Alfred Brendel stood up for both Haydn and Schubert as a serious sonata writer and experienced and even lived the whole, tormented Robert Schumann. He blew away the icing sugar coating from Mozart and promoted the Schönberg piano concerto sustainably worldwide. And yet, Alfred Brendel only played a subordinate reference role in the end of the Beethoven anniversary year. People preferred to remember the very old and the eccentric. The younger listeners, on the other hand, practiced the ubiquitous Igor Levit.