Beethoven Piano Your resource for the piano music of Ludwig van Beethoven

author: Ludwig van Beethoven asin: 0486231348 binding: Paperback list price: $16.95 USD amazon price: $11.53 USD

Volume 1 of authoritative Schenker edition includes Op. 2, Nos. 1-3; Op. 7, Op. 10, Nos. 1-3; Op. 13, op. 14, Nos. 1-2; Op. 22; Op. 26; Op. 27, Nos. 1-2; Op. 28.

asin: B0000V86PA binding: Audio CD list price: $64.99 USD amazon price: $64.99

Artur Schnabel Complete Piano Sonatas of Ludwig van Beethoven 8CD set

asin: B00000K4FL binding: Audio CD list price: $11.98 USD amazon price: $9.99 USD

More than 70 years have passed since the Cortot-Thibaud-Casals trio waxed the Schubert B flat and Beethoven Archduke trios. Both recordings were hailed as classics in the early days of electrical recording and have enjoyed numerous incarnations on LP and CD. Even if you already own these performances, you honestly haven't heard them until you experience these new restorations. The effect is not unlike washing your eyeglasses. All the surface snap, crackle, and swish has been tamed, but more room tone emerges along with long-buried, intermingling overtones from all three instruments. There's more tempo fluctuation than modern ears may be accustomed to, along with Thibaud's slippery portamentos. Yet these devices are channeled toward specific expressive ends. Mannered they may seem, but indulgent, never. And listeners used to Cortot's freewheeling approach to solo repertoire will be surprised at how much he behaves himself in a chamber music context. Write, petition, call, beg, cajole, do anything to induce EMI to bring out the remainder of this trio's recorded output in equally amazing transfers. --Jed Distler