This program, three Mozart Divertimentos and the searching C minor wind Serenade K. 388, balances light-hearted entertainment-genre works against the darkly passionate utterances of the latter. The Oslo players favor rapid, agile tempos in the lively Allegro of K. 227 and in the zestful finale (Presto) of K. 252. Their direct and forceful style, highlighted by pointed articulation and tonguing, seems ideal. The recording picks up some key-noise, especially in running passages--an annoyance for some, heightened realism and immediacy for others. This brisk, punchy approach gives unexpected rigor to the minuets, but also contributes to a highly imaginative account of the stylish variations that (unusually) open the F major Divertimento K. 253. The two bassoons, who have important roles here, are excellent.


In the C minor Serenade, the closely focused sonics significantly bolster the urgent, impulsive manner of the performance. After the incisive unison start, the first movement is thrusting and dramatic, with dynamics carefully observed and maximal contrast attained in the radiant second subject, highlighted by superb phrasing from the first oboe. The Andante is capably done, but more coolly than in the performance by Consortium Classicum on EMI, where there's more individuality and distinctiveness from denser-toned clarinets and softer-edged horns.


The Oslo recording, with its clearer perspectives, makes canonic writing in the vehement Minuet terse and austere-sounding, but you may prefer Consortium Classicum's more genial and imaginative characterizations of the finale's variations. Finally, the Oslo winds' lively, bustling account of the last variation, in bright tonic major, is quicker and also more brilliant, completing a fine budget release. [6/11/2002]
--Michael Jameson, ClassicsToday.com

MOZART: Violin Sonatas, Vol. 1

When he was eight years old Mozart wrote a series of duo sonatas sanctioned for violin or flute and keyboard. Written in London, they were dedicated to Queen Charlotte. The sonatas performed on this disc were written much later for violin but, using that earlier precedent, have been transcribed for flute by one of the world’s greatest exponents of the instrument, Patrick Gallois. Memorably tuneful, they represent different stages of Mozart’s development and are beautifully suited to their new guise.

Regarded as one of the most acclaimed violinists of his generation, Frank Peter Zimmermann brings his intelligence and brilliance to this new album of Mozart’s violin concertos and Sinfonia concertante. Zimmermann’s concerts have taken him throughout Europe, Japan, Australia, South America and the United States, and he has collaborated with the finest orchestras in the world.

“Zimmermann’s poise, sweet expression and unforced athleticism were a constant pleasure, and the ruminative approach into the first-movement cadenza was dovetailing par excellence. Best of all was the relaxed approach to the finale, normally rushed off its feet, but here mercurial and shapely.” - Classicalsource.com

Marianne Thorsen is most active as a chamber player. She's founding member and violinist of the well-regarded Leopold String Trio, leader of the Nash Ensemble, and also has toured as a soloist and made numerous recordings in that role. Here she's heard with the Trondheim Solisten, a superb chamber orchestra from the town of her birth, in Mozart's mature violin concertos. She's up against some fearsome competition in these works, including complete sets by the velvet-toned David Oistrakh and the elegant Artur Grumiaux, among many others. If Thorsen doesn't quite take top Mozart honors, she certainly offers excellent performances that generally wed individuality, elegance, and a touch of intensity. There's also a measure of brilliance to much of the playing, especially in the outer movements. In general, tempos are on the expansive side but never veer from the acceptable.

Warm phrasing characterizes slow movements, which flow nicely despite measured tempos. Thus the Adagio of K. 216 is tenderly sung, while in parts of the Andante cantabile of K. 218 Thorsen scales her tone down to a whisper and later brings a hushed intensity to the Adagio of K. 219's cadenza. If some passages seem somewhat underplayed, it may be because the memory of Oistrakh and Grumiaux linger in the brain.

The Trondheim Solisten is a small band (21 players) but sounds much bigger. The strings have bite as well as smoothness; the winds are perfectly balanced and never swamped by the ensemble. Thorsen plays cadenzas by Sam Franko (K.216) and Eugéne Ysaye (K. 218 and K.219).

If Thorsen doesn't eclipse her predecessors, she does trump such more celebrated contemporaries as the usually stunning Maxim Vengerov, whose latest venture into Mozart for EMI is distinguished by torpor and mannerisms that needn't have been immortalized on disc. But if Thorsen's Mozart isn't a mandatory first choice it is a mandatory acquisition for audiophiles, for the sound is among the best I've heard in a long time.

2L is a Norwegian audiophile label whose catalogue includes fine recordings by Norwegian composers, artists, and ensembles. This disc is recorded in what the label calls DXD. Without getting into the technical details, the vividness and life-like naturalness of the recording are striking, recalling the old Mercury Living Presence LPs.

In both CD and SACD stereo formats the sound is involving, close-up but with plenty of width, depth, and air around the instruments. Details like the wind parts or the lower strings' held notes under the soloist in the cadenza of the third movement of K. 218, often lost in recordings, are graphically present here. The gatefold package contains two discs: one a Redbook CD, the other an SACD (stereo and multichannel) only playable on SACD players. Surround sound buffs doubtless will feel that format trumps the others.

--Dan Davis, ClassicsToday.com

Listen to the Naxos Podcast to learn more about this release

Mozart wrote his Violin Concertos in 1775 while still living in his home town of Salzburg and in service to Prince-Archbishop Hieronymus Colloredo. Mozart had already toured internationally and found his parochial environment restricting, but as ever he rose above circumstances to create sublime and thrillingly unconventional masterpieces filled with wit and elegant charm. The finely sustained melodic expression of each concerto’s slow center provides the perfect foil for inventive sparkle in outer movements that include a cheeky reference to the opera Il re pastore in K.216 to an exotic ‘Turkish’ moment in the finale of K. 219.

Reviews:

In the Fourth Concerto, there’s a lovely singing character to the central Andante, Kraggerud producing a variety of tone which matches the changing intensity of the line. Here, as in all the concertos, he plays his own cadenzas, which are stylish in the best sense, and show off his technique.

– BBC Music Magazine

The Norwegian Chamber Orchestra has something of a reputation for working harmoniously with guest soloist-directors, not least among them Leif Ove Andsnes in concertos by Mozart and Haydn. Their strength lies in the collaborative approach dictated by their modest dimensions and conductorless set-up. Those discs with Andsnes were conspicuously successful, both artistically and critically, and this new project with Henning Kraggerud is no less winning. While these are brisk, no-nonsense performances after the contemporary fashion, the thinking that underpins their shaping right from the very beginning makes these readings of the Third, Fourth and Fifth concertos worth returning to.

– Gramophone

When Frank Peter Zimmermann says that Mozart has always been easy for him, he needs only to recall his debut concert at the age of ten when he played Mozart’s G major Concerto K. 216; or when as a fresh 20-year-old, he made his first recording of the five concertos for EMI. He’s played these works nearly 300 times in concert, and one can appreciate the intense physical and spiritual experience that Zimmermann brings to these new recordings.

This release has been sourced from the Richard Itter archive of 'live' recordings. The collection is very important for collectors because it has never been released before onto the market. Following the archive's launch in October 2017 with releases featuring Beecham, Bohm, Cantelli, Karajan, du Pre, Klemperer and Rostropovich, it has received universal praise from both the classical media and record collectors for the excellent sound and performances. Celebrated violinist Yehudi Menuhin was very familiar with the Mozart Concertos, and played all seven including the spurious No. 6. These 'live' performances reflect Menuhin's Mozart playing during a single month in 1956 where he performed all the composer's major works with orchestra. Menuhin brings great insight and experience to every concerto and his intonation which became a concern in later life is spot on with these performances.

Complete Recording of Mozart’s Violin Concertos - Lena Neudauer belongs to the most famous violinists of her generation - In combination with the Deutschen Radio Philharmonie - Lena Neudauer already inspired with the complete recording of Schumann’s Works for Violin and Orchestra: „The sonorous voice of the Guadagnini-Violin of Lena Neudauer fills the whole sound stage.“ HifiRecords 2011 zu CD 93.285 At age 15, the young violinist Lena Neudauer had already won the famous Leopold Mozart International Competition in Augsburg, where she not only was awarded 1st prize, but also took home the Mozart Prize, Richard Strauss Prize for the best interpretation of Richard Strauss' Violin Concerto and the Audience Prize. Yet despite this spectacular accomplishment, she refused to be pushed into becoming another “child prodigy.” This well-balanced, clear-thinking side of her being plays a special role with her interpretations of Mozart's music. We are reminded of what father Leopold wrote to his son Wolfgang Amadeus in 1777: „You yourself do not know how well you play the violin; if only you will do yourself credit and play with energy, with your whole heart and mind...“. Lena Neudauer‘s beautiful, pure violin tone perfectly fits the spirit of these less-than-virtuoso, but supernaturally lovely concertos, her sensitivity illuminating these works from the inside. She is joined by conductor Bruno Weil, an expert in the music of the Viennese classicists and period instrument specialist, who transforms the German Radio Philharmonic into an aural carpet, upon which the soloist can move with quiet expression and grace.

On this new release, The Klenke Quartett, who are well-versed in the performance of Mozart, present the Mozart’s String Quartets Nos. 1-6. The Klenke Quartett, based in Berlin and Thuringia, was founded in 1991 at the Musikhochschule Weimar. Since then, and still in its original formation, it enriches the concert life “as one of the most distinguished European ensembles.” (Gewandhausmagazin) The immediate response of the musical world to the Klenke Quartett’s performances and recordings of Mozart’s string quartets was one of acclaim and superlatives. In the view of the music magazine Rondo: “With their precise, controlled, and masterly grasp of the music, the four women of Weimar moved international critics to a storm of enthusiasm.” And Deutschland Radio exclaimed: “They are four equally talented musicians, who interact in the most marvelous, indeed, most exquisite fashion.”

REVIEW:

The Klenke Quartett’s new 3-disc set of Mozart’s complete string quintets (with guest violist Harald Schoneweg) constitutes a welcome return for the group to the music of Mozart. This new release shows some familiar strengths: a fine ensemble sound, careful but not over-precise, with enough character to set these performances apart even from such well-known groups as the Amadeus Quartet with Cecil Aronowitz or the Guarneri Quartet with Michael Tree, both of which I find just a bit superficial. My gold standard for these great works has always been the 1973 Philips set with Arthur Grumiaux and four other very fine instrumentalists (or, as they say in the Season One Gilligan’s Island theme song: “and the rest”). Of course, this new recording comes from a completely different tradition of playing, more historically informed and without the fine Corinthian leather upholstery of earlier days, but it has the same high standard of musicianship and not-too-careful tightrope-walks between dancing joy and intense despair. The Accentus engineers provide a surprisingly big, resonant space which matches well with the big sound of these fine string players. This is a more than just an enjoyable release; it’s a profound experience.

– Music for Several Instruments

Classical Music

Mozart: Romantic Mozart (The)

This release contains two of Mozart's greatest concertos. 1784 found the 28-year-old Mozart at the peak of his popularity in Vienna, if we can judge by the fact that he composed no less than six piano concertos during that year. Piano Concerto No. 17 in G major, K. 453 was written in the early spring. Mozart completed it, according to the date he noted on the score and his recently-begun work-catalogue, on April 12. Scored for a small orchestra without clarinets, trumpets, or drums, K. 453 is one of the most graceful of all Mozart's concertos, typically mingling a sense of gaiety with melancholic undertones. A year and a half after the first performance of Concerto No. 17, Mozart completed Piano Concerto No. 22 in E flat, K 482, which he entered as completed into his work-catalog on December 16, 1785. Urbane and aristocratic in character, it gains a regal warmth of sound from the orchestra's inclusion of clarinets instead of oboes - the first time Mozart had done so in a concerto. Vassily Primakov plays Mozart's own cadenzas in K. 453, and those of Camille Saint-Saëns in K. 482.

Charming, lighthearted and fizzing with subversive wit, Neil Armfield's sparkling production of the Marriage of Figaro masterfully captures Mozart's most popular comedic opera. In this classic performance, recorded live at the Sydney Opera House, Patrick Summers conducts an energetic fresh-voiced cast. Available in CD, DVD and Blu Ray.

This is an excellent sample of the Salzburg/RCA Zauberflote. With the extended dialogue of the original excluded one can fully appreciate the attraction of Levine's poised, sane direction of the piece and the excellent work of his predominantly satisfying cast.

– Gramophone