# Wilhelm Kempff



## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

Perhaps a more emotionally rather than technically based pianist? Of course he had great technique and skill, all I'm saying is that he let his emotions run a bit more free compared to some other Classical pianists for better or worse; I like it, especially this performance:


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I like Kempff as a pianist, I have his Schubert box. Nothing flashy, just good playing, and that's good with Schubert and apparently Beethoven, too. Just a calm conveyance of the musical ideas, with no distractions.


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## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

millionrainbows said:


> I like Kempff as a pianist, I have his Schubert box. Nothing flashy, just good playing, and that's good with Schubert and apparently Beethoven, too. Just a calm conveyance of the musical ideas, with no distractions.


Exactly! That is what is great about him as a player, his strength.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

great player. Like many German musicians a questionable record under the Nazis, but made a whole stack of treasurable recordings. Interesting article / biography

https://www.gramophone.co.uk/editor...ofile-by-stephen-plaistow-gramophone-may-2004


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

My first real acquaintance with the pianism of Wilhelm Kempff came via the Deutsche Grammophon Series of recordings the Beethoven Bicentennial Collection, released in the early 1970s.



























Several of those volumes features Kempff performances, sometimes exclusively (as with the Piano Sonatas). I've managed to acquire the entire set and many more Kempff releases over the years. A solid, go-to pianist. Not a lot to dicker about.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

SONNET CLV said:


> A solid, go-to pianist. Not a lot to dicker about.


...and no humming!


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

When I hear his Beethoven sonatas I imagine him playing in an elegant room that is floating in space (think Kubrik's 2001). That he is playing just for himself and that he goes on doing so for eternity. I suspect this is just my imagination.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

He is very good in Brahms I think, he has the right temperament for the music. A fine pianist.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Favourites for me are the LvB 5th and 4th concertos with Leitner, the DG Hammerklavier Sonata, and the Brahms solo works in the early mono deccas. I'm less enthusistic about the rest of his DG Beethoven, or his Schubert and Schumann.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

I used to really like his Beethoven sonatas, he was my go to, until I heard Artur Schnabel. Still like Kempff but I'm listening to Schnabel 9 times out of 10.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

millionrainbows said:


> ...and no humming!


...except on my part.

I can hum along with just about anybody, except Gould. His vocalizations throw me off tune.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

flamencosketches said:


> I used to really like his Beethoven sonatas, he was my go to, until I heard Artur Schnabel. Still like Kempff but I'm listening to Schnabel 9 times out of 10.


I go through periods of wanting to hear x more than y but I know from the way it has played out that there are perhaps 4 or 5 pianists who are extremely different but absolutely wonderful in the sonatas. I can choose between them for today but not for ever. There are many others who I don't think are quite as great but who also often have something to say to me through Beethoven. I often like to listen to them, too. I worship Kempff because his Beethoven is so personal and almost private.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

Ahh you're right. As amazing as Schnabel is on most of the sonatas, Kempff does still give him a run for his money on more than a few of em. It's hard for me to choose between the two pianists on for example the Pathétique, probably my favorite, which they both play very differently from one another. I just go thru phases of being enamored with one or another player over the rest. (For example these days I only wanna hear Samson François playing Chopin. But I still have love for Rubinstein, Argerich, etc.) And as for technical mastery (on record anyway) Kempff probably wins out over Schnabel. 

Is his Schubert sonatas box set worth getting? Hmm...


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Has anyone explored kempff’s Goldberg Variations? Did he ever say why he chose to play them like that?


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## Gallus (Feb 8, 2018)

flamencosketches said:


> It's hard for me to choose between the two pianists on for example the Pathétique, probably my favorite, which they both play very differently from one another.


I very much like how quickly Kempff takes the Pathetique. Great pianist.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

flamencosketches said:


> Is his Schubert sonatas box set worth getting? Hmm...


There are two Schubert things worth getting, neither on DG







.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

tdc said:


> He is very good in Brahms I think, he has the right temperament for the music. A fine pianist.


I'm not a great fan of the sonatas but I can tell that the op 5 here is special


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## Rmathuln (Mar 21, 2018)

I thoroughly enjoy his Schubert in 192k remastering that came on BluRay last year. Suspect the Beethoven sets are forthcoming this year sometime. Best would be both mono and stereo DG sonatas and concertos on one disc.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Mandryka said:


> Has anyone explored kempff's Goldberg Variations? Did he ever say why he chose to play them like that?


I have the DG LP but the comprehensive liner notes don't characterize Kempff's playing or choices.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Re: Kempff



flamencosketches said:


> Is his Schubert sonatas box set worth getting? Hmm...


If you can afford it, yes. Even though you may have several Schubert box sets, another one won't hurt. After all, one learns things from hearing different interpretations. It may be just a few notes or one particular phrase that you hear differently for the first time and say "Ah! That was special!"

I don't believe that any single performer ever captures the ultimate essence of a musical piece, since art appreciation remains subjective and elusive. We all look at the same painting or read the same poem and get different feelings, thoughts, ideas.... So with works of music. Each listener, each performer brings his/her own experiential environment to the music. I think it's wonderful to experience others' ideas about the music, just as I enjoy reading competing critics on art works or literature … and on music. In the end it is only my own preference which really matters, right or wrong though I may be.*

* And that "right or wrong" is purely opinion on somebody else's side, isn't it?


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

Much as I love Schubert, I actually don't have a complete box of the sonatas. So maybe this will be the one to get. 

In any case, I fully agree with the rest of your post.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

When I first heard Kempff (Beethoven) he seemed to do things with pedaling I hadn't heard before. Otherwise I thought him typical of Germanic pianism the likes of Backhaus, Brendel and others … until I heard Schnabel. There is no other German like him.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

joen_cph said:


> I have the DG LP but the comprehensive liner notes don't characterize Kempff's playing or choices.


In fact I'd remembered it as being very unusual, because he mostly avoids ornaments, so the aria sounds very strange. But just going back to it the variations sound quite natural.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

This is a great set, one of the top Schumann pianists


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

I think this live Davidsbundlertanze is quite bold because it's so level headed, sane.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Bwv 1080 said:


> This is a great set, one of the top Schumann pianists
> 
> View attachment 113653


Yes tremendous colour


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Update on Wilhelm Kempff …

Just received the new issue (No. 293, April 2019) of _The Absolute Sound_ and read Ted Libby's review of the Deutsche Grammophon box set (9 CDs + 1 Blu-ray Audio) _Wilhelm Kempff: The Schubert Recordings on Deutsche Grammophon_.









The review received five "stars" (actually, red filled-in circles, the maximum "Like") for "Music" (which includes the performance) and 4 1/2 "stars" (actually, light-green filled-in circles) for "Sonics" (the production sound). That's a good review!

Libbey writes in his third paragraph: "It helps to have an experienced guide in this music, and there's never been a more capable one that Wilhelm Kempff. This splendid reissue -- one of a series of CD/Blu-ray Audio combo packages that DG has released of late -- dusts off what has long been one of the gild-edged securities of the classical catalog. It brings together not just the 18 sonatas Kempff recorded for DG between 1965 and 1970, but the other Schubert he recorded at the same time: both sets of Impromptus (D. 899 a;nd 935), the _Moments musicaux_ (D. 780), the Wanderer Fantasy (D. 760), and a handful of shorter pieces, with the Liszt arrangement of Schubert's "Horch, horch, die Lerch' im Ätherblau" (D. 889), recorded in Berlin for Polydor in 1935, thrown in as a bonus on CD only."

And in the fourth paragraph Libbey notes: "Kempff's touch is lapidary, and his readings abound in imaginative elegances."

If you notice some elegant writing in this post from me, for the first time, keep in mind that I'm quoting _Absolute Sound_ reviewer Ted Libbey. I had to look up the word "lapidary". It's not one you hear very often on the Montana high plains, or anywhere else I've been lately. As a noun a lapidary is a gem cutter; as an adjective the word means (according to Merriam-Webster) "having the elegance and precision associated with inscriptions on monumental stone", or "of, relating to, or suggestive of precious stones or the art of cutting them". Sounds like a good word to describe exquisite playing of music by Schubert!

Further Libby writes: "The sound on the CD is sensational -- meaty, warm, formidably deep in the bass. To my ears it is the same as on the 7-CD set of the sonatas from 1988, long one of my desert island treasures. Compared to this, the new (2018) Blue-ray Audio remastering seems almost a different recording: more polite and soft-spoken, it conveys -- faithfully, I think -- the actual weight of Kempff's sound and the bell-like tone in the upper octave for which he was celebrated. The instrument is heard at a slightly greater distance, yet despite that it is palpably present, in a space that suggests a Biedermeier-era salon."

Libby concludes with more good news: "The set is available for about $40, not a bad price for ten hours of magic, though something this good and this easy on the wallet ought to be illegal."

So, if you were considering making the leap to a box set of Kempff's Schubert, and if you don't already own the 1988 set (or if you want a Blu-ray Audio version that may sound a touch different sonically), it seems you now have no excuse to not purchase this affordable treasure. I think I will. For the Blu-ray Audio. But first I'll have to get me a Blu-ray player. I guess I'm a bit behind the times. Maybe that's what my grandkids mean when they call me a dinosaur! Of course, it could be my roar, the sound I make as I chase them round my son's house, a fun, worthwhile, invigorating activity that actually ranks nowadays a notch above even listening to Kempff's Schubert. But if you don't yet have grandkids, you'll certainly want to get this here box set of Kempff DG Schubert recordings. It'll be a purchase to treasure. A fine choice. And, maybe you'll be able to call yourself a lapidary _because_ of the choice, fine and elegant that it is.


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