ARTUR SCHNABEL (KUNZENDORF,
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY (NOW LIPNIK, POLAND), 17 APRIL, 1882 – AXENSTEIN, SWITZERLAND,
15 AUGUST, 1951)
Schnabel was a child prodigy and studied in Vienna
with the celebrated pianist and teacher Theodor Leschetizky. He lived in Berlin
from 1900 and was a leading piano teacher at the State Academy of Music in
Berlin from 1925 to 1933. He emigrated to Switzerland in 1933 after Adolf
Hitler came to power, and he lived in the United States from 1939 until after
World War II, when he returned to Switzerland.
Schnabel specialized in the music of Ludwig van
Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, and Franz Schubert. He was never a virtuoso
pianist, and he neither taught technique nor concerned himself with mere
technical mastery. Yet he was able to bring out every nuance of meaning in a
musical text with remarkable intellectual penetration and eloquence. Among the
high points of his career were his concert performances of all 32 of
Beethoven’s sonatas in Berlin in 1927 and 1932–34, in which his imaginative
interpretations took on a visionary clarity and intensity. Much of his playing
is preserved on early recordings.
As a composer Schnabel was influenced by his
contemporary Arnold Schoenberg, whom he knew in Berlin. He never played his own
or other modern music in public, however. Schnabel’s thoughts on music were
published as Reflections on Music (1933) and Music and the Line of Most
Resistance (1942) and were more concretely expressed in his edition of
Beethoven’s piano sonatas.
TRACKLIST
6060 WEBER – Invitation to the Dance, Op. 65
6061 BEETHOVEN – Rondo, Op. 51, No. 2, G
6201 SCHUBERT – Scherzo No. l, Bb (Posthumous) D. 953
6229 BEETHOVEN – Minuet in G
6235 BRAHMS – Rhapsodie, Op. 79, No. 2, g
6272 BACH – “Italian” Concerto, F, S. 971 lst Mvt.
6273 BACH – “Italian” Concerto, F, S. 971 2nd Mvt.
6274 BACH – “Italian” Concerto, F, S. 971 3rd Mvt.
