Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 14 in C sharp minor, Op. 27 No. 2 ‘Moonlight' (Mondschein Sonata)

Listen to Ludwig von Beethoven’s symphonies no.’s 5, 6 and 9, Piano concertos 3 and 5, the violin concertos and romances, the Archduke trio and three piano sonatas.

The great British piano virtuoso Solomon Cutner (known professionally by his first name alone) was born in the East End of London in 1902. He was best known for his performances of the music of Beethoven, of which there are many examples in this 7 CD set. In 1956, whilst in the process of recording the complete Beethoven sonatas for EMI, he experienced a massive stroke which rendered him inactive as a professional musician for the rest of his life. He died in 1988, aged 85 years.

Recording dates: 1952 (No. 29 - mono recording)

1958 (Nos. 8, 14, 21, 23)

1961 Nos. 15, 26, 30, 32)

1963 (Nos. 1, 5, 6, 7, 12, 17, 18, 25, 28, 31)

1966 (No. 4)

1968 (Nos. 2, 9, 10, 11, 19, 20)

1969 (Nos. 3, 13, 16, 22, 24, 27)

Recording and performing the complete cycle of Beethoven Piano Sonatas has long been the reserve for the Grand Master or Mistress, a reward for expert hands, following long and storied careers. Here, in a bold and controversial new recording project, the 24 year-old HJ Lim will prove that she is ready now. Lim, who has already performed the sonatas in critically acclaimed 8-day concert series in France, Germany and Japan, will release the complete sonatas in a deluxe, 8-CD slipcased edition.

“I view these sonatas by Beethoven as the most intense diary, in which genius expresses, or even illustrates, all the facets of a life that is sometimes sublimated, and idealized, and often deeply moving by its realism.

To perform Beethoven's sonatas is not just to interpret music, but is also an attempt to understand the multi-faceted psychology of a human being. It is, in any case, an attempt to bring to light one's own truth. If Beethoven's music can help us understand the human being that he was, so can entering Beethoven's life help us understand his music.”

“All these reflections would not be valid without a source coming from Beethoven himself or from one of his close contemporaries, the many accounts from his close relations that we have, also the letters and personal notes are therefore very important. It does indeed help us place ourselves within the composer's lifetime and cancel as much as possible of the distance that separates us from him. As Beethoven's music is profoundly human, we can today still understand it with our hearts. And yet there is a crucial element that as an interpreter we must urgently work on, which is to "re-actualize" the impact and shock that this music could create at the time. Each sonata should be conveyed with all the freshness and innovatory inspiration it could produce in the eyes of Beethoven's contemporaries. This is the difficult role and heavy responsibility of the interpreter.

All composers need the indispensable assistance of interpreters in order to survive and communicate their ideas to a larger number, and for that their "divinity" could be transmitted to the public. However, I feel that I, as interpreter, I am not only serving the composer, but I am using myself in my turn, composers as my intermediary, as the interpreters of the divinity, to get myself closer to the Muse.” HJ Lim

NB Lim has chosen to omit the two small Op. 49 sonatas on the grounds that Beethoven didn't intend them for publication

Artur Schnabel was born on 17 April, 1882 at Lipnik Górny, a suburb of the modern-day Polish town of Bielsko-Biala. At the time of his birth this town would have been known as Bielitz, in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Schnabel died in 1951 at Axenstein in Switzerland.

He was the youngest of three children and when still a child the family moved to Vienna, where the young Schnabel took up studies with the legendary Theodor Leschetizsky, who also taught Paderewski and Moiseiwitsch. Schnabel remained a pupil of Leschetizsky's for seven years, from 1892 to 1897.

Schnabel's début took place in 1890 in Vienna and in 1900 he moved to Berlin, where he lived for 33 years. In 1905 he married the well-known contralto, Therese Behr, and the couple successfully toured the German provinces giving Lieder recitals.

The birth of their first son, Karl Ulrich, took place in 1909 and in 1912 a second boy, Stefan, was born. Karl Ulrich was to become a famous teacher and accomplished pianist: he features in two of the recordings in this set. A number of today's famous pianists studied with him, including Leon Fleisher and Peter Serkin. Stefan took up acting as a career and achieved a fair degree of success in both Germany and Hollywood.

Schnabel made his first recordings in 1930 of the Beethoven sonatas and concertos and, in 1933, the Schnabel family left Berlin a few months after Hitler took power. They lived in England for a while and in 1939 moved to the USA where, in 1944, Schnabel became an American citizen. Although resident in America, it was in Europe that he was more widely recognised and it was in London, for EMI, that Schnabel made virtually all of his great recordings.

This set of 8 CDs presents the incomparable Schnabel in a range of works by composers whose music he particularly admired and made a speciality of: Bach, Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert.