But I hope Mr. Levit will return to these pieces in the future with something more to say than "Look what I can do!".

LEVIT, Igor. Beethoven: The Late Piano Sonatas. 2 CDs. SNYM. 2013. IL, p. This two-CD recording of Beethoven’s late piano sonatas (op. 101, 106, 109-111) is wonderful! Russian-born Levit was only 26 when he recorded but so assured is he and so wise in his playing that age becomes immaterial. These compositions, written when Beethoven was totally deaf and suffering from depression, have stirred up more controversy than his other earlier work, prompting an early commentator to write that they were the works of a man who had gone mad. They don’t seem that chaotic now, but they are free of constricting rules on musical composition that may have held sway then but seem inessential now. This is rigorously demanding music that requires an artist who can combine ferocious technique with great sensitivity. I read a criticism of this recording that complained of Levit’s lack of dramatic expressiveness. I wonder if the listener was listening to the same music I was, because unexpressiveness is not a term I would apply to it. This is first-rate piano playing and rich, deep, beautiful music.

I read a New York Times review of a recent (March 2014) performance by Igor Levit at a tiny venue in New York City. I gather he does not show up in the United States very often and the reviewer was intrigued. Levit played the last three Beethoven piano sonatas and it sounds like the audience was enraptured. The reviewer, who was rather bowled over himself, mentioned that Levit had recorded the last five Beethoven sonatas and I wondered how he handled these daunting pieces.All I can say is that these recordings go straight to my A-list, up there with the classic performances by Arthur Schnabel and Richard Goode. Levit handles most of the technical challenges with easy virtuosity (his trilling might be a little better … or maybe not; I'll have to listen some more). But it is the emotional and interpretive maturity that he brings to these works, which Schnabel famously described as "better than they can be played," that really impresses. Perhaps what I like most about the Levit performances is their sense of spontaneity: they sound as if they were being played by a real human being.

igor levit doing beethovan - a wonderful 2 cd-s of piano music - I have these same sonatas on cd played by other artists - the sonatas are great music and have been enjoyed by people for what? centuries ? and here we have them played by Mr. Levit and I feel doing better than other artists I have listened to doing the same sonatas

I'm not particularly good at writing extensive, detailed reviews so all I can tell you is (1 I really liked this set. Beautiful piano tone, greater clarity in the fugues than I usually hear (just a few brief muddy spots), careful attention to dynamics, impressive finger work. (2 Many will argue that this doesn't sound like gruff, intense, dark Beethoven. No, it doesn't. Neither does Arrau's, Kempff 's or a number of others. It does sound like a set of great performances. The competition is stiff in this repertoire and you probably already have several Late Sonata sets but Levit is more than up to the task and you really do need to hear this CD.

Igor Levit - as many others have noticed - has a rare insight, "clean" style and impeccable technique that - so to speak - makes himself near scarse. Perhaps the greatest compliment you can give an interpreter. Though personnally not in any way an expert in Beethoven a delight to rediscover these wonderful late sonatas "as fresh as when he wrote them". Forget any misunderstandings about Beethoven (at that time) as an old, bitter man. Beautiful and lots and lots to discover and enjoy!

Enjoying it very much.

There's something oddly subversive about the Hammerklavier as played here -- pauses held slightly too long, emphases strangely placed. There's an archly false quality, a subtle mockery.The album photos, too, are strange -- the latest Sony wunderkind is portrayed as an introspective altar boy, but one who's resentfully but dutifully playing a role in which he doesn't believe.He gets the notes right, of course, but subverts our emotional expectations.

I feel like I'm missing out on something here, as I do not find myself in agreement with the plethora of positive reviews. My reaction is not an instinctive antipathy to Mr Levit's playing (I love his Diabelli variations), however I feel he dispatches the sonatas immaculately but superficially. In his late sonatas Beethoven delves into the depths of the human soul and attempts to relay its inexpressible secrets to the listener through a medium only understandable through feeling. They are works of a passionate man without place in society, but who still holds a love for humanity. Here certain words come all too easily, and secrets remain undiscovered. The works emerge here almost as bland feel-good music, without conflict and, sadly, without heart. To take one example, in the words of Edward Sackville-West the last pages of op. 111 should leave one on the shores of paradise. Here I'm enjoying a sunny summer's day on Blackpool beach. If you want a modern performance turn to Paul Lewis who truly achieves innigkeit in this movement, otherwise all the old favourites (Kempff, Arrau and co) still hold up very well. Jumping back, the Hammerklavier has an arresting first movement and a relatively good scherzo. The adagio should stop you dead though, a bleak ice-capped mountain of loneliness, and here it all flows by like a chilly Nordic stream. Similarly the last movements of op 109 and 110 slide gently through one’s consciousness, without leaving behind a trace of emotion.Throughout, the quick movements are dispatched with tremendous energy and resolve, but the contemplative movements lack something (experience?). This was a brave first release for a pianist, but for me misses the mark.

For a young pianist to choose the late Beethoven sonatas for his first recording is bold, even foolhardy. Many ultimately great Beethovenians have left their first thoughts on record - Brendel and Barenboim spring to mind - and although they provide some interesting insights, they are uneven, and in some movements or sonatas, unmemorable or unsatisfying.Igor Levit is different. These are now my most frequently played recordings of these sonatas: I've listened to each disc about 20 times in the first month, and on each listening I notice something new. There's power and courage - some bold, dramatic interpretations - but subtlety, flexibility and beauty of sound, without ever sounding self-regarding or cosmetic.I think these are two discs I will continue to enjoy for many years to come.Having collected many historical recordings, and been bored by the competition-smoothed, faultless but characterless young pianists in the 1990s, I've lately been bowled over by a new generation of musicians who play the piano - Igor Levit, Ingrid Fliter, Nikolai Lugansky, Rafal Blechacz and Yevgeny Sudbin strike me as performers with breadth of vision, individuality and consummate technique which put them on a plane with Richter, Gilels, Curzon, Rubinstein, even Schnabel. It's a wonderful time to appreciate piano music.

I can add little to the other reviews, save to confirm that as a collector with all the 'great' recordings (and quite a few odd others), this should be in the collection of anyone who adores the LvB sonatas.Igor Levit has superb poise, fantastic dynamic control, and evident thoughtfulness in his interpretations. Every time I thought he was going too fast or slow, when I looked at the timings I realised he has Horowitz's ability to defy your senses. Horowitz was ill-matched to Beethoven, but he could balance a mountain on a pinhead, pianistically, and if this is what Levit can achieve now, heaven knows what breadth and depth he will achieve in maturity.Five stars or more to Igor Levit, but zero stars to whichever dull and ungrateful suit at Sony decided that the CD booklet should comprise a long-winded, grandiose, but by definition speculative essay on Beethoven's psyche during the period of the late sonatas (as if we need another), but not a single word - not one! - about the illustrious young pianist who gave us these superb performances.

I have five versions of the late Beethoven sonatas. The Igor Levit set is by far the best Particularly theHammerklaviier.Barn.

Levit has the lot - power, control, musicianship - and gives stunning performances of these wonderful works. The first movement of the Hammerklavier is quite fast, and played with a lighter touch than one usually hears, but this is observation, not criticism, In fact, I don't think I could find anything to criticise if I wanted to. I hope I'm around long enough to see how he develops over the next decade or so. If you buy these, you won't regret it.