Russian pianist to play all 32 of Beethoven’s piano sonatas, in order, over eight concerts in Hong Kong
Konstantin Lifschitz will do something few pianists have ever done – perform the cycle of Beethoven sonatas in sequence – in six days at the University of Hong Kong, beginning this week
This month, Russian pianist Konstantin Lifschitz will be doing something he has never done before – in fact, something which has rarely ever been done. He will be playing all 32 of Beethoven’s piano sonatas in the order they were written, over eight concerts.
And he will be doing this in the Grand Hall of the Lee Shau Kee Lecture Centre at the University of Hong Kong (“what a wonderful concert hall that is”) from September 15.
“I had this dream to do it, and then they invited me and my first thought was ‘That is really early,’ but they were so kind I just could not say no.”
He was speaking in a Skype call the day before he did the first of six rehearsals in front of an audience of friends and students, in Lucerne, Switzerland, where he teaches at the university.
The sonatas span from No 1 in F minor (written in 1795 when Beethoven was 24, and dedicated to his teacher Joseph Haydn), to the extraordinary, almost jazzy, No 32 in C minor, written in around 1822, five years before the composer died at 56.
Lifschitz has been playing most of these works all his life, although he has learned a couple this year, specially for this challenge.
Nine symphonies, five nights: Hong Kong date for hotshot Dudamel’s Beethoven cycle
The simpler pieces – including the Moonlight Sonata (No 14 in C sharp minor) and Für Elise (No 25 in A minor), both with extracts famously played by people starting on the piano (although the latter piece, curiously, was not discovered until 40 years after Beethoven’s death) – were among the works Lifschitz learned first, when he started playing the piano as a toddler living with his parents some 100km from Moscow.
