Congratulations to pianist Axel Schmitt (CSMA faculty) who brough us the final concert in his quest to perform the complete sonatas of Ludwig van Beethoven on Saturday, October 23, 2021 in Tateuchi Hall and livestreaming on CSMA’s YouTube channel. This singular achievement was 4 years in the making and required a truly impressive commitment and level of virtuosity.
“While many pianists have dreamed of performing all 32 Beethoven sonatas, few have had the opportunity or drive to make that dream a reality,” said Carrie Campbell, Director of Finn Center Programs at CSMA. “It is an almost unimaginable task, even for Dr. Schmitt’s musical colleagues at CSMA. This is not only a great accomplishment for Dr. Schmitt, but for the school as well.”
We spoke to Schmitt about his relationship to Beethoven’s music, his performance process and his reflections on preparing to complete his goal.
Axel Schmitt, piano
What was your earliest memory of Beethoven and his music?
One of my liveliest childhood memories of Beethoven’s music is listening to an old vinyl recording (there were no CDs yet) of the Sonata op. 106 “Hammerklavier” played by Friedrich Gulda. Although I was too young to fully comprehend the music, I immediately felt fascinated by its beauty and greatness. That sense of awe has never left me. I even tried to play it on the piano at that young age and of course, did not get past the first page because of the great technical challenges. It is the longest and most difficult of Beethoven’s sonatas. Only many years later was I able to learn and play the entire piece.
When did you start to practice his music and at what point did you start to perform his music?
I have played quite a few of Beethoven’s works throughout the years, including several of the concertos with orchestra, duo sonatas, trios and about a dozen of the solo sonatas. But I never had the time or courage to attempt a complete cycle of the sonatas. For me, it is the biggest and most rewarding challenge for a pianist. As Artur Schnabel once put it, no performance of a Beethoven sonata can do complete justice to it. The work and its demands are greater than any performance.
What influence has his music had on you and has that relationship with his music changed in any way?
Beethoven is maybe the most important composer for the piano with the exception of Bach. No other composer has left such an immense repertoire. It takes a whole lifetime to learn it. Beethoven wrote his first piano sonatas around age 25 when he was still taking counterpoint lessons with Haydn in Vienna. By the time he wrote the last sonatas, he was already completely deaf and isolated from the world. It is hard to imagine that he never heard them played in reality. He wrote piano sonatas for most of his career and they are like a diary, in which he expressed his most personal and intimate thoughts. There is also an incredible stylistic development from the earlier to the later works as Beethoven became older and his style changed.
What made you want to take on such a herculean task as performing the entirety of Beethoven’s piano sonatas?
It has been my dream to perform the complete sonatas for almost as long as I have played the piano. I have always admired the older generations of pianists who knew all these works from memory, for example, Wilhelm Backhaus, Artur Schnabel, Wilhelm Kempff and Claudio Arrau. One can learn so much from studying their recordings. I feel that my life as a musician is incomplete until I attempt to play all of the Beethoven sonatas.
What should a musician who is new to Beethoven take away from his music?
The music of Beethoven is hardly completely new to any musician today since even young students play pieces such as “Für Elise” or the “Moonlight Sonata.” At the same time, he wrote a lot of great music that is not played so often. The sonatas are like an entire universe filled with musical color, contrast and drama. For example, in the first recital of the complete sonatas, each work has a different character. The first sonata is tragic, the second playful and elegant, the third virtuosic and the fourth passionate. Beethoven was in love with a young countess when he wrote the fourth sonata, which influenced the mood of the piece. I hope that in my performances I will be able to share some of the excitement I feel about this music.
What have you learned about Beethoven from playing through all his piano sonatas?
It is amazing to see how Beethoven was continuously able to reinvent his style and redefine the genre in almost every sonata. He never does the same thing twice. In the early sonatas, we can still see the influences of his predecessors, especially Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He takes elements from their styles and combines them in new and playful ways to forge his own style as a composer.
When we reach the sonatas of the middle period, Beethoven’s way of composing becomes much more individualized. Every element of the music is woven into the context of the whole and the piece could not be by any other composer. It is almost incomprehensible how he was able to turn out one masterwork after the other. There is an unbelievable amount of creativity and intelligence in his music.
What does your audience look like? Are they the same people following your progress?
One of the most delightful things about playing this cycle is to see the same audience members coming to concert after concert. After the performance, they talk to me about how they felt about the music and how it was different from the previous concert. Playing the sonatas is an extremely rewarding experience, something wonderful to share with an audience. I am also very happy to see a surge in the number of my students who want to learn a Beethoven sonata and play it for their recitals or auditions. It shows that the music has not lost any of its fascinations and will stay alive for future generations.
Could you tell us about the program for the final concert?
The program for the final concert of the series will focus on the last three sonatas, which are Beethoven’s farewell to the genre. They are among his most personal and enigmatic works. He was almost completely deaf when he wrote them, and he seems to withdraw more and more into himself. In the second movement of sonata op. 111, he literally says goodbye on the final page of music: As Thomas Mann explains in chapter 8 of his famous novel Doktor Faustus, Beethoven adds a single note C# to the main motif as a gesture of departure and transcendence. That is why the sonata could not have a third movement. Furthermore, the last note of the piece is the exact same note that he had used more than a quarter of a century earlier to start the first sonata. The circle from the first to the last sonata is complete.
How do you feel about reaching your goal and completing the eight-part concert series?
It has been so much fun to play all the Beethoven Sonatas at CSMA — I would love to start over and do it again! LOL. We are so fortunate to have Tateuchi Hall. I could not think of a nicer venue for my project. I am truly grateful for all the help from the exceptional staff at CSMA, who have worked so hard to make these concerts happen. During the COVID-19 Covid pandemic, it was amazing to see how they were able to switch to a virtual format almost instantly. And last but not least I am very thankful for the wonderful audience of our Community Concert Series, who have shown so much support and interest in my concerts over the last four years.
Watch all of Axel Schmitt’s Beethoven Sonatas on our YouTube channel.
