Mozart: Piano Concertos, Vol. 1 (Nos 17 & 18)

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W. A. MOZART
Mozart: Piano Concertos, Vol. 1 (Nos 17 & 18)
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet (piano) / Manchester Camerata, Gábor Takács-Nagy

[ Chandos / CD ]

Release Date: Sunday 16 October 2016

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After demonstrating their 'innate love and understanding of Haydn's music in performances of the expected vivacity and insight' (BBC Music - CHAN10808), Bavouzet and Takács-Nagy, the latter conducting his Manchester Camerata, now explore Mozart's extraordinarily prolific year 1784 in this new series.

Two of the six concertos composed that year are heard here, each unusual for having been written by Mozart for another pianist and for featuring a central Andante, instead of the more common Adagio.

This is a unique version that, as Bavouzet stresses in his booklet note, 'although played unequivocally on modern instruments, contrasts with those versions made not so very long ago, which used a large orchestra incorporating sixteen violins and eight double-basses'. He adds: 'a versions which also will take into account a number of performing practices current in Mozart's time, such as the use of a solo quartet to accompany certain well-defined passages in which the piano is predominant. A version which in one way or another aims to link tradition and modernity.

"There's splendid playing from both Bavouzet and the Manchester Camerata under Gábor Takacs-Nagy: a passionate account of the extraordinary moment in the finale of K456…or the hushed atmosphere of the minor mode variation in the last movement of K453…a beautiful account of the much earlier Divertimento K137 is a welcome bonus" BBC Music

"Tremendous performances of Mozart concertos in their own right, but spiced up by some deliciously acerbic cadenzas." MusicWeb

Tracks:

Piano Concerto No. 17 in G major, K453
Piano Concerto No. 18 in B flat major, K456
Divertimento in B flat major, K137