Search - Beethoven, Schnabel :: Schnabel Plays Beethoven, Vol. III

Definitive reissue of the definitive performances

A techno geek | Kihei, Maui, HI USA | 12/18/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've heard many reissues of these performances --- the Seraphim LPs, the EMI and Naxos CDs. Without question the Pearl series far exceeds the others in its fresh sound. The Pearl series sounds unfiltered --- it has the greatest surface noise, but for the first time you can actually hear the sparkle and vibrancy of Schnabel's piano --- almost like a modern recording with a lot of noise. That sparkle gives the music a psychoacoustic aliveness that is profoundly important to the emotional impact. The engineering of the new Naxos series puts the musician behind a veil of 70 years. The Pearl series brings Schanbel into your room now. The mind can filter out the surface noise and hear the vibrancy present. Perhaps someday computers will be able to do this for us (perhaps they already can---listen to the Sony reissue of Louis Armstrong's Hot 5 and 7s). As to the performances --- I've focus on the sound, because the performances are simply essential to any lover of Beethoven; when I sit down and close my eyes and listen, Schnabel more than any interpreter evokes a stream of images, moments, characters, feelings, and indescribable stories that inhabit Beethoven's musical world. It's not simply that I like Schnabel's performances. I like many other pianists' performances. But Schnabel opens the gates of the imagination."

Schnabel is king!

Ralph J. Steinberg | New York, NY United States | 10/21/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Anyone who has read my other reviews of the Schnable Beethoven series will know how I react to this kind of exalted music-making. So just forget other versions and get the complete Schnabel Beethoven recordings, already!"