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Complete Sonatas for Pianoforte Solo (Dover Music for Piano)

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Many piano scores are visually cluttered, possibly to save space and printing costs.They are printed on rubbishy paper and are a great dampener on wanting to spend the time necessary to master a piece. Some are so compressed that they have the ambience of an El Greco painting. Not so the Dover editions of piano music! They are nicely spaced and show crisp, black notes on quality, firm paper. They are aesthetically excellent and makes one feel relaxed to practice the works. The Dover Complete Schubert Pianoforte Sonatas contains the great D major work, the hauntingly beautiful second movement of which was used in that fine French film,"Tous Les Matins du Monde", starring Gerard Depardieu. This sonata seems to be missing in some of the other so-called "complete" sets. Also, it is great to have all the sonatas in one volume,as in the Dover edition. In sum, a most satisfying,useful contribution to the making of Schubert's piano sonatas better known to pianists,as they so deserve.

This book is a reprint of the 1888 Breitkopf & Härtel edition. Kudos to Dover for making this edition available, since you could spend 10 times as much buying another edition such as the Henle Verlag. This book contains the 15 completed sonatas, but not the incomplete fragmented works (You can find the remaining fragments in PDF format on the web, and assemble your own complete edition using my list below).
The sonatas contained in this volume are:
Sonata in E Major (1815) D.157
Sonata in C Major (1815) D.279
Sonata in A-flat Major (1817) D.557
Sonata in E Minor (1817) D.566 (but NOT the Adagio & Rondo D.505-6).
Sonata in B Major, Op. 147 (1817) D.575
Sonata in A Minor, Op. 164 (1817) D.537
Sonata in E-flat Major, Op. 122 (1817) D.568
Sonata in A Minor, Op. 143 (1823) D.784
Sonata in A Minor, Op. 42 (1825) D.845
Sonata in A Major, Op. 120 (1825) D.664
Sonata in D Major, Op. 53 (1825) D.850
Sonata in G Major, Op. 78 (1826) D.894
Sonata in C Minor (1828) D.958
Sonata in A Major (1828) D.959
Sonata in B-flat Major (1828) D.960

Missing from this edition are:
Piano Sonata No. 3 in E major, D. 459 (Funf Klavierstucke).
Piano Sonata No. 8 in F sharp minor (fragment), D. 571/604/570.
Piano Sonata No. 10 in C major (fragment), D. 613/612.
Piano Sonata No. 11 in F minor (fragment), D. 625/505.
Piano Sonata No. 15 in C major ("Relique"), D. 840.

A set of the complete sonatas of Schubert is an essential book in the library of the music lover, as are most of the items in the Dover music catalogue. For a reasonable price, it compiles all the complete sonatas Schubert wrote. One only wishes Dover would have included the many fragments and single movements that Schubert left incomplete - some, like the C Major "Reliquie" provide much entertainment and insight.