Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven - Piano Sonatas Nos. 4, 9 & 10 (2021) [Official Digital Download 24/88]

With the Sonata in E-flat Major, Op. 7, published by Artaria “for harpsichord and piano” in 1797, Beethoven expands the scope of keyboard technique and structural proportions. Indeed, some of the passagework in the outer movements must have been prohibitive to most amateur pianists; and the length of the sonata, at the time, made it the longest work for piano ever published, and the second longest sonata Beethoven composed (the record goes to the Sonata in B-flat Major, Op. 106 “Hammerklavier”). Metric displacements and violent dynamic contrasts inform the opening movement, while the prayer-like Adagio is possibly one of the most extraordinary achievements of Beethoven’s youth. The Allegro that follows, light and playful, is interrupted by a stormy “minore” section that was most likely the inspiration for the first of Schubert’s Klavierstucke, D 946. The melodious but challenging Rondo closes the sonata, unexpectedly, in a murmur.

The two Sonatas, Op. 14 were published by Artaria as a set in 1799, and show a Beethoven less concerned with structural expansion and technical display. However, the iconoclastic spirit that informed earlier explorations in the genre is preserved, in particular in the way harmony and dialectics between thematic materials are developed. The first of the two works, in the key of E Major, was transcribed as a string quartet in the key of F major. Of note, the middle movement. The second sonata, technically perhaps slightly more ambitious than the first, features a lighthearted march followed by variants as a middle movement (at the very end, however, Beethoven startles us by placing a dramatic fortissimo chord), and a humorous Scherzo characterized by continuous metric displacements as a closing movement – all elements that must have been considered rather unusual at the time.

TRACKLIST

01. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 4 in E-Flat Major, Op. 7 "Grand": I. Allegro molto e con brio
02. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 4 in E-Flat Major, Op. 7 "Grand": II. Largo con gran espressione
03. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 4 in E-Flat Major, Op. 7 "Grand": III. Allegro
04. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 4 in E-Flat Major, Op. 7 "Grand": IV. Rondo. Poco allegretto e grazioso
05. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 9 in E Major, Op. 14 No. 1: I. Allegro
06. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 9 in E Major, Op. 14 No. 1: II. Allegretto
07. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 9 in E Major, Op. 14 No. 1: III. Rondo. Allegro comodo
08. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 10 in G Major, Op. 14 No. 2: I. Allegro
09. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 10 in G Major, Op. 14 No. 2: II. Andante
10. Maurizio Zaccaria - Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 10 in G Major, Op. 14 No. 2: III. Scherzo. Allegro assai



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