Decca Alfred Brendel - Complete Philips Recordings

"""If I belong to a tradition it is a tradition that makes the masterpiece tell the performer what he should do and not the performer telling the piece what it should be like, or the composer what he ought to have composed."" ALFRED BRENDEL An exclusive artist for the Philips label since 1969, Brendel’s discography is now among the most extensive of any pianist, reflecting a repertoire of solo, chamber and orchestral works by the major composers from the central European tradition from Bach through to Schoenberg. This 114 CD Edition encompasses his complete discography for Philips and Decca and includes studio albums, live recordings and radio broadcasts. The set is accompanied by a 200-page book featuring a note by Brendel’s personal choice of writer, Misha Donat. THE SET: • Complete for the first time – includes live recordings and radio broadcasts • 200-page booklet with tracklists, composer index, new and archive photographs, a newly commissioned note by Misha Donat and a list of Brendel’s favourite recordings. HIGHLIGHTS: • 3 cycles of Beethoven’s Piano Concertos (Rattle,WPO 1997-98 / Haitink, LPO 1975-77 / Levine, CSO 1983 • 2 cycles of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas (1970-77 and 1992-96) • Haydn: 11 Sonatas (1979-85) • Complete Mozart Piano Concertos (Marriner, Academy of St. Martin in the Fields 1976-1982) • Mozart Piano Concertos under Charles Mackerras • Mussorgsky: Pictures At An Exhibition • 2 cycles of Late Piano works by Schubert (analogue and digital) • 2 recordings of LISZT: Années: Italie (1972 and 1986) • LISZT: Piano Sonata; Totentanz • Beethoven Complete Cello Sonatas with Andrian Brendel (2003-4) • Unpublished live & radio performances – Beethoven / Busoni / Mendelssohn / Chopin (1968-2001) • Schubert and Schumann lieder with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Matthias Goerne • 1 CD of Live Recitals in Salzburg • Farewell Concerts (2008) QUOTES BY BRENDEL: ‘‘The word ‘Listen’ contains the same letters as the word ‘Silent’.’ ’ ‘’A work of art is like a person: it has more than one soul in its breast.’’ ‘’Silence... is the essence of the music itself, the vital ingredient that makes it possible for the music to exist at all.’’ ‘’Nothing could have made me happier than the awareness that I did not owe my reputation to a giant publicity drum but to the appeal of my playing.’’ QUOTES ABOUT BRENDEL: ‘’One of the greatest pianists in the world. ‘’ THE GUARDIAN ‘’A great pianist is not necessarily a big pianist . . . Alfred Brendel is unmistakably both.‘’ BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE ‘’With him, even the ""heavenly length"" of some movements becomes a delight, and you don't want them to end. ‘’ MAIL ON SUNDAY ‘’Er ist eine lebende Legende . . . Denn Brendel ist viel mehr als ein Ausnahmepianist, er ist ein wahrer Tausendsassa.’’ FONO FORUM “Brendel has always stood alone in what he does. He was a very individual voice when I first met him more than 40 years ago – his concert life was on an upswing as he reached 40, but he had a large body of recordings already behind him that were evidence of a wide range of repertoire, delivered with insight and energy, and fuelled in their integrity by active interest in the visual arts, literature and humour.” Imogen Cooper AWARDS • Honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE; 1989) • Hans von Bülow Medal of the Berlin Philharmonic (1992) • Beethoven-Ring of the Vienna Music University (2001) • Léonie Sonning Music Prize (2002; Denmark) • Ernst von Siemens Music Prize (2004) • Prix Venenia: Premio Artur Rubinstein (2007) • Praemium Imperiale (2008)[14] • Herbert von Karajan Prize (2008) • Franz Liszt-Ehrenpreis (2011) • Juilliard Medal (2011) • Voted into the Gramophone Hall of Fame (2012)[15] • Golden Mozart Medal of the Salzburg Mozarteum (2014) Among the countless prizes he has won (sometimes on more than one occasion) are the Grand Prix of the Liszt Society, the Gramophone Award, Grand Prix du Disque, the Japan Record Academy Award, the Deutscher Schallplattenpreis, the Grand Prix de l’Academie du Disque Français, the Edison Prize and the British Music Trades Association Prize to name but a few. Important musical awards include the Léonie Sonning Prize, the Siemens Prize, the Prix Venezia, and in 2009 the Praemium Imperiale. He was made an Honorary KBE in 1989 for his “outstanding services to music in Britain”, awarded the Légion d’Honneur in 2004, received the highest rank in the Order of Merit of the German Federal Republic in 2007, and holds honorary degrees from the universities of Oxford, Yale, Exeter and Dublin. He is a recipient of the Hans von Bülow medal of the Berlin Philharmonic and was made an Honorary Member of the Wiener Philharmoniker in 1998, an honour conferred on only two other pianists, Emil von Sauer and Wilhelm Backhaus, since this orchestra’s foundation in 1842. His farewell concert took place with the Vienna Philharmonic on December 18, 2008, which was recently voted one of the 100 greatest cultural moments of the la