Recording the Beethoven Violin Sonatas!

Help us fund and finish our recording of the 10 Sonatas for piano and violin by Ludwig van Beethoven!

Hi! Who are you?

Hello, we are Shunske Sato & Shuann Chai - great that you're here!

Shunske is a violinist, conductor and teacher. His work can be seen on the All of Bach channel; with Concerto Köln he's involved in cutting-edge Romantic performance practice. He loves working with his delightful students at the Amsterdam Conservatory.

Shuann performs on a wide range of early to modern pianos as a soloist and chamber musician (check out her videos here). She is regularly invited to give masterclasses at conservatories and festivals in The Netherlands and abroad.

Both of us are musical omnivores who are grateful for the chance to travel all over the world.

And what's the plan?

We are recording Ludwig van Beethoven's 10 Sonatas for Violin and Piano. List of necessary ingredients as follows:

• Lots of hours spent preparing, performing and assimilating the sonatas
• Creative, expressive and daring players on both instruments (that's us!)
• Gorgeous-sounding historical instruments in tip-top condition
• A copious dose of historically informed practice, because it blows the music out of the water like nothing else
• A phenomenal sound engineer (Ernst Coutinho), a dedicated producer (Marloes Biermans), and a great label (Cobra Records)

Mix items above in a beautiful acoustic for 12 days; be particularly kind to the recording engineer; get 3 amazing CDs.

Another recording of the Beethoven violin sonatas? For goodness' sake, why?

Because, as far as we can tell, there isn't a Beethoven sonata set that sounds like ours.

We have spent an inordinate amount of time delving into historical sources and old recordings, and playing the pieces themselves to make them truly our own. Thankfully, there is ample information to be found about Beethoven, his life and music - from his aesthetics and personality to his standards of hygiene. Our conclusion is that his music is as full of contradictions as he was: boundary-challenging, improvisatory, tightly constructed, whimsical, earthy, intense, sincere and confronting. This is what we wanted our Beethoven sonatas to become.

These pieces have occupied a special place on our music stands for a very long time - in fact, the Kreutzer sonata (Op. 47) was the very first piece we ever played together (and may therefore be responsible for the fact that we eventually got married...). The motivation to record the complete sonatas arose when we played them all as a mini-marathon in concert for the first time. While preparing, we were unsure if both we and the audience would survive - it is 10 sonatas after all, totalling about 220 minutes of music. It turned out to be a worthy endeavor: not only did we survive, but we also got tremendously positive feedback. Making this recording, we thought, would allow us to share "our" Beethoven with even more people.

The first four recording days out of 12 are already behind us, and we're already thrilled about some of the takes that we have put into the "can" . To finish it however, we need financial help... quite badly!

You mentioned gorgeous-sounding historical instruments. Elaborate?

For this project we were able to use two "sibling" fortepianos, both built by Michael Rosenberger. They are:

• 5 1/2-octave piano built in Vienna in 1800, with two knee pedals (Edwin Beunk collection)
• 6-octave piano built in Vienna in 1820, with 6 (!) foot pedals (restored by Edwin Beunk for the Nationaal Muziekinstrumenten Fonds)

The violin is by Auguste Bernardel from 1846 with complete gut-string setup - the bow is a copy by an original from ca. 1780 by François Tourte, made by Stephan Sänger.

I'm almost convinced. Give me a few more specifics?

Recording is, alas, not free. And with CDs you don't earn much. The money we raise here will go towards:

• The recording engineer and the producer
• Renting the recording location (Westvest90 in Schiedam, The Netherlands)
• Rental and transport of the fortepianos
• Keeping the fortepianos tuned (and happy) - old instruments are easily influenced by changes in temperature and humidity. The tuner is on site for the entire duration of every session, and must tune the instrument several times a day while maintaining the pianos' sensitive mechanics
• Creating the artwork for the CD
• Editing, producing and distribution of the CD

To record the 10 Sonatas we need 12 recording days. You can imagine how the costs pile up quickly... That's why we need you!

Buy a CD, digital or physical. Or take an (online) class with one or both of us, join a Beethoven Q&A, surprise a friend or family member with an exclusive birthday gift, book a private concert, or check out one of our other rewards.

We will be exceptionally thankful for your help!