Unfinished - Finished

Unfinished pieces are nothing unusual in Franz Schubert’s work. Out of nine operas, for example, he finished only four, out of eight symphonies one remained unfinished, and out of his 21 piano sonatas twelve were finished, while the others remained one-movement fragments or they’re missing one movement.

Why, of all things, does an artist attend to the unfinished piano sonatas even though there is such a wide range to choose from?

"There are two reasons, why I specifically recorded these four unfinished, early sonatas. Back then, Schubert still experimented with the sonata form, but they are still absolutely worth playing. There are but a few pianists who attend or attended to these works. One of them was Wilhelm Kempff. Through him, I became acquainted with a few sonatas in the concert hall. He also played the unfinished ones. Simply great!"
Gitti Pirner

The appeal of Gitti Pirner’s Schubert lies within its genuineness and subtlety. Even in Schubert’s music, the great Mozart interpreter deploys her wealth of experience, traces the melodic alignment and the inner dynamic of the phrasing – without neglecting the formal buildup and the long arcs of suspense of Schubert’s music. The technical airiness of her play makes even the most complex passages seem like very simple music.