I'm slowly turning into a bit of a historic recordings buff, in spite of myself. Last year I really enjoyed listening to the APR release of the 8 late Beethoven sonatas Wilhelm Kempff recorded in Germany during the war years. Here now are 16 earlier sonatas recorded on 78rpm records in 1940, 41 and 43. There is the same meticulous discography, down to the matrix numbers, indispensible to historic recording buffs of a deeper understanding than me. Also we have a superb long essay by Bryce Morrison about Kempff, and an essay on the recordings from Michael Spring. Kempff recorded this music a lot; the Pathetique, for example, in 1924, 1928, 1929 and 1936 before the 1940 recording here; the Appassionata in 1924, 1928 and 1932 before the 1943 recording on this disc. The fact that these works often sound so completely different from the 1964/65 stereo LP set I know so well, and the 1950s mono set I've listened to since, is typical of Kempff's spontaneity and his ever-evolving interpretation of this music.
Once again there are caveats about the sound. These are in some cases actually worse than the pre-war recordings because of the war-time quality of materials used to press the discs. But the spirit of Kempff comes through, and this pianist's spirit is central to his art.
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