Search - Ludwig van Beethoven, Artur Schnabel :: Beethoven: Complete Sonatas for Cello and Piano

Amazing Amazing Amazing!!!

Ryan Kouroukis | Toronto, Ontario Canada | 11/11/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"After all my listening research of the cello sonatas, I found the ones that I have been looking for without even knowing that these were the ones!
Boy-oh-Boy, what performances! Such singing! Such superlative playing! What mystery! What spontaneity! Plus excellent transfers! No hiss...loud and clear!

The great Schnabel matches his faboulous and brilliant partner Fournier so equally that its truly an amazing sight for the ear!
If you're looking for a historic recording of these sonatas, here they are my friends! They play with blazing intensity and such exquisite beauty.
I just found out that out of all the Beethoven Cello Sonatas cycles out there, these ones have always got the top praise along side the Rostropovich and Richter set on Phillips. But I enjoy these much more because of the blazing intensity and excitement (which is a bit lacking in the Phillips set).These 1947-48 recordings are also released on Enterprise records but for like $40! Save yourself some money and get these ones!"

Transfer trade-offs

Doc Holliday | Great Northwest | 11/19/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Great Performances by two of the very best: Fournier and Schnabel. You won't be disappointed. However, the transfers on this cd are not the best. While trying to achieve brilliance and clarity and reduce the original "recording hiss", the engineers on this recording have pushed the "loud and clear" to the point where you now have to hear the presence of volume noise. I had to reduce the volume on my cd player by 25-30% to make the listening tolerable. A better balance between hiss reduction and increased clarity, (like Naxos is frequently able to do), would have been better.



I would also like to hear the other transfer on Enterprise as a comparison, but $40.98 is a bit too much.

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