The year 1802 was a decisive one for Beethoven. In the autumn, he wrote the Heiligenstadt Testament, in which he clearly expressed his awareness of the outcome of his inexorably increasing deafness. At almost the same time, he told his friend Krumpholz that he was, "not satisfied" with his "work so far," and he was planning to embark on "a new path." The works, skillfully grouped together by Andreas Staier, correspond precisely to that new direction.
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REVIEW:
The playing here is a model of restraint and good musical sense; even in the so called Tempest Sonata, Op 31 No 2 in D minor, nothing is pushed too hard; clarity is to the fore. These performances are models of thoughtfulness and insight.
