Conducting Beethoven from the piano

[Barbirollians]

Having just listened to the short extracts available on the Presto website (and before I knew anything else about the recording), it was the size of the orchestra and particularly the small complement of strings, that struck me immediately rather than the sound of the fortepiano. It is this rather than anything else that makes it sound completely different to any other recording I have heard; as Jayne would say, it makes us listen with new ears.

I must admit to being very tempted by the recording.

I didn't't like the wiry string sound much either but it was the piano I really could not abide - very much unlike Brautigam's piano .

[Barbirollians]

I didn't't like the wiry string sound much either but it was the piano I really could not abide - very much unlike Brautigam's piano .

What size I wonder were the forces when Beethoven arranged his benefit concert at Theater an der Wien ?

[Bryn]

. . . very much unlike Brautigam's piano .

Which one? He has recorded these concertos on two different modern copies of instruments Beethoven would have been familiar with, and also a modern (lidless) Steinway.

[Barbirollians]

Which one? He has recorded these concertos on two different modern copies of instruments Beethoven would have been familiar with, and also a modern (lidless) Steinway.

The one I referred to above with Willens on BIS.

[Bryn]

The one I referred to above with Willens on BIS.

In that case, which of the two instruments he used for those recordings, The copy of a c. 1805 Walter or that of a c. 1819 Graf? They are each, after all, rather different, tonally. #31 made no mention of which Brautigam recording it was referring to.

[CallMePaul]

Is there a truly successful recorded cycle apart from the Cleveland/Ashkenazy where this has been done .

What about the Buchbinder/ Vienna Phil set on Sony?

[kea]

It never seems to occur to the reflexing early-piano-haters that there might just be something of interest going on at a musical, performative and interpretive level...

True in most cases. Would not say that is true in the Schoonderwoerd cycle: slow, leaden tempi, amateurish and uneven piano playing, and no real interpretive insights that I could detect. I'd be interested to hear a recording by different artists (or even simply a different pianist) with that instrumental setup, as I'm sure it could work.

That said I don't actually have any self-conducted Beethoven piano concertos; my reference cycle tends to be Tan/Norrington and I also have Immerseel/Weil, but I also listen to the music very infrequently at this point. Of the newer cycles out there I've considered Bezuidenhout/Heras-Casado and Wallisch/Haselböck, but not very seriously, and can't think of any cycles I would be interested in that meet the criteria of: period instruments, use Beethoven's cadenzas, and self-conducted. I will take suggestions (other than Schoonderwoerd) though.

[Bryn]

As you have misrepresented me by implication for the sake of clarity I don’t hate early pianos . I don’t like the sound of this one though which I heard on Qubuz not on YouTube and I think there is much to learn from the better HIPP performers but just not this one.

Hmm. Which of the two fortepianos used is it that you find wanting, the Fritz or the Walter copy?

[Barbirollians]

Gosh I was joking but it seems there is a Cristofori Eroica on AVI released last October 2021- Gramophone did not review it but it received a pasting in BBC Music Magazine as " skeletal " .

I shall go and listen to one of their first three concertos as apparently that was on a different piano to the Fifth - an 1800 Walter .

[Barbirollians]

Indeed the piano used for the Third which I have just listened to the first six or seven minutes sounds nowhere near as bad as the one used for the Fifth but is a very harpsichord soundalike fortepiano . The violin is a more than a little teeth on edge .

[Braunschlag]

Just had the misfortune to listen to the first movement of the Fifth on You Tube - sounds like the piano in a pub I used to go to in the 1980s .

Having tried it I really wish I hadn’t lost a quarter of an hour so pointlessly - truly, the emperors new clothes

[Barbirollians]

As it happens, I find that 'contribution' of yours, "terrible on every level'. To quote Ives, (someone, regrettably, not known for enlightened sexual politics) "stand up and use your ears like a man". Sheesh, there's a right cabal of Rollos on this forum.

For goodness sake - some people like the Cristofori recordings of the Beethoven piano concertos and some people do not . The idea that Braunschlag did not like it because I didn't is risible JLW and I cannot see any reason for this personal insult either . It is as if nobody is allowed to have a different opinion to some contributors on here . It is time surely to calm down and accept we all hear things differently.


I am out of here for a few days at least.

[Bryn]

For goodness sake - some people like the Cristofori recordings of the Beethoven piano concertos and some people do not . The idea that Braunschlag did not like it because I didn't is risible JLW and I cannot see any reason for this personal insult either . It is as if nobody is allowed to have a different opinion to some contributors on here . It is time surely to calm down and accept we all hear things differently.


I am out of here for a few days at least.

Oh. I see. It's fine to dismiss a performance, and by implication, the opinion of those who appreciate it, as "terrible on every level", but an outrage to respond in kind, replete with ameliorating emoticon, eh?

[pastoralguy]

The two recentish (well, in the last ten years, conductor-lite cycles with which I am familiar on record are Andsnes (with the Mahler CO) .

I was lucky enough to hear this cycle in Edinburgh, London and New York and found the performances superb. The players were really Listening to what was happening. (I love the cds too!)

Like Dougie, I was a little disappointed with Lisiecki on disc but they may have been more convincing live.

[Barbirollians]

What about the Buchbinder/ Vienna Phil set on Sony?

I don't know that one - is it good? I have a vague memory of it receiving somewhat lukewarm reviews ?