Output details

CD recording of Mozart sonatas for violin and keyboard, vol. 1

This recording presents an alternative approach to the prevailing view of Mozart interpretation that replaces an anachronistic, Romantic stance that falsely emphasizes the lyrical, with a more rhetorical and vitally engaged interpretation. This creates a much more viable representation of eighteenth-century performance styles and aesthetics. Much so-called historically-informed performance fails to adopt practices clearly described in contemporary letters and literature, and documented in treatises of the time, e.g. CPE Bach (1753) DG Türk (1789) & L Mozart (1756/87).

The recording was preceded by a number of concert cycles of the sonatas, using either original eighteenth-century instruments or reproduction instruments. The more intimate character of the Classical piano sound makes the decision to emphasize articulation rather than the lyrical elements even more convincing. The ensemble balance is also much more even than that of their modern descendants. For the recording, I used a piano made by Christopher Clarke in 1988 that was an exact copy of a Walter of 1795, very similar to that owned and used by Mozart in Vienna in the last years of his life. The violin used was a Grancino of 1709, set up in an appropriate manner for the late-eighteenth-century repertoire.

Meticulous attention to details of articulation (so frequently overlooked or ‘rationalized’ in such a way as to make them so discreet as to be negligible) brought out a passion and starkness in some of the music that was usually not apparent. Contrasts became more marked and the character changed radically from an accepted tradition.

The disc has been widely disseminated and received conspicuous critical comment. The BBC Music Magazine commented how the performances present a different approach, changing one’s perceptions of the repertoire and of other performances. Gramophone Magazine awarded the CD a Critic’s Choice. It is regularly played internationally on radio stations.