Beethoven: The Five Piano Concertos

Ludwig van Beethoven (Composer), James Levine (Conductor), Chicago Symphony Orchestra (Orchestra), Alfred Brendel (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Alfred Brendel
• Orchestra: Chicago Symphony Orchestra
• Conductor: James Levine
• Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
• Audio CD (July 15, 1997)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 3
• Label: Philips
• ASIN: B0000041MN
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #29,621 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

46 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A first rate performance much preferable to his later work, March 31, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Beethoven: The Five Piano Concertos (Audio CD)

In this release, Brendel again ventures - or should I say, ventured (back in 1983)? - forth on well-trodden ground, but his performance is defeinitely the best he has produced so far and much better than his recent live performances (BPO, VPO). It has a clarity and freshness that stands in sharp contrast to his later, more rigid and inflexilbe style. Levine and the CSO provide a perfect orchestral foil for his playing. The range and quality of sound are impeccable as well. (Wolfgang, from Vienna, Austria)

38 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Academic and expressive, May 30, 2005

By 

Daniel Graser "saxgod685" (Wappingers Falls, New York United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Beethoven: The Five Piano Concertos (Audio CD)

Alfred Brendel is probably the most knowledgeable Beethoven interpreter that we have seen in the past half century along with Richard Goode. It also helps that he is a phenomenal pianist and chamber musician. When listening to these performances I got a sense of a warmer more intimate ideal for the works, not everywhere, it was as soloistic as these need to be, but the connection between melody and accompaniment was very well balanced right on par with Fleisher and Szell. Levine gives the music everything it needs and the Chicago Symphony plays wonderfully. The live recording gives these works a wonderful atmosphere and the audience is reverently silent. If you want to seek out individual performances of these concertos by all means do it but for a box set of them all I would recommend this as well as his more recent with Rattle, as well as Fleisher and Arrau. All of them are wonderful however this is by far the best live recording of these works. Highly recommended

33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Warmer, More Expressive Brendel, April 4, 2001

By 

John Kwok (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Beethoven: The Five Piano Concertos (Audio CD)

Alfred Brendel doesn't come across as a meticulous craftsman, but instead, as a lyrical, joyful interpreter of Beethoven in this version of Beethoven's piano concerto cycle which he recorded with James Levine and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the CSO's Ravinia Festival in the early 1980's. While this won't replace my recordings of Arrau, Perahia, Kovacevich or Ashkenazy performing these concerti, Brendel's third traversal is one of the best performed - and recorded - versions currently available. His warm, expressive playing reaches its peak in the last two concerti. Both Levine and the CSO are admirable, sympathetic accompanists. If you are looking for your first set of Beethoven piano concertos or your latest, then you certainly won't go wrong with these fine performances.