Beethoven: The last 3 Piano Sonatas, Opp. 109, 110, 111

Album review

This beautiful release, devoted to Beethoven’s last three piano sonatas, features a booklet in which Anne Queffélec summons the words of those who have spoken best: Wilhelm Kempff, Julien Green, Edwin Fischer, Thomas Mann, Milan Kundera, Pierre Boulez and finally, Beethoven himself. ‘One day they’ll understand; I write for the future’.

Anne Queffélec found inspiration in Beethoven’s language, which still speaks to the hearts of today’s men and women. Here, she takes us deep into her own inner journey with these three very demanding works that every pianist dreams of taming one day. ‘The very last one [opus 111] is metaphysical’, she says. ‘They say that the first movement is about the “here below”, and the second is about the “hereafter”. This is very true. For a pianist, it’s an incredible gift that nourishes the soul’. She also confesses to playing them ‘with a mixture of hope and fear each time’.

Nonetheless, Anne Queffélec has no fear. Her piano is lucid, and her performance is bright, leading the listener into the most remote regions of consciousness and teasing them with infinity. Then, she concludes the journey with silence, initiated by a final pianissimo in which Beethoven steps away from a form that he served so masterfully throughout his life. © François Hudry/Qobuz