Listen to Stephen Kovacevich anywhere in these four sonatas and the authentic voice of Beethoven leaps out at you. The feeling conveyed carries the ring of truth and Kovacevich characterizes the expressiveness so exactly you could imagine putting words to the phrases. Beethoven’s vitality in its rhythmic and dynamic aspects is also excellently projected. Yet there’s nothing analytical about the presentation. The playing is personal but the engagement with the music so natural and complete as to give the impression Kovacevich has gone at once to the heart of the matter. The beginning of the D major Sonata, Op. 28 is revealed as a sublime inspiration, the first paragraph gradually stirring with movement and gathering force as if the music were being brought out into the sunlight. You notice too how the pianism is always integral to the experience, not something ‘correct’ and donned like a suit of clothes. The steel in Kovacevich’s forte I don’t mind at all, and when he whips up a storm, as he quite often does, I am usually with him all the way, though I do find him noisy and over-brilliant at the end of this Pastoral Sonata: does it really need such a virtuoso peroration? And sometimes there is a fierceness of accent which is overdone: absolutely apt to the outer movements of the C minor Sonata, Op. 10 No. 1, but from time to time excessive in other places, where the eruptions of intensity land me on the ropes. I think the C minor Sonata is the finest performance all round. The quick movements are at the edge, as if threatening to fly apart, but are underpinned by a control of gesture, movement and sound which only the best players achieve. Between them, Kovacevich is equally masterly in the Adagio molto, plunging us into its interior world with the very first chord and sustaining a moving tenderness and calm at the close.
Another reflection might be that it would be nice if he lightened up a little, here and there, in the interests of the humorous, teasing qualities of (for example) the F major Sonata, Op. 10 No. 2, or the finale of the D major from the same set. When Beethoven is closest to Haydn Kovacevich can seem farther off, even matter-of-fact. But it is a small thing. Your first and abiding impression is likely to be of his master’s voice and exciting playing, and there is no doubting his faithfulness as servant and compelling qualities as guide. The recording was made at Air Studios in London; there’s a touch too much space around the sound at the beginning of the C minor Sonata but the quality is ideal thereafter. This is turning out to be a distinguished series.'