Led by questions from the auditorium, Jonathan explores the evening concert programme and the development of Beethoven over the decade the performed works span. He discusses how teaching and preparing his Coursera lectures has affected his approach to playing the piano sonatas, and how an audience in Beethoven’s day might have reacted to the works.

Jonathan Biss, following the December concert in his Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle, is joined by Antoine Lederlin and Krzysztof Chorzelski of the Belcea Quartet (who are currently performing the complete Beethoven String Quartets) for a discussion on their programmes. The conversation includes comparisons between the string quartets and piano sonatas, the co-existence of contrasting elements - human & superhuman, complex & banal - in the works, and what it's like performing a complete cycle by one composer ("living with" Beethoven).

Jonathan Biss is joined by composer Sally Beamish who wrote a piano concerto, City Stanzas for him. Together they discuss how this works responds to Beethoven's music.