Mikhail Pletnev is one of the most extraordinary musicians we have. He is a pianist of the first rank, and a worthy conductor. He composes as well. I have never heard any of his music, but how bad can it be? His overall musicianship is too good to allow bad composition — or at least to allow the public airing of bad composition.

He is also something of an entrepreneur or impresario — founding the Russian National Orchestra in 1990, even before the disintegration of the USSR.

With this orchestra, he has performed a lot of Beethoven, who seems to be his favorite composer. For Deutsche Grammophon, he has recorded all five piano concertos with the RNO, and all nine symphonies. The liner notes for the symphonies make very, very big claims. They begin, “The present set of Beethoven symphonies is bound to shake up the established image of the composer. No Beethoven recording in recent years holds so many surprises in store.”

They go on to say that Mr. Pletnev insists on a spirit of improvisation. The conductor himself says, “With Beethoven, you have to have the courage to take liberties.” And the notes conclude by promising “a new image for Beethoven.” You see, “a heart begins to beat in the marble bust of the composer,” for “Pletnev makes Beethoven our contemporary.”

This is nonsense talk, of course. If you want to go ahead and record Beethoven’s symphonies — even though many have done it in the past — just go ahead and do it. You don’t have to make excuses, or boasts. And the man has never been marble, trust me. He has always been our contemporary, and always will be.

In any case, shall we dip into this set, touching on some movements of some symphonies? The set is a mixture of the brilliant and inspired, and the willful and loopy.

The Symphony No. 1 opens with a two-sectioned movement, Adagio and Allegro. In the first, Mr. Pletnev is nimble, long-breathed, and expressive — rarely do you hear the music so beautiful. In the second, he makes things crisp and delicious — incisive, but not too punchy or crude.

So, the set begins encouragingly well.

The “Eroica” Symphony (No. 3) begins with two bullets fired — those are the opening chords. And this first movement is nervous, edgy. It is too fast for my taste, lacking sufficient grandeur or heft, but Mr. Pletnev surely makes his case.

The following movement — the Funeral March — is quite strange: slow and operatic — filled with rubato, and, more than that, a distorting of time. This music needs a steadier pulse to have its full, wonderful impact. (And it is a march, after all.) Nonetheless, Mr. Pletnev is interesting.

How about the Fifth Symphony? The first movement is very light-seeming — light in texture. And Mr. Pletnev again takes great liberties, slowing down considerably when the music gives him half a chance. This is not terribly good for momentum. But the second movement, Andante con moto, is very intelligent, not too fast, having its necessary breadth (and breath). The third movement is very quirky — improvisatory and propulsive. And the finale courses with joy, as it must.

The first movement of the “Pastoral” Symphony (No. 6) is probably the nuttiest in the whole set. Its opening measures are slow and cutesy. And then the music speeds up, to an absurd degree. The movement is just too frenetic, strained, and schizo to be itself. I’m afraid that Mr. Pletnev is indefensible here.

And the Seventh? As with the Symphony No. 1, the first movement has two sections: Poco sostenuto and Vivace. Mr. Pletnev is so fast in the first section, he really has nothing to transition to — and that opening section is short on majesty or wonder. But the next movement, Allegretto, is superb. In Beethoven’s conception, this movement is not all that dissimilar to the Funeral March of the “Eroica” — yet Mr. Pletnev affords it a better pulse.

The closing movement, Wagner called “the apotheosis of the dance.” I believe that Mr. Pletnev is so fast and mechanical here, it’s more like “the apotheosis of the techno-dance.”

Finally, the last movement of the last symphony — the choral movement of the Ninth. This is an idiosyncratic movement for an idiosyncratic guy. And, in Mr. Pletnev’s hands, it sounds odder than ever. Oddness aside, the movement becomes pedestrian, I fear — but I was glad to hear it, once. (Maybe twice.) And the tenor soloist is perfectly compelling. Heretofore unknown to me, he is Endrik Wottrich.

Throughout this set, the Russian National Orchestra is not exactly immaculate. Much of its execution is spotty. Even its pitch is sometimes suspect. But the orchestra is plenty good enough, and the main point of these discs is Mr. Pletnev and his ideas.

I have my reservations, as you’ve heard. But Mr. Pletnev is a dazzling and very musical person. There is also that versatility. If he were American, and could talk on television, he might be a Leonard Bernstein. Moreover, he is as spontaneous as the publicity material claims: If he recorded Beethoven’s Nine over again, they would probably come out much different.

Some years ago, Matt Haimovitz, the very gifted and strange Israeli-American cellist, recorded the Bach suites. I said that, if you could own only one set of these suites, you would not want Mr. Haimovitz’s — too “personal.” But, if you had room for extras on your shelves, you would want to include it. I say much the same about Mr. Pletnev’s Beethoven symphonies. You will not want to throw away your Bruno Walter, George Szell, or Otto Klemperer. But if you have room for Mr. Pletnev — why not?

In addition, a man so devoted to Beethoven is a man with his head and heart in the right place.