Today, the piece is heard almost exclusively in
transcriptions for
cello and
piano or
viola and piano that were arranged after the posthumous publication, although versions that substitute other instruments—including
violin,
double bass,
flute,
euphonium,
alto saxophone and
clarinet for the arpeggione, or
guitar or
harp for the piano part—are also performed. Transcribers have attempted to address the problems posed by the smaller
playing range of these alternative instruments, in comparison with the arpeggione, as well as the attendant modifications in
articulation (4 versus 6
strings). Notable arrangements include: •
Gaspar Cassadó – cello and orchestra •
Göran Söllscher – violin and guitar •
James Galway – flute •
Dobrinka Tabakova – viola and string orchestra •
David Werden – Euphonium and Piano •
Kenneth Radnofsky – Alto Saxophone and Piano •
Brian Newbould –
clarinet quintet The work has been recorded in the original version by the following musicians: •
Klaus Storck and Alfons Kontarsky (1974,
LP No 2533 174 on the
Archiv Produktion label). Klaus Storck played an arpeggione attributed to
Anton Mitteis, a student of the instrument's inventor,
Johann Georg Stauffer;
Alfons Kontarsky played a
Brodmann fortepiano built in Vienna ca. 1810. • Alfred Lessing and
Jozef De Beenhouwer (2000–2001, Ars Produktion FCD 368 392). Played on a copy by Henning Aschauer of an early 19th-century instrument built either by J. G. Staufer or by Anton Mitteis, at present in the Musical Instrument Collection of the
Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation and on the 1824
Conrad Graf pianoforte from the
Beethoven House in Bonn. •
Gerhart Darmstadt and Egino Klepper (2005, Cavalli Records CCD 242) • Nicolas Deletaille and
Paul Badura-Skoda (2006–2007, Fuga Libera FUG529). This recording was made in Florence (Accademia Bartolomeo Cristofori) on a Benjamen La Brigue arpeggione (2001) and the fortepiano is a Conrad Graf (ca. 1820) • Nicolas Deletaille and Alain Roudier (2012, Ad Libitum) •
Lorenz Duftschmid (arpeggione by Caroline Zilmann & Steffen Milbradt, 1999 Meissen after Mitteis/Staufer ca. 1825) and Paul Gulda (fortepiano by Conrad Graf, 1824) • Emmanuel Girard and Chie Hirai • Guido Balestracci and Maude Gratton • Alexander Rudin and Aapo Höbarth (Conrad Graf, 1827) • Michal Kaňka (original arpeggione by Georg Stauffer, Vienna, 1832) and Jaromir Klepác (fortepiano by Joseph Donhal, Vienna, ca. 1808–1818) recorded the middle movement only of the sonata. Other musicians recorded the work on historical instruments, but employed a historical cello rather than an arpeggione. Among those are the following: •
Pieter Wispelwey (bohemian cello, 19th-century) and Paolo Giacometti (fortepiano by Salvatore Lagrassa, c. 1815). •
Anner Bylsma (anonymous violoncello piccolo, 5 strings, Tirol. ca. 1700) and
Jos Van Immerseel (fortepiano by Johann Nepomuk Tröndlin, Leipzig, early 19th-century). • Stefano Veggetti (5 strings violoncello piccolo by Christian Gottfried Schönfelder, 1750) and Jos Van Immerseel (fortepiano by Conrad Graf, 1826). •
Ernst Simon Glaser (unspecified cello, possibly modern) and
Liv Glaser (fortepiano by Alois Graff, 1825). ==Notes==