Beethoven • Brett Dean

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5; Brett Dean: A Winter’s Journey

Jonathan Biss (piano); Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra/david Afkham Orchid Classics ORC100291 64 mins

Jonathan Biss’s recent autobiography details the pianist’s dedication to the composer, and while a career spent in Beethoven’s shadow has led to jarring emotional self-discovery, Biss’s own pianism is wondrous for its apparent ease. Ironically, it is the quiet stillness that he finds in Beethoven that marks Biss as a master. Where others fall for dandyish brashness – midway through the first movement in the Fifth Concerto, for example – Biss is restrained; allowing the developing melody to shimmer but not dazzle. His account of the third movement is one of the few that observes the ‘ma non troppo’ part of the Allegro title – lively, ‘but not too much’.

This is the fifth and final instalment in his Beethoven/5 series, a project that has paired Beethoven’s piano concertos with newly commissioned works by Timo Andres, Sally Beamish, Salvatore Sciarrino, Caroline Shaw and now Brett Dean. The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra are the original collaborators, and it is to their credit that the programme has been picked up by many other ensembles in the intervening years, including, here, the Swedish Radio Symphony. Dean takes inspiration from Beethoven’s ill-fated visit to Gneixendorf, where the composer fell out with his brother and contracted the pneumonia that would contribute to his death a short time later.

The music quotes from the corresponding concerto, but cleverly distorts the original material. A muffled sound is achieved when

Biss moves from the concert grand to an upright placed within the orchestra – a not-so-subtle, yet compelling, reference to Beethoven’s deafness.

PERFORMANCE ★★★★★

RECORDING ★★★★