SXL / SWL / CS    BEETHOVEN: THE COMPLETE PIANO SONATAS      WILHELM BACKHAUS

DECCA / LONDON   UK 1952 - 1970     13 DISCS      NM vinyl / EX sleeves

A hybrid set if ever there was one. Neither Decca nor London made a serious attempt to present Backhaus' second survey of the Beethoven sonatas - a project lamed by the refusal of Backhaus to re-record the  Hammerklavier sonata - until the early 70s, when Decca issued them in a 10 LP box set*. Despite having recorded all 32 sonatas in mono in the early 1950s, Decca asked Backhaus to re-record the most popular sonatas in stereo and the first two sonatas appeared in 1960 (SXL 2241 / CS 6161). Six more were issued in the UK in 1962 on three SWL 10" medium play records, but not in America, where they were issued on LP. Over the next 7 years the remainder of the cycle was issued on LP, except the mono Hammerklavier, which was electronically reprocessed for inclusion in the 10 LP box set. 

Now very hard to find, this collection features 11 first pressings (SWL 8016 / SWL 8018 / SXL 6063 / 6064 / 6097 / 6300 / 6358 / 6359 / 6416 / 6417 / CS 6246), 1 second pressing (LXT 2777) and 1 third pressing (SXL 2241)e - see photographs.

Vinyl NM / Sleeves EX+ or EX 

 * also available from Kingsway Hall Classics