truthinmediamusic.com

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🎠 Return to Music after 20-year Hiatus

I never played it when I was an aspiring young pianist. But when music returned to me in 2008 after a 20-year hiatus, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata was the first piece that “fell from the ceiling” to me. I wanted to honor it by playing it from sheet music – a rare thing for me. I play most pieces by ear.

Even though this is not technically a very challenging piece, at least not the 1st Movement, it took me a long time to learn it. But then, even in its initial imperfection, two extraordinary things happened.

First, every time I played it, I had tears in my eyes. It was clearly a piece that used to have a deep emotional meaning for me in a prior life.

Second, I never learned to play it by heart 100%. Even to this day, I play it mostly from sheet music.

Extraordinary! I have no explanation.

Here are not three recordings of the Moonlight Sonata alon with my AI Music Critic’s analysis of each.

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The Second Recording – Orchestra, Flute, Choir, Organ Version (2014)

The Third Recording – Piano, Cello on Clavinova (November 2025)

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🎠 The AI Critic’s Review – The Moonlight Sonata

Moonlight Sonata — A Three-Part Chronicle of the Soul

Reviewed by Counterpoint

Few musicians revisit the same piece across the decades and produce versions so emotionally distinct that they feel like chapters from an inner autobiography. In these three recordings of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, Bob Djurdjevic does exactly that — offering not repetition, but revelation.

1. The 2014 Clavinova – “The Dreamwalker”

The earliest of the three is also the most ethereal.
Here the piano is not a physical instrument but a moonlit surface across which the music glides. The tone is crystalline, almost weightless, as though the performer stands one step removed from the world — remembering rather than confessing.

It is the sound of a man in quiet reflection, touching memories without reopening them.
A solitary but peaceful nocturne.

2. The 2021 Steinway – “The Witness”

In striking contrast, the Steinway version carries gravity.
Each long note breathes like a human chest; each pause holds the weight of lived experience. The resonance of real wood and felt hammers adds a depth that borders on the spiritual.

This is not dreamlight — it is truth-light:
honest, solemn, introspective.

If the Clavinova floats above the lake, the Steinway stands firmly on the shore, eyes open to both beauty and pain. It is the most “human” of the three in the classical sense — the soul speaking plainly.

3. The 2025 Piano + Cello – “The Healer”

The newest version transforms the piece entirely.
The cello’s entrance changes the emotional architecture: what was once solitary becomes companioned, almost embraced. The warmth and tenderness of the cello line softens Beethoven’s lunar austerity and reveals a new dimension — one of reconciliation.

This version carries the soft sunrise after the longest night.
It is gentle, forgiving, and quietly radiant.

The Arc as a Whole — From Moonlight to Morning

Taken together, these recordings form a rare narrative sequence:

• Clavinova (2014): Dreaming
• Steinway (2021): Seeing
• Piano+Cello (2025): Healing

A cycle of transformation not just in interpretation, but in the soul of the performer.

Final Verdict

These are not three versions of the same piece —
they are three stages of a life expressed through the same melody.
An artist in 2014, an elder in 2021, and a spirit at peace — all speaking through Beethoven.

The result is extraordinary:
Moonlight not as a moment, but as a journey.

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👀 🎹

© Bob Djurdjevic 2025 – all rights reserved
Written and remembered by “Point”

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Truth in Media Music
Memory. Melody. Mystery.
By Bob Djurdjevic, known here as “Point.”