Craig Sheppard’s
cycle of the Beethoven sonatas was given in the Meany Theatre,
Seattle, over a period of sixteen months between 2003 and
2004. The sonatas were given chronologically in a series called
Beethoven: A Journey. The performances are unedited
and have now appeared in a nine CD box. Not that Sheppard
has previously shied away from imposing, live Beethovenian
Meany Theatre recitals on disc. Three years ago I reviewed
his deeply impressive Diabelli Variations performance
(see review),
which he coupled with Scriabin’s Fifth Sonata and Schubert’s
Impromptu in G flat D899. This, one of the peaks of Beethoven’s
solo piano writing – perhaps the peak – drew from Sheppard
a profound awareness of characterisation in all its myriad
breadth and this, allied to a potent and unruffled technique,
coalesced in a performance of, for want of a better phrase,
powerful universality of spirit.
So one should
expect no less of Sheppard, three years later, than that he
should have proved equally masterful in his unfolding of the
sonatas.
At the risk of
courting dullness in a similarly chronological review of Sheppard’s
playing I think it’s best to alight on certain features of
his playing, qualities that lend so cohesive and convincing
a standpoint to these works. One is rhythmic; note the easy
swing generated in the opening of Op.7 or the commensurately
powerful chording in its Largo. There’s the brisk, businesslike
determination evoked in the Allegro of Op.10 No.2 and the
distinctive textual clarity explored in the opus companion
in D major in which a rather martial declamation is to the
fore. The quality of clarity – never equitable with coldness
– is exemplified in the Largo e mesto of Op.10
No.3. Sheppard refuses either to inflate these early sonatas
beyond their natural stylistic bounds or to downplay their
more cavalier moments, characterising instead with affinity
for their particular place in the Beethovenian scheme of things.
Thus by the time
we reach the Pathétique we find all these qualities
firmly in place; dynamics are natural sounding and not subject
to extremes; there’s a sense of measure in phrasal placement;
the slow movement is reserved but not indifferent; there’s
great care over note values and articulation; phrases flow
with crest and fall; the finale is not an exercise in defiance
or over-generous emotionalism. Things are, in fact, profitably
scaled, both emotively and architecturally. Some may find
Sheppard here rather unwilling to luxuriate in romantic reverie;
others will warmly welcome the imagination and intelligence
that informs playing that remains true to itself.
I enjoyed his
way with the Op.14 sonatas – wittily engaging in the capricious
modernity of the E major and displaying limpidity and lyricism
in its companion in G major where his clipped phrasing in
the Andante is well contrasted with more yielding pliancy
of phrasing. So too the real élan of his bumptious brio in
Op.22 with its corollary, a measured dignity. What Sheppard
does so well in these earlier sonatas is to present a rather
formal control; he does it in Op.26’s Funeral March to fine
effect; there’s a sense of distance, emotively speaking, a
rather formalised concentration that marks a delineation between
the personal and the externalised and has a rather pictorial
cast.
The Moonlight
remains entirely consonant with the tenor of his playing –
subtlety of dynamics, no overt emotionalising beyond natural
constraints, tonal colour, a clear sense of pacing, and a
natural sense of the peaks and troughs of phraseology. To
this extent the Allegretto can sound a touch deliberate but
this is part of Sheppard’s schema for the sonata; one listens
unencumbered by pre-judgement or presupposition when one hears
playing such as this.
Sheppard revels
in the operatic vocalising of the opening of Op.28 – here
his skilful balancing of hands, his subtle pedal usage and
his instinct for the natural falling of phrases is at its
most impressive and acute. The repeated left hand figures
are perfectly scaled and the gentlemanly rococo flourishes
mid section are brought out with glorious wit. Catching wit,
exploring the more guttural and coalescing the two are constant
features of this playing; so the witty badinage of Op.31 No.1
is reinforced by the slow movement’s left hand repeated stabbing
and ensuing gallant roulades and furtive frivolities in the
slow movement. The Tempest is measured, coloured with
chording of considerable weight and portent, a sense of gravity
ever-present; Sheppard is certainly not afraid to make gruff
attacks when necessary as we can hear in the same sonata’s
Allegretto finale. Fluid and lyric the Op.49 sonatas are given
their full measure of Sheppardian acuity. Rubati are finely
judged throughout. There’s splendid swagger in the Op.54.
The Waldstein
evinces a reserved and patrician gravity; dynamics count,
contrastive moods are integrated within the whole; points
are made through entirely musico-dramatic means, tension is
generated incrementally throughout the finale but with the
sense of an Allegretto moderato before the Prestissimo
conclusion. His approach to the Appassionata prefigures
his way with the last sonatas; one senses that things are
unresolved, that the expressive control exercised in the slow
movement – in its compressed intensity – is a microcosm of
future intensities and that the driving, note perfect finale
is the natural consummation of the preceding rhetoric.
He takes seriously
Op.78 – delicate treble sonorities – and vests Op.79 with
a reflective and questing drama. There’s superb balance between
hands and a songful seriousness entirely appropriate to the
feel of the music. The lightness and relief of the vivace
finale ends a mini drama of compelling but appropriate
intensity. This being the case it’s no great surprise to find
Les Adieux responds so well to Sheppard’s sense of
the listless and unsettled, though one should again note that
he eschews artifice and bogus brush strokes in his quest for
the essential truth of the music.
The justness of
his rhythm and the delicacy and unselfconscious simplicity
of his phrasing, which bespeaks the complex depth of his association
with the music, can be heard in Op.90. Its songfulness takes
wing, is subtly held back and relinquished, as Sheppard traces
its coursing movement with avian flexibility but sure command.
Wonderful playing. Lest one should concentrate on his rhythmic
control and his digital surety and believe this to be a rather
ironclad traversal I need to stress the pure lyricism of his
playing but add that he refuses to distend phrases or to bloat
these sonatas with the spurious. The depth proceeds from his
total concentration on the verities of music making. This
is very much the case with Op.101 where tone colours are exemplary
in the opening movement and where timbral variety and structural
control lead very naturally from the slow opening of the finale
to its more pressing tempo.
For the Hammerklavier
we find Sheppard’s resources devoted to his highly personal
and concentrated exploration. The sense of organisation here
is palpable, indeed remarkable; phrases sound progressive
and inevitable. There’s no excessive lingering in the slow
movement but there remains a powerful sense of phrasal freedom
and space nonetheless. The rhythmic subtleties and the resilience
of the playing are notable, the digital clarity in the fugal
passages of the finale beyond reproach - astounding, in fact.
The playing abjures what one might define as speculative,
philosophic utterances as is indeed the case with Op 109.
The delightfully sprung rhythm and clarity of the playing
might tempt one to think Sheppard a cool player but his directness
in the theme and variations finale here is not seen by him
as a titanic tussle with extra-musical issues so much as rooted
in musical problems and complexities and their proper resolution.
His refusal to bathe in contemplative waters here, and throughout,
is in accordance with his clear vision of the unsettled and
the provisional in the writing.
If one can speak
of a mood throughout Sheppard’s playing of the last sonatas
then it’s something akin to agitation, a perpetually alive
and intense vortex of feeling. He captures the brilliant dynamism
of the writing through powerful digital command; behind this
lies his intellectual control and behind this control lies
a cogent and plausible perception of the panorama of Beethoven’s
writing. This much is clear with Op.110 where we find playing
that is vibrant and alive and intensely exciting – Sheppard,
for all the sometimes gaunt drama is never one to underplay
the manifold emotions in these sonatas. Again we find in the
Adagio Sheppard’s characteristic intensity, a quicksilver,
unsettled response that demands much of the performer.
And so to Op.111
where the dynamism that runs throughout the cycle courses
through to the end. There is here a blistering grandeur of
utterance allied to magnificent chordal intensity and precision.
The Arietta is characterised with all his accustomed authority
and perception; changes of mood are powerful and telling;
again he makes no concession to those for whom the spiritual
elides into the religiose. This is tactile, life affirming,
deeply human playing. And yet it is also hugely affecting
in its own terms bringing with it a sense of immensity and
conquering spirit. It affirms Sheppard’s own journeying.
This is a cycle
then of the highest quality. The booklet notes are Sheppard’s
own. He plays on his Hamburg Steinway and it sounds magnificent.
The sound captures its full range but is rather close. Which
brings me to my only real criticism. The closeness of the
Steinway to the microphones has also captured what I take
to be air displacement when Sheppard pedals. It comes across
as a small but persistent, sometimes quite loud, “whoosh.”
It would be wrong of me to say that I didn’t find it an occasional
irritant but it would be equally wrong to suggest that it
materially distracted me from Sheppard’s playing. That, needless
to say, is of a truly elevated standard.
Jonathan Woolf
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Craig Sheppard (piano)
