Melograni Mozart

At the end of April 1791, Wolfgang Amadé Mozart applied for the position of second Kapellmeister at St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, hoping to inherit the position from Leopold Hofmann, the incumbent Kapellmeister, the City Council of Vienna accepted Mozart’s petition in a strongly worded decree as a basis for the text in the vocal passages of his Sieben Klangräume accompanying the Unfinished Fragments of Mozart’s Requiem KV 626.

Alpha is pleased to welcome again the great flautist Juliette Hurel, who has made several recordings for ZZT and Outhere in the past. This recording is the result of the fruitful encounter between the flautist and the Voce Quartet, which occurred in the inspiring framework of the Ferme de Villefavard in the Limousin region.

Matthias Bamert’s survey of music by Mozart’s contemporaries continues with this elegant programme of Cannabich Symphonies. Harmonically conservative, lavishly scored, and full of the mannerist crescendi and rising figures the Mannheim Orchestra was famous for, these are fascinating examples of the style gallant. Though Cannabich had found his way to sonata form in the G major symphony, something of Telemann’s programmatic writing hangs over the Symphony in A major, while baroque affects are yet more keenly felt in the D major Symphony. The London Mozart Players’ pristine sound and careful phrasing is highly enjoyable throughout.

It's a recording that just a few years ago would have been mainstream: a "name" pianist (albeit one much less well known in the U.S. than elsehwere), who has been playing Mozart's piano concertos since childhood, joins forces with a name conductor with whom she has frequently collaborated, leading a modern-instrument orchestra of some 70 players, with the results released on a major international-conglomerate label. Now it's distinctly unusual. But lo, there's value in the old ways. Portuguese-Brazilian pianist Maria-João Pires is a lifelong Mozart specialist, but she still has new things to say in two of Mozart's most popular piano concertos. You can chalk it up to her Buddhist outlook if you like: her readings of the Piano Concerto No. 27 in B flat major, K. 595, and Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466, might be described as detached without being lifeless. Her approach is most startling in the Piano Concerto No. 20, where her no-drama shaping of the material runs sharply counter to type. Sample the piano's entrance in the first movement, where it offers a twisting, tense elaboration of the main theme that is far removed from its source material. Generally pianists use this to raise the tension level, but Pires lets the unusually shaped, chromatic line speak for itself with fine effect.

A 10 CD Box set with 23 Beautiful Mozart Piano Concertos. Alfred Brendel playing piano. Imogen Cooper also on piano. Accompanied by Academy of St. Martin-In-The-Fields orchestra. Conducted by Neville Marriner. This set is wonderful: Brendel is at the peak of his art, the conductor and the Orchestra are perfect, the sound is clear and old fashionable, very recommended.

Karl Böhm's recording of the Mozart symphonies with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra is among the most respected and beloved sets of this important body of work. Böhm's set was the first complete recording of the symphonies (including several that subsequent scholarship has shown to be written by other composers and misattributed to Mozart) and it remains a substantial achievement because of the conductor's stature as a Mozartian and because of the enthusiastic and refined playing of the Berlin Philharmonic.

Originally released in the 1980s as separate albums, Itzhak Perlman's recordings of Mozart's violin sonatas were reissued in this box set in 1991 as a special collector's edition. In these sonatas for keyboard and violin, the piano dominates as the violin often tags along in unison with the piano's melody, rarely departing from it except in an ornamental capacity. Even so, Perlman brings his customary good humor and energy to these pieces, and through his vibrant and spirited playing makes the violin's obbligato more or less equal to the pianist's elaborate part.

This transcription of Don Giovanni for string quartet by an anonymous arranger perfectly conveys the symbiosis of voice and instrument – a hallmark of Mozart’s genius. Throughout the opera, the deft arranger recreates the balance between the purely musical aspects of the work, without detracting from its theatrical qualities. In short, drama and buffoonery are both preserved.

…[Böhm] may be an octogenarian, but he directs the opera for the most part with a spirit and an urgency that many a young man might envy. Most of the accompanied recitatives are alert and fiery, and in this particular work they carry a great deal of the emotional weight. Here and there I find myself at odds with a choice of tempo. Especially in the closing scenes, some of the orchestral recitative seems to need to go more slowly; it is inclined to lack the proper sense of momentousness. I was a little surprised too at the quickish tempo for the opening aria and, most of all, for the great quartet in Act III, which has more turbulence and urgency than usual, particularly with its sharply contoured dynamics and its incisive accents.

Così fan tutte is the third most-frequently performed work at the festival after Le nozze di Figaro and Die Zauberflöte. This DVD provides a closer look at a classical staging from the Salzburg Festival in the series of important opera productions seen at the festival in the last decades. Riccardo Muti had made a sensational Salzburg début in 1971 and this Così fan tutte was his first Mozart opera at the festival. It was acclaimed by both the general public and international critics, who were virtually unanimous in their praise of the aesthetic quality of the production. Muti was praised for his authoritative approach to Mozart’s music, while the remarkably homogeneous team of international soloists was equally applauded. The singers form an admirably cohesive ensemble and all of them are outstanding Mozart singers.