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Schubert: Piano Sonata D. 960

Classical / Romantic · 1972

Schubert: Piano Sonata D. 960

Sviatoslav Richter

슈베르트: 피아노 소나타 D960 · 스비아토슬라프 리히테르

Why listen

The vast opening movement gains perspective from the much smaller scherzo that follows it later.

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Tracks · previews

English editorial edition

Album story

The quiet opening is not the whole story. A low trill disturbs the singing line, giving the piano’s lower register a presence that cannot be reduced to accompaniment. Richter lets this first movement occupy more than half of the sonata’s playing time. Its roughly twenty-four and a half minutes are a matter of proportion as well as pace: what follows must be heard against that unusually large beginning.

Schubert completed D960 in September 1828 as the last of his final three piano sonatas. This Richter recording comes from Schloss Anif near Salzburg in August and November 1972, rather than the Prague concert of the same year. The Alto reissue couples it with D958. Here the complete four-movement D960 programme is retained, allowing the recording’s internal proportions to remain clear without treating the coupling as another movement.

Two registers, different functions

The bass trill changes the character of the opening melody. A returning tune therefore carries a memory of disturbance as well as recognition. Following the difference between the singing upper register and the darker lower one offers a concrete route through the long movement. Length becomes part of a changing relationship, not merely the amount of time needed to reach the next section.

The weight of the first half

The slow second movement lasts just over ten minutes, while the scherzo takes less than four. That contrast is essential. Richter’s sonata is not an uninterrupted stretch of slow music, and the smaller dance acquires its particular lightness after two substantial movements. Listening only to the opener obscures the scale of this transition and makes the interpretation seem more uniform than the programme actually is.

A different kind of ending

The finale completes the work in under eight minutes. Returning material and forward movement replace the opening movement’s expansive proportions. The four movements thus create several kinds of musical time within one performance. Schubert’s final year supplies historical context, but the changing textures and formal balances offer more precise listening clues than treating every gesture as a prediction of his death.

The album through its tracks

Remember the first movement’s bass trill, then continue through the short scherzo to hear how the whole sonata redistributes weight.

  1. I. Molto moderato

    A melody establishes calm before the low trill unsettles its surroundings. Keeping those two registers in mind gives the extended movement a more specific character than simply calling it slow. When the melody returns, compare its outline with the resonance around it: recognition and changed emphasis can coexist. At approximately twenty-four minutes and thirty-four seconds, this movement occupies more than half of the selected recording. That proportion helps explain its weight without making a contest of duration. The track is from Richter’s 1972 Schloss Anif sessions in the Alto edition. Hearing the later scherzo as well reveals how different a scale the same pianist can establish within this sonata.

    Reference · Alto official booklet — complete programme, durations, personnel and 1972 sessions

  2. II. Andante sostenuto

    The sonata does not immediately turn from its long first movement to a dance. This second movement, lasting just over ten minutes, adds another substantial span before the scherzo. Attend to the relationship between the melodic line and the recurring accompaniment below it. A single instrument can sustain several roles at once, allowing song and measured movement to coexist. The contrast between the central passage and the return helps the movement unfold rather than remain a single dark colour. This track belongs to the same Alto delivery as the opener. Together they show how much of the performance’s overall weight is concentrated before the shorter third and fourth movements.

    Reference · Alto official booklet — complete programme, durations, personnel and 1972 sessions

Listen next

Schubert’s String Quintet D956 also dates from 1828. Compare the piano’s combined melodic and bass roles with their distribution among five string players, including two cellos.

Schubert: String Quintet in C ↗
References & editorial note

Written for English readers. Album facts are referenced below; listening suggestions are editorial interpretations. AI-assisted editorial review; not independently human-reviewed.