This box set of the complete piano sonatas is a must for all lovers of Beethoven and of great piano playing. The compositions are bold and beautiful, challenging, witty and fresh. They seem to encompass all aspects of human sensibility and aspiration, and the superb playing of Louis Lortie takes the music to another level.

Highlights among the new recordings are that of the sublime Sonata No.30, composed in 1820–22, which displays all the characteristics of Beethoven’s last creative phase: rich harmonic structures, a fascination with intricate counterpoint, and a strict adherence to classical and baroque forms.

Also worthy of a separate mention is Sonata No.22, a veritable study in contrasts. Its two complementary themes – a gracious, dignified ‘feminine’ theme resembling a minuet, and a stamping, assertive, ‘masculine’ theme – gradually influence one another in the course of the movement until they become thoroughly integrated and combined in the final passages.

Contents:
Disc 1: Nos 1, 2, 3, Op. 6 for 4 Hands
Disc 2: Nos 5, 6, 7, 8
Disc 3: Nos 9, 10, 11, 12
Disc 4: Nos 13, 14, 15
Disc 5: Nos 16, 17, 18
Disc 6: Nos 4, 19, 20, 21;
Disc 7: Nos 22*, 23*, 24*, 25*, 26
Disc 8: Nos 27*, 28, 29
Disc 9: Nos 30*, 31*, 32*

*New recordings