Output details

Beethoven Explored (volumes 3, 4 & 5)

This is an example of a digital release sharing new and substantially improved insights. Beethoven Explored is an exploration of Beethoven’s music that takes as its starting point the music of his contemporaries and the performance practices of the time. The series involved rigorous groundwork, particularly in sourcing lesser-known repertoire from manuscript sources (see sleeve notes) and aims to give a fresh account of the sound world of and context for Beethoven’s music. This output furthers the impact of the researchers’ original recital series by disseminating their work more widely, and contributes to the scholarly infrastructure for the performance of Beethoven and his contemporaries by providing reference recordings of representative works.

Across the three discs submitted as this output, the principal focus is the genre of Sonata for Piano and Violin – that is, the chamber Sonata in which the piano takes the principal role, with the violin providing embellishment and accompaniment. The researchers’ success in this genre has been noted in reviews: 'Hats off … to Peter Sheppard Skærved, whose beautifully articulated, lithe playing emerges from out of the piano's rolling textures rather than masking them. For once we are allowed to experience these glorious works as piano sonatas with violin obbligato in the true Mozartian sense as Skærved weaves his way in and out of Beethoven's indomitable flights of pianistic fancy, brought stunningly to life by Aaron Shorr's perfectly regulated playing … Shorr delights the ear with his subtle rhythmic nudges and off-beat sforzandi' (Julian Haylock, Sinfini Music, accessed 11 November 2013.)

While some of these Sonatas (e.g. Op.24) are very well known, others are rarely performed (e.g. Op. 23); these works by Beethoven are contextualised by music by his contemporaries, including Romberg, Ries and Franz Clement.