now playing, continuing with Jonathan Biss' Beethoven piano sonatas cycle

start of Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 15 in D Major, Op. 28 "Pastoral"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngIcxniDxEQ&list=OLAK5uy_luMbsKvyR60NxdlzwbovH3MTNuQRCgF7s&index=2

start of Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 16 in G Major, Op. 31 No. 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KPQrGS9ISs&list=OLAK5uy_luMbsKvyR60NxdlzwbovH3MTNuQRCgF7s&index=6

start of Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 21 in C Major, Op. 53 "Waldstein"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkIhYc6z6ak&list=OLAK5uy_luMbsKvyR60NxdlzwbovH3MTNuQRCgF7s&index=8

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_luMbsKvyR60NxdlzwbovH3MTNuQRCgF7s

Love it. Revitalized performances of Beethoven's piano sonatas for our time.

>This handsomely-produced boxset of the complete Piano Sonatas (Orchid Classics) presents the sonatas not in chronological order, as many sets do, but rather with a cross-section of sonatas on each disc, to demonstrate Biss’s conviction that each one stands as a brilliant masterpiece in its own right. This approach – one which he is also taking in his concert cycle – allows the listener to appreciate the individual qualities and distinct structures of each sonata, and the extraordinary development in Beethoven’s piano writing. Thus, the final sonatas, usually presented as a trilogy, in concert and on disc, are placed on separate discs within the context of sonatas from different periods of Beethoven’s compositional life. Biss refutes the notion that Beethoven had three distinct compositional periods as an over-simplification and instead urges the listener to view Beethoven’s compositional style in “a perpetual state of evolution”; even the final sonatas still betray some of his gruffness and a desire to shock, while the slow movements of the early sonatas look forward to later ones in their heart-stopping beauty and eloquence.