The fourth volume of András Schiff's Beethoven cycle for ECM New Series contains the sonatas Opp. 26, 27 and 28, written in 1800 and 1801, among them the "Moonlight" Sonata, Op. 27 No. 2. Schiff sees these works as the close of Beethoven's early period, years in which the composer mastered characterisation and experimented freely with form. Each of the four has a strong individual profile, and Schiff's attention to the score makes even the most familiar of them sound unexpected.
The recording comes from the recital of 24 April 2005 at the Tonhalle Zürich. As with every programme of the cycle, Schiff had played it in around fifteen cities first. He records only live because, as he told Minnesota Public Radio, artists "live for those very moments when music really happens". He played a Viennese Bösendorfer. Manfred Eicher produced and Stephan Schellmann was the Tonmeister. The booklet contains an extensive conversation with Martin Meyer on the repertoire and its interpretation.
Op. 26 is the first sonata in which Beethoven opens with a set of variations, and its third movement is the Marcia funebre sulla morte d'un Eroe, sombre here without dragging. The two Op. 27 sonatas carry the heading "quasi una fantasia", announcing a freer form. In the Adagio sostenuto of the "Moonlight", Schiff follows Beethoven's markings literally, with a flowing alla breve pulse and the right pedal held down, so that the harmonies blur and rub against each other. Op. 28 returns to the classical four-movement plan, and its finale takes on an unexpectedly Schubertian breadth. Here Schiff avoids expressive pauses and keeps the music moving, a contrast with more lyrical, dramatic readings.
Peter Hagmann wrote in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, after the Zurich recital: "Nobody in the hall will have heard this first movement like that before." In The Sunday Times, Stephen Pettitt found the playing "always suffused with a lovely, fluid singing quality", and noted that Schiff meets the drama of the "Moonlight" finale head on. The disc was a BBC Music Choice and entered the quarterly list of the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik (3/2007).
CD edition, ECM New Series 1944, released in May 2007, the fourth of eight volumes in the cycle.
