OK, so I have been taught to feel Beethoven's music with definite pulse--no straying away from architecture. Feel the music--keep the pulse--do the dynamics--pure and simple. So, my Rubinstein recordings show him to be freer than that, and recently, a student of mine at Brooklyn College presented me with cd copies of rare Heinrich Neuhaus recordings of Beethoven Sonatas--he's incredibly free with the pulse--in a very natural way, though. The liberties make sense--like an artist who's lived and finally feels free to do whatever he wishes. It's with taste, though one can hear the deviations from the initial pulse, and wonders, why weren't we allowed to do all of that? Does it kill the style of Beethoven's intentions, or is it merely an artist's rendering of the spirit of Beethoven and his music--what he truly meant off the printed canvas, and not just some well thought out architectural wonder? I prefer it in between the two aesthetics, however. For me and my students, I take the Schnabel route: a common denominator of a pulse, though you can go a bit above and below the initial pulse as the music dictates, but not too much, because then it feels like a different piece. I always like hearing the legendary artists of the last century, since they were ever closer to their teachers whose pedagogical pedigree extends back to Beethoven. But like the game 'telephone', by the time it gets around, the initial message can be quite different than the one originally sent out.