Artur Schnabel

Artur Schnabel (17 April 1882 – 15 August 1951) was an Austrian-born classical pianist, composer and pedagogue. Schnabel was known for his intellectual seriousness as a musician, avoiding pure technical bravura. Among the 20th century's most respected and important pianists, his playing displayed marked vitality, profundity and spirituality in the Austro-German classics, particularly the works of Beethoven, Schubert and Mozart. Music critic Harold C. Schonberg described Schnabel as "the man who invented Beethoven". Between 1932 and 1935, he made history by producing the first recordings of the complete Beethoven piano sonatas. In 2018, the Library of Congress selected these recordings to be placed in the National Recording Registry for its historical significance.