Performer
Igor Levit, Piano

Beethoven’s sonatas on this program range from intimate to the colossal. The Op. 14 sonatas have a gentle lyricism, while Op. 22 dazzles with its virtuoso passages and shifting emotional moods. The “Hammerklavier”—the German word for “pianoforte”—is his most expansive and complex sonata. His late creative style is revealed in all its glory with the juxtaposition of titanic power and fragility, dashes of whimsy, a slow movement of immense scope and depth, and—culminating the sonata—a double fugue to rival Bach in the complexity of its counterpoint.

Program
ALL-BEETHOVEN PROGRAM
Piano Sonata No. 9 in E Major, Op. 14, No. 1
Piano Sonata No. 10 in G Major, Op. 14, No. 2
Piano Sonata No. 11 in B-flat Major, Op. 22
Piano Sonata No. 29 in B-flat Major, Op. 106, “Hammerklavier”