Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Vol 3

Jonathan Biss's Beethoven sonata cycle is coming out at a rate of one disc a year, and his third volume consists of three works also covered by Bavouzet. Biss's style is bigger and looser, the sound often burlier, the expressive approach more probing. His Waldstein explores ominous, mysterious regions that Bavouzet eschews. But Biss sometimes seems to tumble over himself a little through the freedoms he allows himself, especially in the impudent snappiness and rapid-fire arpeggios of the opening of the Sonata in G, Op 31 No 1. And either the recording or Biss himself creates moments of left-hand dominance that upset the apple cart in terms of musical priorities. The sense of spontaneity, which abounds, does sometimes seem to get slightly out of hand. url.ie/dzi7