Listen to this. The piano is 🔥 BURNING 🔥 ! That's how I like it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0yoX2b9_hk
Who is there now?
'Ne cherchez plus mon coeur, les bêtes l'ont mangé.' Baudelaire
Lang Lang.
You're my wife now.
No. He doesn't have that kind of fire.
'Ne cherchez plus mon coeur, les bêtes l'ont mangé.' Baudelaire
Historically, no one can touch the great Artur Schnabel.
"Whatever is morally necessary must be made politically possible" - Eugene McCarthy
Beethoven's sonatas are fathomless, enough so that no one player can hope to encompass every possible mood and nuance. Gilels is certainly one of my "essentials." I don't think anyone could play them with the same power, drama, and pristine musicality. He's certainly one of the virtuosos that had a real command over the technical challenges. On the other hand, Arrau's Beethoven is very special to me, as I think he brings out the depth and profundity of Beethoven, especially late Beethoven, better than anyone. Gilels and Arrau are, in a way, mirrored approaches; both entirely valid, but with completely different virtues (Gilels more analytically musical, Arraru more emotionally philosophical). Richter was a chameleon who could adapt his approach to each piece and bring out whatever aspects he thought were relevant. Like Gilels he had unlimited technique, but he used it towards very different approaches. Kempff, on the other hand, had an unmatched lyricism, and I think he brings out the beauty in a way few pianists can.
I can't imagine living with only ONE set of these sonatas, but Gilels would certainly be on my short-list for the best. Shame he didn't record them all, and not having a recording of #32 is a great shame.
warriorspirit: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost.
Beethoven's sonatas are fathomless, enough so that no one player can hope to encompass every possible mood and nuance.
Well, maybe Liszt did okay.
And maybe the composer himself, before the obvious problem became a factor.
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But we don't know and we never heard it.
'Ne cherchez plus mon coeur, les bêtes l'ont mangé.' Baudelaire
Hard to conjecture about performers whom we've never heard, and impossible to compare second-hand reports to first-hand experience. I'm sure Liszt was a phenomenal pianist, but I can't imagine anyone being definitively better than the likes of Horowitz, Richter, and Hamelin. At that level, it's more about different-but-equal than better.
warriorspirit: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost.
but I can't imagine anyone being definitively better than the likes of Horowitz, Richter, and Hamelin.
I can, in the same way that Jimi Hendrix is definitively better than all other electric guitarists and Louis Armstrong is definitively better than all other jazz trumpeters.
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