Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Nikolaus Harnoncourt - Beethoven: Triple Concerto, Choral Fantasia & Rondo (2012)

Go ahead, play rough and tough with Beethoven. He can take it: he's made of marble and stone and it'd take more than a couple hardcore eccentrics to ruin his reputation. This is not to say that gard-core eccentrics Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Nikolaus Harnoncourt don't give it their best shot. Like their earlier recording of the complete Piano Concertos of Beethoven, Aimard and Harnoncourt do what they like with his Triple Concerto, Rondo in B flat major, and Choral Fantasy to consistently terrible results. With violinist Thomas Zehetmair and cellist Clemens Hagen, Aimard and Harnoncourt turn in an ungainly and graceless recording of the graceful and gracious Triple Concerto. Alone together, they turn in a gawky and gauche of the elegant and expressive Rondo in B flat. And together, with the superb Arnold Schoenberg Choir, they turn in a performance of the already distinctly strange Choral Fantasy that blunders and thunders through the score with the self-discipline of a man who doesn't know where he's going, but is bound and determined to get there. Warner's sound is big and round, but not particularly realistic.