Best Mozart

Beethoven called Mozart's Requiem "wild and terrible," and that's what we get in Harnoncourt's new recording. Ominous dread hangs from every note of the dark opening measures, the Rex tremendae and Confutatis are driven with terrifying strength, and the supplications of the Lacrimosa, with their weeping stabbings of the orchestra, are freighted with emotional power. The Tuba mirum duet of bass soloist and trombone has a beauty almost never achieved in other readings. Nor does Harnoncourt overstep the stylistic boundaries of this classical-era work; rather, the intensity is heightened for being in the idiom of its time. Call it a Romantic reading of a Classical piece that looks forward to a more unbuttoned era.

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa's magnificent soprano breathes a fresh spirit into operatic favorites by Mozart, Puccini and Wagner in this collection of arias and other songs. Per Piate, Ben Mio, O Mio Bambino Caro and Vissi D'Arte are joined by Gustav Holst's In the Bleak Midwinter and the pop classic "The Windmills of Your Mind," among others. A diverse and exciting collection from one of the finest voices of our age.

This is a review of the 'live' Mitropoulos recording from Salzburg. Although it is in mono sound the sense of perspective is actually better than in many stereo efforts. Yes sometimes voices recede further than is ideal but that is to be expected in the theatre. The audience is unobtrusive between numbers. The stage noise is generally very low frequency so does not obscure the music.

Considering that Mozart's Divertimento in E-flat is far and away the greatest string trio ever written, and one of the unquestionable monuments of chamber music generally, it doesn't get the attention that it surely deserves from either record labels or collectors. Perhaps the dearth of regularly constituted string trios (as opposed to quartets) has something to do with it, but the fact remains that there is no greater testament to Mozart's genius than this epic, nearly 50-minute-long masterpiece in six movements that contains not a second that fails to rise to the highest level of textural gorgeousness and supreme melodic inspiration. Happily, most performances understand how special the music is, and give it their best effort. This one is no exception. The Zimmerman Trio plays with remarkably accurate intonation and a ravishing tone that's also mindful of the Classical style. Schubert's single-movement trio makes the perfect coupling. It seems to grow right out of the Mozart until the end of the exposition, when Schubert suddenly sails in with some typically arresting harmony.

Believed to have been composed between August 1775 and January 1777, the Concerto In E Flat Major for two pianos technically counts as being the tenth of Mozart's twenty-seven concertos, that huge and prodigious body that would set the standards for all piano concertos from Mozart's time forward. Although it is not performed with the same frequency as his later works (especially the final eight concertos, 20-27), this "Double" piano concerto, believed to have been composed by Mozart for performance by him and his sister Maria Anna ("Nannerl"), is nevertheless a fascinating experiment of Mozart's, one that requires a pair of solid keyboard virtuosos to do (and for the composer's Seventh piano concerto, you needed three soloists).

Yury Markovich Kramarov (1929-1982), one of the best representatives of St. Petersburg viola school, the outstanding Russian musician and teacher, has contributed a great deal to the development of the national viola art. In 1952 Kramarov, still a student at the Conservatoire then, was invited to fill the post of the viola group concertmaster of the Leningrad Philharmonic Society orchestra. Simultaneously he started teaching at the Conservatoire. From that time on performing and pedagogical arts were constantly present in his creative life and complemented each other. From 1956 through 1963 he was the viola group concertmaster in the famous Mravinsky Orchestra. In 1957 the young musician won two important and convincing prizes at the All-Union and International competitions in Moscow. Being a brilliant soloist, having performed with best national orchestras and conductors (Ye. Mravinsky, N. Rakhlin, A. Yansons, K. Eliasberg), Kramarov nonetheless was always drawn towards chamber music. Such leading figures of the Russian performing arts as I. Braudo, M. Vaiman, B. Gutnikov, V. Liberman, M.Rostropovich played together with Kramarov. The musician performed with great enthusiasm in the quartets named after Taneev, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Glazunov.

Mozart?s concerto actually began life as a concerto for basset horn (not basset clarinet) and was written in the key of G. The manuscript ended abruptly after the 191st measure of the first movement. Mozart rethought his plan, decided to recast the concerto in A, and overhauled the solo part for basset clarinet, an instrument developed by his friend Anton Stadler The version that entered the repertoire after Mozart?s death was an adaptation of the original.