Home listening - a feast of late Beethoven piano sonatas

The Guardian 0

Steven Osborne, Yevgeny Sudbin and Jonathan Biss underline the composer’s humanity. Plus: the life of Michael Tippett on Radio 3

• The cover of Steven Osborne’s recording of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas, Op 109 in E major, Op 110 in A flat major and Op 111 in C minor (Hyperion), shows a detail of Rodin’s The Hand of God in marble. Smoothly sculpted fingers clasp a rough clod of earth. It’s an apt simile for these three late works, a summation of Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas, and written between 1820-22, around the time of the Missa Solemnis.

As in that great choral masterpiece, storm and perdition unite with heaven and serenity. Keys closely linked, moods contrasting, these three sonatas seem to express everything in music, including wit and generosity. Osborne, always a player in absolute service to the composer, captures Beethoven’s humanity, tumult and crazed fervour. This revered Scottish pianist has a special capacity for the ethereal. Check out the opening of the last movement (andante) of Op 109, in the Adagio of Op 110, in the Arietta: Adagio of Op 111.