Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 1: Nos. 16, 17, & 18 ~ Lewis

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 1: Nos. 16, 17, & 18 ~ Lewis

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 1: Nos. 16, 17, & 18 ~ Lewis
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Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Performer: Paul Lewis
Edition: Music CD
Format: Import
CD Release Date: 2005-11-08
Music Label: Harmonia Mundi Fr.
Soundtracks:
  1. I. Allegro Vivace
  2. II. Adagio Grazio
  3. III. Rondo Allegretto
  4. I. Largo. Allegro
  5. II. Adagio
  6. III. Allegretto
  7. I. Allegro
  8. II. Scherzo. Allegretto Vivace
  9. III. Menuetto. Moderato E Grazioso
  10. IV. Presto Con Fuoco

Music reviews of Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 1: Nos. 16, 17, & 18 ~ Lewis

Music Review: Lewis starts his cycle with assurance and poise, but the "Tempest" isn't stormy
Rating: 4 Stars

(Note: instead of reviewing Paul Lewis's Beethoven cycle as a whole, I'll write separate reviews of each installment. As it happens, when Harmonia Mundia assembled the box set of the complete sonatas, they retained the layout of each installment, so it makes even more sense to approach them invidivudally.)

I wonder if Paul Lewis's record label wanted to put their toes in the water by releasing Vol. 1 of his Beethoven cycle as a single disc? the succeeding installments contained three discs each, an expensive proposition for the buyer. It was easy to get hooked on Lewis from the very start, however. In a sense he's the Goldilocks of Beethoven players, not as light as Kempff, as detached as Brendel, or as erratic as Richter, but just right. That's too glib, however. It's remarkable for a pianist in his thirties to sound as accomplished as Lewis does. Two brilliant Schubert recordings proved his mettle, and he brings the same innate musical instincts to Beethoven. Without sounding at all studied, his phrasing is classically proportioned; without sounding idiosyncratic he gives a sense of spontaneity. Put those ingredients together and you have a rare result: MATURE PLAYING THAT SOUNDS ALIVE>

This single disc is devoted to the three sonatas of Op. 31, long beloved and often recorded. The named sonata in this group is No. 2, the 'Tempest,' and one can't escape that all the named sonatas are the ones that the public recognizes. Even so, all three are lovely representations of Beethoven at a decisive time when he could be elegant and even witty as well as tempestuous. Already thirty-one when he began to write the Op. 31 group in 1801 -- the first to appear was the 'Tempest,' although it is listed second -- and with fifteen sonatas behind him, Beethoven made a conscious, decided break with the classical past, declaring his high ambitions for a new style.

Lewis seems attuned to both the forward and backward looking aspects of this music. Unlike Richter, who attacked it with high Romantic fervor and revolutionary zeal, Lewis sees this as a balanced idiom, and he makes you smile where you're supposed to in Op. 31 no. 1, drolly echoing the bass trills that would crop up later in the Diabelli Variations, where it's hard to tell if Beethoven is joking or not (the next most famous bass trill would appear, quite mysteriously, in the opening of Schubert's monumental last sonata, D. 960 in B flat.) Lewis's biography notes that he studied with Brendel, but to me his playing sounds more like Richard Goode's or Murray Perahia's in its assured modesty, if I may coin a phrase.

I felt that Lewis was tempted to make the first sonata sound too uniform, but the 'Tempest' is a study in dramatic contrast. Here Lewis gives us a clue to his overall approach, because once again he is tempted to smooth out the variety of Beethoven's moods. After the brooding few bars marked Largo, he doesn't pounce on the stormy theme as he should, thus losing the intended effect. Serkin and Richter would never have made such a mistake, although the general taste nowadays, which has clearly influenced Lewis, is to reduce Beethoven to the scale of Haydn. Only in the finale does Lewis seem to catch a whiff of drama. Happily, he would go on later in his cycle to correct some of this reticence.

There's more life, thankfully, in the third sonata, where for the first time I felt that Lewis was as engaged as he was in his best Schubert. This music wears a crooked smile at times, and it also contains some of the sudden contrast as the Tempest. Keeping the line going without over-italicizing or, at the opposite extreme, ignoring Beethoven's many asides, is difficult. Lewis manages it very well -- a good sign for the sonatas to come. The galloping finale sounds almost as carefree and insouciant as it needs to be.

It doesn't bear saying that by undertaking a complete cycle, every pianist is subject to the criticism that there are ups and downs. When taken individually, one can find more captivating accounts of the Op. 31 sonatas, my favorites being by Richter, Glenn Gould, Schnabel, and Pollini. The young Lewis makes no claim t that kind of stature, but here in Vol. 1 he's off to an impressive start.

More Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 1: Nos. 16, 17, & 18 ~ Lewis free music reviews:
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