DUSSEK : Complete Piano Sonatas & Sonatinas (2024) 10-CD SET | FLAC (image+.cue) lossless

Johann Ladislaus Dussek (1760–1812) was regarded by his contemporaries as one of the foremost keyboard performers and composers of his age. Over a span of three decades, Dussek completed nearly 300 compositions, most of which involve a keyboard instrument. The sonata as a genre holds a special position in his overall oeuvre: keyboard sonatas were among his first published pieces in the early 1780s, and the sonata Op.77 in F minor was to be his last work before his death in 1812.

This set is the result of an extensive recording project using the combined resources of eight excellent fortepianists to produce the first comprehensive recording of Dussek’s keyboard sonatas on period instruments. Listeners are invited to take a journey through the brilliant, harmonically beautiful and expressive music of one of the most fascinating composers at the threshold of early Romanticism. While in modern times piano building has been largely standardised, 18th-century instruments were very personal works of art, and their construction differed from town to town and from builder to builder, and even within one builder’s output. The distance between cities as far apart as London and Vienna resulted in two distinct schools of piano building: the “English” and the “Viennese.”

The formidable array of both English and Viennese fortepianos played on this recording (see info below) provides listeners with a parallel journey, alongside through Dussek’s music, exploring the great tonal variety that existed amongst fortepianos in the composer’s day, with each instrument’s unique qualities matched to the differing characters of Dussek’s works.

Other information:
- Recordings date from 2017–2021
- Period instruments used include fortepianos by Longman, Clementi & Co. (London, 1797), (London, 1798) & (London, 1798/9); Chris Maene (Ruiselede, 2003, after Longman–Clementi, London, 1799), (Ruiselede, 2010, after Anton Walter); Robert Brown (Oberndorf, 2009, after Michael Rosenberger, Vienna, c.1810); John Broadwood & Son (London, 1804); Paul McNulty (after Anton Walter, 1792); Thomas & Barbara Wolf (Washington DC, 1983, after Johann Schanz, c.1800); anonymous Viennese 5-octave (c.1795/1800)
- Booklet in English contains a profile of the composer by Olga Witthauer and extensive liner notes on each of the discs, written by several of the performers.

- For the first time all in one 10-CD box: the complete Piano Sonatas and Sonatinas by Johann Ladislaus Dussek!
- Johann Ladislaus Dussek (1760-1812) was born in rural Bohemia. He led a restless life, travelling Europe as a keyboard virtuoso and settling in several European capitals, notably Paris and London, where he became a fashionable pianist and teacher.
- Dussek’s style is rich, harmonically expressive and pianistically challenging, Classicism on the brink of Early Romanticism.
- Played by 10 eminent and foremost pianists playing period instruments: Bart van Oort, Piet Kuijken, Alexei Lubimov, Tuija Hakkila, Wolfgang Brünner, Viviana Sofronitsky, Zvi Meniker,
- Ursula Dütschler and Petra Somlai, all of them experts in the field of historically informed performance practice.
- The single CD issued previously has received numerous excellent reviews in the press: Fanfare: ‘Bart van Oort, playing on a late 18th-century Longman Clementi instrument, serves up vital, energetic performances that draw the most from the music… Strongly recommended.’, ‘Uniformly adept performances… that illuminate the music’s characteristic disruptions without over-emphasizing them, and that capture the music’s emotional character (or, more accurately, characters) with impressive conviction.’ (Volume 4, 95604) Brilliantclassics

Tracklist :
CD01 - Op.10 and Op.31 (61:07)
CD02 - Op.25 and Op.39 (54:35)
CD03 - Op.44 and Op.77 (62:35)
CD04 - Op.5, 24, 43, 61 (61:22)
CD05 - Op.18 and Op.45 (65:01)
CD06 - Op.9 and Op.75 no.3 (79:12)
CD07 - Op.47 and Op.64 (59:48)
CD08 - Op.14 and Sonate in G (56:29)
CD09 - Op.35 and Op.69 no.3 (84:40)
CD10 - Sonatinas Op.32 and Op.20 (77:00)

JAN LADISLAV DUSSEK : 3 Piano Sonatas (Markus Becker) (2006) FLAC (tracks), lossless

Investigate the music of Beethoven's contemporaries who were well enough known to be called his rivals, and the idea of Beethoven as fist-shaking revolutionary comes in for some serious revision. Jan Ladislav Dussek, Bohemian-born, became famous all over Europe for piano music that was daring in every way. The three sonatas on this disc date from the very beginning of the nineteenth century. They have Beethovenian dimensions and conventions -- the Piano Sonata No. 18 in E flat major, Op. 44, is a "Farewell" sonata -- and their harmonic schemes, at both movement-wide and local levels, are ambitious. Listen to Dussek, or Hummel, and Beethoven begins to seem like the composer who brought their innovations back within the confines of classical frameworks. The clear outlines of Beethoven's movements are missing in these works, which are occasionally dull -- the incessant motor action of the first movement of the Piano Sonata No. 24 in F sharp minor, Op. 61, is enough to make you want to leave the room for a sandwich and a beer, or to wish for the opening movement of the "Moonlight" sonata. But in the main these are expansive works with much to tell us about the music Beethoven was hearing and reacting to. Pianist Markus Becker delivers fine readings, with sensitivity to the rhetorical gestures of the music and an admirable refusal to pile more passion onto these works than they can comfortably handle. James Manheim

JAN LADISLAV DUSSEK : Piano Sonatas, Opp. 9 & 77 (Markus Becker) (2008) APE (image+.cue), lossless

CPO's Jan Ladislav Dussek: Piano Sonatas Opp. 9 & 77, featuring pianist Markus Becker, contrasts Dussek's last-known work -- the Grande Sonate in F minor, subtitled "L'Invocation" -- with three of Dussek's earliest, solo piano arrangements of works originally published as accompanied sonatas. Becker -- who performs these sonatas on a modern grand -- is certainly the right player to put the best face on these pieces; his playing is grand, confident, and forceful. "L'Invocation" is an engrossing piece with a wide variety of emotional twists and turns and a secure, yet exploratory approach to pianistic technique that in the Tempo di Minuetto movement betrays the influence of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. It is a landmark piece well worth knowing, and as Dussek -- by 1812 no longer youthful, badly overweight, and suffering from a multitude of ailments -- did not live to produce another, "L'Invocation" stands as his valedictory statement.
By comparison, the three sonatas of Op. 3, dating from 1786, contain no foreshadowing of psychological form, though they do represent a highly elaborated and expanded take on the classical piano sonata. Superficially, they seem similar to Beethoven's early piano sonatas, but listening closely reveals that Dussek's work has its own aesthetic and unique voice, not to mention that Beethoven himself was only beginning to compose when these works first appeared. While they are anything but conformist -- contrast any one of these sonatas to one of Haydn's, for example -- they are a little more difficult to warm up to than the "L'Invocation" is and will reward repeated listens. However, the Larghetto from the Sonata Op. 9/2 in C major is quite penetrating, striking, and memorable.
If one were to judge Dussek solely on his scandal-ridden and sometimes wasteful personal life, then his relative obscurity might be seen as well deserved. Where would we be, however, if we applied the same criteria to the work of Richard Wagner? In terms of the final phase of the classical piano sonata, Dussek's work has a relative value similar to Wagner's place in the scheme of high German romanticism just prior into its dissolution into the post-romantic ethos. Wagner was the culmination of the process that began with Beethoven, just as Beethoven naturally carried the torch of the aesthetic from which Dussek sprang, and probably buried it forever. Such observations still may not compel one to listen to Dussek; however, if a listener decides to take the plunge, CPO's Jan Ladislav Dussek: Piano Sonatas, Opp. 9 & 77, is as good as it gets in terms of advocacy of Dussek as a figure worthy of first-tier status. Uncle Dave Lewis 

DUSSEK : Sonatas; Fantasia and Fugue (Andreas Staier) 2CD / FLAC (image+.cue), lossless