Note to Readers: This column is switching gears to review the complete Andras Schiff and Idil Biret Beethoven Sonata cycles. One sonata will be addressed at a time. This will be more orderly than ...

A wonderful box set of all 32 of Beethoven’s Complete Piano Sonatas, performed by the veteran Italian virtuoso, Maurizio Pollini, has been issued on Deutsche Grammophon/ Universal Classics. His ...

Andras Schiff has called Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 29 ("Hammerklavier") "a monument of impenetrability" with moments of humor and "unfathomable depths of tragedy and loss." Beethoven's 32 piano ...

Beethoven's second compositional phase, often known as his heroic period, is most obviously exemplified in the Eroica Symphony of 1803-4. But, as the slow movement of his Op. 26 Piano Sonata shows, ...

While a number of Beethoven's piano sonatas have titles (authentic or otherwise), Op. 81a is the only one to have a concrete extra-musical inspiration: the flight from Vienna of his patron the ...

Long after most of my grandmother’s memories had faded, she would occasionally sit down at the piano bench, pull a yellowing score from a nearby shelf, and begin to play. Mendelssohn’s “Songs Without ...

With typical assertiveness, Beethoven once asked, “With whom need I be afraid of measuring my strength?” You might, indeed, measure the strength of his genius with a number of other great composers.

Watch pianist Kira Nickerson perform Beethoven’s Piano Sonata #17 in D Minor, “Tempest.” Watch Kira Nickerson's full performance of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata #17 in D Minor, “Tempest.” Kira, a pianist ...

The first years of the 19th century found Beethoven at a crucial point of transition in his career. Having mastered the Viennese high Classical style for which Haydn and Mozart served as paradigms, he ...

A few weeks ago I outlined some binge listening plans. I’ve completed two of them. The first was all 32 of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas. The second was a survey of Baroque music. The Beethoven took about ...

Performances in N.Y.C. Advertisement Supported by critic’s notebook Our chief classical critic took on the daunting Opus 110 in college, and now relishes risky recordings. By Anthony Tommasini For my ...

Whether or not music stirs inside, each of us bears a living metronome at our core. It may tick at 40 or 100 beats per minute, in three-quarter time or in six-eight, erratically or like a Swiss clock.