I was a kid in Iran during the 80s aerial bombardments.  My dad used to play Alfred Brendel's Beethoven Sonata's on his cassette player every night while we were hunkered down in the basement.  He took me to a different universe, one which was safe,  generous and wise...all while chaos echoed around us.    Many years years later, I got to see him live on stage in the west as a Piano student.   Again, Beethoven sonata's.   To see him live while reliving the events of war in my memory was something very hard to process at that moment.    I saw him many more times in recital and consider myself lucky to have personally met him and gotten his autograph.   RIP Maestro.   Your impact went far beyond anything you could have imagined.

"I’m not a good sight reader, I don’t have a phenomenal memory, I dont come from an artistic or intellectual or musical family, there was no music in the house. I'm completely at a loss to explain how I did it."

A musicians musician, and a giant of a pianist. RIP Alfred Brendel.

Alfred was my teenage musical hero. Suffering terrible depression I can remember buying his 3rd cycle of the complete Beethoven piano concertos.
One night I was in despair and filled with tears. I put on his recording of the Moonlight sonata, and within minutes, my tears stopped. I was entranced by his playing.
I can say confidently, he helped me overcome my depression.

Rest in Peace Alfred.

this is the best, most insightful, kind-hearted, least pretentious docu-obituary I have ever come across. Thank you very much, Ben Laude!

I knew Alred Brendel back in tehe 60s. There was a group of pianists and friends who lived in London and we would often see each other at concerts and at parties. Alfred had a store of funny stories and clippings from newspapers which had errors. I remember he had an advert cut from a Buenos Aires newspaper which advertised  "Vah Heuson Shit Makers"! .In those days, Brendel was not the super revered musican of later days. He had recorded a lot for Vox - even Prokofiev concerto 5 (which he didn't like but was cajoled into learning and recording) - but since these were cheap LPs, he was considered a "cheap pianist. There have been a lot of pianists like that , for example Janos Jando. - a superb musician. -  - a Vox pianist not a DG pianist. But then a critic- I think it may have been the critic  in the times who  wrote a piece about him that portrayed him as the  truly great musician he ws. The critic had said that Brendel's Mozart concertos on Vox  were by fat the best on record. A week later, Alfred gave a Wigmore Hall recital. Until then his Wigmore recitals had been well attended but nothing spectacular. After the Times piece. there were queues for tikcets. He gave the recital and the critics were rapturous. It reall was a case of fame overnight. But Alfred never let this sudden fame change him. I have a much treasured photo taken at a party of me and Alfred chatting on a sofa. I have many memories.  He enriched the musical world. RIP..

What a wonderful tribute!

How fitting that you included the ending of Opus 111, Brenden’s music will live on 😢

Brendel was my first sober introduction to Liszt's true value 40 years ago!

This is a very sad news for all the world of real music. An intelectual of the highest category, a refined and profound personality that gave his entire life for the interpretation and performances of the greatest minds in music. Composers in heaven must be so proud of their music. Thanks to Alfred Brendel, with all my heart ❤️

Rest in peace, you absolute legend ❤️

I saw Alfred Brendel in concert in the 90's, in McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton. It was spring, and a lot of colds were going around. I ignored the coughs and focussed on the music. In the middle of a Beethoven Sonata, from across the balcony, came a loud, wet, sucking, snorting super-sniffle — fortissimo — the hall went dead silent, including the piano.

Brendel slowly turned to the audience and said graciously, "Ladies and Gentlemen, please. I need to concentrate. I can hear you as well as you can hear me." Then the turned back to the piano, inhaled, and returned to the Sonata. That was the only time I've ever heard a professional musician stop.

For the rest of the concert, I watched the audience desperately trying to avoid coughing, silently heaving, taking the moments between movements for relief and going dead silent whenever he raised his hands to the keys. The cough at the beginning of this video brought it all back.

We are living in a golden age to be able to watch artists up close on YouTube like this.  Thank you.  Birmingham, England.

I was deeply moved by this tribute. Alfred Brendel was not only one of the great pianist-thinkers of our time, but also someone who touched my life personally. In 1975, I had the rare privilege of a televised master class with him on Stravinsky’s Trois mouvements de Petrouchka. I remember vividly how impressed he was with my precision and technique—but he also didn’t hesitate to rein me in. Brendel stressed that Stravinsky himself demanded strict tempos—no indulgences. He noticed how I tended to slow in the most difficult passages and speed up when showing off. “Stravinsky wouldn’t have any of that,” he told me, with the clarity and conviction that defined his artistry.

Despite the critique, he praised my performance and we ended up having a delightful lunch afterward. We stayed in touch for some time after, and I’ll always cherish that connection.

My main teacher, John Perry—who also just passed—told me once that he stood in the direct descendancy from Beethoven, through Liszt and Schnabel, and that he was passing that lineage on to me. To have been shaped by both Perry and Brendel is something I will never take for granted.

Thank you, Alfred, for your monumental Beethoven, your uncompromising integrity, and for inspiring generations of pianists—including me.

Great video Ben. I grew up with Beethoven Sonatas by Wilhelm Kempff on Deutsch Grammophon. Moonlight, Appassionata, Pathetique was my first. Then I discovered Brendel 10 years later and his complete Beethoven Sonatas on Vox or Phillips. They were all fabulous. Especially 109. I just seem to like everything he does. Thanks for your wonderful tribute.

It took me a while to appreciate Brendel’s very direct style of playing.  But he’s the only pianist to make me enjoy the Haydn sonatas.  Now I appreciate his emphasis on pulse, movement, and how he kind of uses “non-subtlety” as a form of genuine musical expression

A thoughtful and well-presented tribute to a consummate artist. For me, Brendel was, with the likes of Pollini, Horowitz, Gilels, Gould and Rubinstein one of the giants of 20th century pianism and his passing is immensely sad.
I will always remember hearing his recording of late Schubert works for the first time as a kid back in the 80s. It was as if his soul was at one with the composer himself.
Thank you, Mr Brendel, for all that you gave us, and may you rest in peace.

Personally, I like the attention to phrases, to the meaning of the themes, in the music. He's not just reciting poetry in a language he isn't fluent. He brought the music to life.

Alfred Brendel: RIP.
Your Beethoven is second to none. So is your Schubert, and Haydn.
What a great legacy!

When I was young I would often drive my parents' car in the town where we lived, and I'd tune in to WFMT.  Very often there would be some piano music and more times than not, if I really liked something
I heard, at the piece's conclusion I would hear, "That was Alfred Brendel playing (fill in the blank, though likely something by Schubert, Beethoven, or Haydn)."  In that way I came to have a lot of respect for
and appreciation of Alfred Brendel.  He wasn't "charismatic" in how he appeared on stage, but he was always so reliably musical and had a beautiful tone as well.  Yesterday, not even being aware that Mr.
Brendel had passed away, I recalled that he had done a recording of some Chopin Polonaises many years ago.  I found a YouTube recording of what was no doubt the VOX LP I had as a teenager, and I
listened to it again.  (And there in the comments on the video, I sadly read of his passing.)  I remember reading (possibly in David Dubal's "Reflections From the Keyboard"?) that Mr. Brendel felt that he was
not the right person to play Chopin's music.  Maybe so, but, for what it's worth, I found there was a lot to love in his Polonaise recording, and I was also deeply impressed by Mr. Brendel's pianistic command.  
Scales are pristine and ornaments are rendered so beautifully, and the coda of the Polonaise part of the "Andante Spianato et Grande Polonaise Brilliante" is rousingly rendered.  Even in music which he felt was
somewhat alien to his musical background and temperament, he was (and will continue to be through his recordings) deeply impressive.

AND NOW I'M CRYING FOR SOMEONE I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW, BUT WHO COMMUNICATED HIS SPIRIT THROUGH HIS MUSIC !!!