This is the final CD in Angela Hewitt’s complete cycle of the 32 Piano Sonatas of Beethoven. Both the sonatas recorded here are recent additions to her repertoire, and the results amply justify the patience and wisdom of her approach. A fitting end to a magnificent Beethoven sonata cycle.
‘Heaven, pure and simple. The second movement’s opening Arietta bore a closer resemblance to the great Artur Schnabel’s 1932 recording than any other I know of: its breadth and profundity of utterance, the perfect weighting of its chords and the rests between those chords, and a comprehensive understanding of the music’s harmonic architecture, all helped nudge old interpretative values into a new context, ‘old school for a new age’ you might say … I would suggest you wrap up any preconceptions you might have about the interpretation of this music, dig a very big hole and bury them. Here’s your chance to listen with fresh ears … Hewitt’s accessibly analytical notes add a further degree of pleasure to the listening experience and the Fazioli piano used rings resplendent thanks to a superb recording. If this disc isn’t shortlisted for prizes in 2022 I’ll be very surprised’ (robccowan.com)
‘Angela Hewitt’s pianism is on an exalted level throughout both of these sonatas. I was enthralled by her performances and I also learned much from her insightful essay … an outstanding disc’ (MusicWeb International)
‘Now that Angela Hewitt has concluded her Beethoven sonata cycle with two of its ‘biggest guns’, it appears that she has also saved her best for last, interpretatively speaking … her flexible and fluid exposition [of the first movement of Op 106] abounds with vitality and variety of articulation … a heartfelt, sensitively nuanced Adagio sostenuto gorgeously showcases Hewitt’s refined finger legato technique … to say nothing of the pianist’s rapt concentration, hypnotic continuity and sustaining power [in the second movement of Op 111]. At 21 minutes, Hewitt’s Arietta is longer than most, yet there is not one slack or indulgent moment. Hewitt’s longtime producer Ludger Böckenhoff does full justice to both pianist and her resplendent new Fazioli grand’ (Gramophone)
Label: Hyperion
Recording details: November 2020
Kulturstiftung Marienmünster, Germany
Produced by Ludger Böckenhoff
Engineered by Ludger Böckenhoff
Release date: February 2022
Total duration: 78 minutes 16 seconds
Cover artwork: Fifth Street P03.8 (detail) by Caio Fonseca (b1959)
Reproduced by kind permission of the artist / www.caiofonseca.com
