169. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Clarinet Concerto (1791)

Recording

Title: Complete Wind Concertos
Performer: Charles Neidich (clarinet), Orpheus Chamber Orchestra
Year: 1987
Length: 30 minutes

Review

They should really have made me go through this book during proof-reading. This is like the third occurrence of wrong image in 170 albums. A few days ago the book image for Clemenza di Tito was wrong and now this one is wrong. Oh well.

This is the last Mozart Concerto...sniff. And it is a corker! Yes it is. From the jubilant first movement through what is possibly the most delicate and moving piece of music composed by Mozart in the second movement back to a great finale. This doesn't sound like a man dying, even if the second movement is as beautiful as farewell as he could have composed... the Requiem, for all its brilliance, is a more stressful affair as a farewell it isn't really peaceful.

So again an essential piece of Mozart, it is a pity that the second movement, which is the perfect classical Adagio has been so overused in films and such, to the point where no one knows when they first heard it... I would like to remember what it is like to listen to it for the first time. Oh well.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Mozart originally wrote the work for basset clarinet, a special clarinet championed by Stadler that had a range down to low (written) C, instead of stopping at (written) E as standard clarinets do. As most clarinets could not play the low notes which Mozart wrote to highlight this instrument, Mozart's publisher arranged a version of the concerto with the low notes transposed to regular range, and did not publish the original version. This has proven a problematic decision, as the autograph no longer exists, having been pawned by Stadler, and until the mid 20th century musicologists did not know that the only version of the concerto written by Mozart's hand had not been heard since Stadler's lifetime. Once the problem was discovered, attempts were made to reconstruct the original version, and new basset clarinets have been built for the specific purpose of performing Mozart's concerto and clarinet quintet. There can no longer be any doubt that the concerto was composed for an extended range clarinet. Numerous recordings of various restorations exist and some of the notable ones include Sabine Meyer with the Berlin Philharmonic, David Shifrin with the Mostly Mozart Orchestra, and Erich Hoeprich with the Old Fairfield Academy (notable for Hoeprich's use of a period-style basset clarinet based on Stadler's of his own manufacture instead of a modern-style instrument).

Second Movement:

168. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Piano Concerto no. 27 (1791)

Recording

Title: Piano Concertos No. 19 & 27
Performer: Clara Haskil
Director: Ferenc Fricsay
Year: 1957
Length: 30 minutes

Review

We finally come to the last of Mozart's Piano Concertos, and what a great one it is. Piano Concerto No. 27 contains what is possibly one of the most beautiful and original pieces of music by Mozart in its exquisite slow movement.

The very long first movement with its brighter mood and beautiful solo part is also an highlight, and if you have to listen to these two what is the point of leaving the also great third movement out.

It is with pieces like this that we will always wonder what Mozart would have done, had he lived. His musical style is quickly approaching the Romantic and he would surely have had no problem keeping up with Beethoven when the styles changed. But hey he died, so this is all supposition. Fortunately we can still listen to this.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The work followed by some years the series of highly successful concertos Mozart wrote for his own concerts, and by the time of its premiere Mozart was no longer so prominent a performer on the public stage. It is a popular assumption that this concerto was first performed at a concert on 4 March 1791 in Jahn's Hall by Mozart and by a clarinetist Joseph Bähr. Seen from today's state of scholarship however there is absolutely no proof that Mozart actually performed K. 595 on this day. The concert might well have been premiered by Mozart's pupil Barbara Ployer on the occasion of a public concert at the Auersperg palace in January 1791.
This was Mozart's last appearance in a public concert, as he took ill in September 1791 and died on 5 December 1791.

Second Movement:

167. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - La Clemenza di Tito (1791)

Recording

Title: La Clemenza di Tito
Performers: Anne Sofie von Otter, Julia Varady, English Baroque Soloists etc.
Director: John Eliot Gardiner
Year: 1990
Length: 2 hours 10 minutes

Review

1791 was a busy year for Mozart, two operas, the small but beautiful Ave Verum Corpus, the 27th Piano Concerto, the Clarinet Concerto, the Requiem and DEATH make for a hectic year. It was also a year of pretty good production not only in terms of quantity but also of quality.

Of the Mozart operas we have had here this is probably the least great one, but not by very much. You can tell that Mozart was on a schedule here, composing for the coronation of Leopold II (Leopold with a Vengeance!). The recitatives are quite clearly delegated to some other composer, but that permitted Mozart to shine on a couple of pretty amazing arias.

Unfortunately the speed of composition made Mozart not make the amazing set pieces of uninterrupted music that he was famous for since Le Nozze di Figaro. The end of the first act here, with Rome burning in the background is the closest he gets to that. And it is still pretty great. So, yes it is worth listening to or watching, but I don't think it ranks up there in my top 5 Mozart operas.

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Metastasio's libretto had already been set by nearly 40 composers; the story is based on the life of Roman Emperor Titus, from some brief hints in The Lives of the Caesars by the Roman writer Suetonius, and was elaborated by Metastasio in 1734 for the Italian composer Antonio Caldara. Among later settings was Gluck's, in 1752; there would be three further settings after 1791. Mozart was not the first choice of Guardasoni. Instead, he had approached Antonio Salieri, who, as the most distinguished composer of Italian opera in Vienna, would provide exactly the lustre which Guardasoni sought. But Salieri was too busy and he declined the commission.

The great end of Act I:

166. Joseph Haydn - Symphony No.94, "Surprise" (1791)

Recording

Title: The London Symphonies, Vol.2
Performers: Amsterdam Concertgebouw
Director: Colin Davis
Year: 1981
Length: 23 minutes

Review

Haydn's constantly humorous approach to to his compositions is never as clear as in this particular symphony. The subtitle of "Surprise" is not here by accident, the second movement has a little musical joke, in the middle of a soporiferous slow movement, so simple as to sound almost like a lullaby, Haydn makes a loud crashing sound.

Is it meant just as a surprise or as a way to wake up the dozing audience? We will never know, but it is smart, funny and original. If the symphony consisted solely of this movement it would be interesting enough to include it here. Hell there have been entries here shorter than that movement.

The rest of the symphony is equally as bright spirited as that little joke in the second movement would make you believe, while Mozart is circling the drain of Romantism and death, getting progressively gloomier with only some bits of light shinning through, Haydn retains all his joviality, and that's nice.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

As with Haydn's England visits in general, the premiere was greatly successful. One reviewer wrote that the symphony was "equal to the happiest of this great Master's conceptions." In his feeble old age Haydn remembered the premiere with nostalgia, recounting to his biographer Griesinger:

...it was my wish to surprise the public with something new, and to make a debut in a brilliant manner, in order not to be outdone by my pupil Pleyel [who was leading a rival series of concerts] ...the first Allegro of my Symphony was received with countless bravos, but the enthusiasm reached its highest point in the Andante with the kettledrum stroke. Ancora, ancora! sounded from every throat, and even Pleyel complimented me on my idea.

Toward the end of his active career Haydn wove the theme of the second movement into an aria of his oratorio The Seasons (1801), in which the bass soloist depicts a plowman whistling Haydn's tune as he works.

Here is the second movement, turn up your sound:

165. Die Zauberflote (The Magic Flute) (1791)

Recording

Title: The Magic Flute
Performers: Peter Schreier, MArgaret Price, Kurt Moll
Director: Sir Colin Davis
Year: 1984
Length 2 hours 10 minutes

Review

This a really fun opera. OK the writing is not to the standard of Da Ponte, but the story is also quite a different one to anything he would have written making it quite interesting. The story is essentially a fairytale with esoteric and masonic overtones.

The fact that it was composed to a more general audience than most other Mozart operas also makes for some great catchy vaudeville tunes. This is particularly true of the arias by Papageno, all of which are memorable. On the other side of the scope of the opera you have the properly high opera arias of the Queen of the Night which are just as equally memorable.

The music is amazing here, this is a singspiele, so the recitatives are just people speaking, no continuo or accompaniment, and for that reason the CD version does away with them. If you know the story and have seen it before and don't understand German you really don't need the recitatives, they are just distracting. So this CD is a great option.

Here you see the birth of German opera as it would be, both in theme and music this is much closer to Wagner than Seraglio. Above all, however, this opera is fun! The most fun you can have, and for good reason it is the ideal opera to introduce children to the whole genre, songs to sing along, giant serpents, an evil queen and a bird-man... what more could you want?

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The opera celebrated its 100th performance in November 1792. Mozart did not have the pleasure of witnessing this milestone, having died of his illness on December 5, 1791.

Queen of the Night:

164. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Ave Verum Corpus (1791)

Recording

Performers: Wiener Sangerknaben, Chorus Viennensis
Director: Peter Marschik
Year: 1994
Length: 2 minutes 46 seconds

Review

Wow, this is probably the tiniest pieces of music that we have had on this list yet. Shorter than three minutes it doesn't even get to pop-music length. That said it isn't size that matters, or else Couperin's 27 Ordres would be beating this list hands down, and they aren't.

Ok, so it is a lovely piece of Choral music. It is very lovely, very short, and very classical. We have had few chances to listen to classical sacred music here, and this short choral piece is a true gem.

There is just such emotion crammed into this short little song, it is difficult to stick so many different feelings in such a short place, from sadness to hopefulness it is all here. It is a tribute to Mozart's emotional skill.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's setting of Ave verum corpus (K. 618) was written for Anton Stoll (a friend of his and Haydn's) who was musical co-ordinator in the parish of Baden, near Vienna. It was composed to celebrate the feast of Corpus Christi and the autograph is dated 17 June 1791. It is only forty-six bars long and is scored for choir, stringed instruments, and organ. Mozart's manuscript itself contains minimal directions, with only a single sotto voce at the beginning.
Mozart composed this motet while in the middle of writing his opera Die Zauberflöte, and while visiting his wife Constanze, who was pregnant with their sixth child and staying in a spa near Baden. It was less than six months before Mozart's death.

Bernstein conducts a slightly longer version of the Ave Verum Corpus:

163. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Cosi Fan Tutte (1790)

Recording

Title: Cosi Fan Tutte
Performer: Carol Vaness, Dolores Ziegler, John Aler, et al.
Director: Bernard Haitink
Year: 1986
Length: 3 hours 10 minutes

Review

Cosi Fan Tutte is the third and last of the great operas that Mozart did with the collaboration of Lorenzo de la Ponte, the same guy who did the libretto for Le Nozze Di Figaro and Don Giovanni. So we know it is another interesting exploration of social status and erotic love.

So it is, Mozart creates a quite strange opera, with a libretto that could easily be turned into a light comedy Mozart transforms it into a kind of sadistic absurdist work.

The opera is so inconclusive and the music so emotional that it is either about a weird swinger's club or about entrapment. It is these levels of interpretation that the Ponte-Mozart association creates that make the operas so interesting. So it it an essential end to a trilogy of operas looking at the depths of human erotic feeling, even if it is not as amazing as the previous two.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The subject matter did not offend Viennese sensibilities of the time, but throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries it was considered risqué. The opera was rarely performed, and when it did appear it was presented in one of several bowdlerised libretti.
After World War II, it regained its place in the standard operatic repertoire. It is frequently performed and appears as number fifteen on Opera America's list of the 20 most-performed operas in North America

Soave Sia Il Vento:

162. Joseph Haydn - String Quartets Op. 64 (1790)

Recording

Title: String Quartets Op. 64
Performers: The Lindsays
Year: 1999
Length: 2 hours (2 seperate CDs, each with three quartets)

Review

Mozart is becoming progressively darker and more emotive in his compositions, such is not the case with Haydn. Haydn is retaining his lighter touch, his humorous point of view on music, while still composing some great music.

This set of six quartets is a delight. My particular highlight goes to the second quartet, which even if it is less well known than the fifth is a great piece, using what sound like Hungarian folk music influences to great result.

So it is a welcome break from the progressively doomier and gloomier Mozart, and even if the spark of genius is not as bright in Haydn, it is always a joy to listen to one of his compositions.

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

Listing of the Quartets from Wikipedia:

* Quartet No. 48 in C Major, Op. 64, No. 1, FHE No. 31, Hoboken No. III:65
* Quartet No. 49 in B Minor, Op. 64, No. 2, FHE No. 32, Hoboken No. III:68
* Quartet No. 50 in B♭ Major, Op. 64, No. 3, FHE No. 33, Hoboken No. III:67
* Quartet No. 51 in G Major, Op. 64, No. 4, FHE No. 34, Hoboken No. III:66
* Quartet No. 52 in E♭ Major, Op. 64, No. 6, FHE No. 36, Hoboken No. III:64
* Quartet No. 53 in D Major ("The Lark"), Op. 64, No. 5, FHE No. 35, Hoboken No. III:63


The Lark, quartet number 5, finale by the Lindsays:

161. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Clarinet Quintet (1789)

Recording

Title: Sabine Meyer Plays Mozart
Performers: Sabine Meyer, members of Vienna String Sextet
Year: 1988
Length: 34 minutes

Review

The clarinet is a beautiful instrument and Mozart had a real touch for it, it is hard to find two more beautiful pieces of music than the Larghetto here and the Adagio in the Clarinet Concerto that we will have in the nearish future.

Even if the plaintive quality of the Clarinet is better explored in the slow movements, the faster ones are equally impressive. This is also extremely influential music up until today. It sounds in fact quite modern, again the Larghetto is a particular example of this, it sounds like the soundtrack for The English Patient, something made for a Merchant Ivory film.

The whole thing is delicate, beautiful and delightful and above all immensely touching. A truly indispensable piece of Mozart music and, for one of the earliest pieces for solo clarinet, amazingly developed in its exploration of its capabilities.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

There are a number of similarities between this quintet and Mozart's Clarinet Concerto. Both are in the same key of A major and were written for the same soloist, Anton Stadler. Both pieces are written for the basset clarinet which has an extended lower range. Also, the first theme of the first movement of each piece begins with a falling major third. Also, both the second movements are in the same key (D major) and have similar character, although they have different tempo markings. There is a direct quotation of two bars in the clarinet line in the second movement of the Concerto of that in the Quintet.

Sabine Meyer plays the Larghetto:

160. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - "Prussian" String Quartets (1789-90)

Recording

Title: 3 "Preussische" Quartette
Performers: Petersen Quartet
Year: 1991
Length: 1 hour 10 minutes

Review

These three quartets are kind of a mixed bag for Mozart, one is amazingly good, another one is just good and another one is kind of unimpressive. Let's have the bad news first. The first concerto is nothing special, K. 575 doesn't really impress.

The second concerto K. 589 is quite good but it didn't really blow me away, the dance movement is very nice indeed. Now the big highlights here is the third concerto, K. 590. This is the really good one, and Mozart definitely saved the best for last.

K. 590 is a little gem, the Andante is particularly beautiful and the Menuetto is ahead of its time. The whole thing is worth the price of admission for this concerto only, but the other ones are also welcome. However, of the three only one is truly impressive, bringing this record down.

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Mozart's last three quartets, dedicated to the King of Prussia Friedrich Wilhelm II, are noted for the cantabile character of the parts for cello (the instrument played by the king himself), the sweetness of sounds and the equilibrium among the different instruments.


No video for any of these... well there is a video for the first movement of K.575, but it is pretty terrible, not all kids are good at playing classical music.

159. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Symphony No.41 (1788)

Recording

Title: Nos. 40 & 41 "Jupiter"
Performers: Wiener Philarmoniker
Director: Leonard Bernstein
Year: 1984
Length: 38 minutes

Review

The greatest and most majestic of all of Mozart's symphonies is his last one, just another indication of the greatness he could have achieved had he lived long enough to keep composing. Mozart's Symphony 41 is aptly named Jupiter after its grandiosity.

Bernstein does not shy away form that grandiosity in this recording, he plays the Symphony with all its repeats making it longer than might sometimes be heard, he makes it slightly slower than most other recordings as well, but that contributes to the sense of deliberateness.

The first movement is a great shinning piece but the real highlight is the last movement with its five themes coming together in a huge bang in the coda. Mozart at his best here, and therefore essential.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Four additional themes are heard in the "Jupiter's" finale, which is in sonata form, and all five motifs are combined in the fugal coda. In a 1906 article about the Jupiter Symphony, Sir George Grove wrote that "it is for the finale that Mozart has reserved all the resources of his science, and all the power, which no one seems to have possessed to the same degree with himself, of concealing that science, and making it the vehicle for music as pleasing as it is learned. Nowhere has he achieved more." Of the piece as a whole, he wrote that "It is the greatest orchestral work of the world which preceded the French Revolution."

Last movement without repeats, by Bohm:

158. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Symphony No. 40 (1788)

Recording

Title: The Symphonies
Performers: The English Concert
Director: Trevor Pinnock
Year: 1994
Length: 33 minutes

Review

The first movement of this Symphony is probably one of Mozart's most famous pieces of music, interestingly it is one which is usually used by itself disregarding the rest of the Symphony, even if the last movement is quite famous as well.

This is the middle symphony in the triumvirate of Mozart's last great symphonies, and rivals only No.41 in terms of fame. It is again an amazing piece of music, Mozart at his best.

It is actually a pretty dark piece, but Mozart is always pretty good at making dark music, Don Giovanni and the Requiem being prime examples of how good he is. Still there are plenty of moments where the light shines through here, making it all the better for it.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

This work has elicited varying interpretations from critics. Robert Schumann regarded it as possessing “Grecian lightness and grace”. Donald Francis Tovey saw in it the character of opera buffa. Almost certainly, however, the most common perception today is that the symphony is tragic in tone and intensely emotional; for example, Charles Rosen (in The Classical Style) has called the symphony "a work of passion, violence, and grief."

Although interpretations differ, the symphony is unquestionably one of Mozart's most greatly admired works, and it is frequently performed and recorded.

First Movement, Harnoncourt:

157. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Symphony No.39 (1788)

Recording

Title: Symphonies No,38 "Prague" & No. 39
Performers: English Baroque Soloists
Director: John Eliot Gardiner
Year: 1990
Length: 32 minutes

Review

Now we have the three later great Mozart Symphonies in a row here, and we start with 39, probably the least famous of the big three, but a great one nonetheless. It starts in a truly grand way, and Gardiner's interpretation makes it very plain that it is a magisterial beginning to the first movement.

It follows on to a beautiful Andante and a jaunty Menuetto before the real highlight of the whole thing. The Finale is just extremely playful and fun, Mozart at his best.

So the first and last movement bookend in perfection this great symphony. This is really, together with the next 2 Symphonies the pinnacle of Classical Orchestral music, and therefore unmissable.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

It seems to be impossible to determine the date of the premiere of the 39th Symphony on the basis of currently available evidence; in fact, it cannot be established whether the symphony was ever performed in the composer's lifetime. According to Deutsch (1965), around the time Mozart wrote the work, he was preparing to hold a series of "Concerts in the Casino", in a new casino in the Spiegelgasse owned by Philipp Otto. Mozart even sent a pair of tickets for this series to his friend Michael Puchberg. But it seems impossible to determine whether the concert series was held, or was cancelled for lack of interest. In addition, in the period up to the end of his life, Mozart participated in various other concerts whose program included an unidentified symphony; these also could have been the occasion of the premiere of the 39th (for details, see Symphony No. 40 (Mozart)).

The fourth movement by Karl Bohm, the whole thing is on-line in the same concert so just look for it: