Beethoven: Sonata in C# Minor, “Moonlight“ (Lortie, Jando)

Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata (which really should be known as the Second Sonata-Fantasy) is probably the world’s most popular bit of Great Music, and for good reason. Its peculiar brand of expressive and imagistic power is nearly unrivalled in piano literature. The first movement is one of those rare things that is, like Bach, almost totally impervious to all kinds of interpretive liberty: depending on how you play it it might sound funereal, wistful, melancholic, lyrical, or tragic, but it will never be an