Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Mozart's orchestral and chamber works on period instruments

2013; Oxford University Press; Volume: 41; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1093/em/cat075

1741-7260

S. P. Keefe,

Diverse Musicological Studies

There is no doubt that, over the last 40 years or so, period-instrument recordings have helped to challenge and refine historical, stylistic, aesthetic and performance-related perspectives on Mozart’s music, especially in matters of timbre, texture and effect. Now faced with a daunting back catalogue of such recordings, today’s performers need carefully to consider how they can continue to offer enticing and original interpretations of largely familiar repertory. For the most part the recordings under review here are successful in this respect. Two CDs, Mozart: Concertos for Piano and Orchestra no.20 in D minor,kv466 and no.21 in C major,kv467 (Discantica 254, rec 2011, 59′) with Baart Van Oort (fortepiano) and Accademia Hermans conducted by Fabio Ciofini, and Mozart: Piano Concertos nos.24 in C minor & 25 in C major (BIS bis-sacd-1894, rec 2010, 55′) with Ronald Brautigam (fortepiano) and Die Kölner Akademie conducted by Michael Alexander Willens, are superficially similar in several respects. For example, both offer a minor-key concerto and a chronologically adjacent major-key work on modern copies of fortepianos made by the late 18th- and early 19th-century Viennese manufacturer Anton Walter. (Mozart himself owned a Walter, which is now housed at the Mozart museum on Getreidegasse in Salzburg.) On the whole Van Oort and his group are considerably more engaged and engaging than Brautigam and his group. k466/i neatly combines surges of intensity with demonstrations of fortepiano fragility: the solo theme at the opening of the solo exposition, which reappears in the development section, is made to stutter slightly by Van Oort as if struggling against the more imposing orchestral material that surrounds it; and the fortepiano lead-in to the recapitulation, a stop-start tour de force in this recording, allows the resonant lower register of the fortepiano to project an assertive, demonstrative persona for the instrument in keeping with much of its participation in the second half of the development. The contrast between the opening and the middle sections of the second movement is perhaps more modest than might have been expected given the performance of the first movement, but the return to the opening calm and elegance at the reprise is still highly effective. The character and drama of Van Oort’s k466 is lacking in Brautigam’s k491. Brautigam’s playing is crisp, clean and rigorous, but insufficiently nuanced: the almost perfunctory rendition of the main theme of the slow movement is a case in point. As a result, one of Mozart’s most orchestrally and pianistically colourful concertos is performed in rather a mechanistic fashion, albeit with some memorable moments (including the euphonious wind playing in variation 4 of the finale). While similar criticisms can be levelled at Brautigam in k503, Van Oort and the Accademia Hermans do a much better job of exploring similarities and differences between the two concertos on their CD. In keeping with general scholarly commentary, k467 is conveyed as a more relaxed, less anxiety-ridden work than k466. The famous Andante of k467, a particular highlight of the recording, features beautifully articulated and phrased orchestral playing in the opening section and an excellent blend of fortepiano and orchestra in the remainder of the movement. Accentuated surges of intensity in the development section of the first movement and occasional brittleness from the fortepiano in the finale skilfully remind us of points of connection between the two concertos in spite of their divergent overall moods.