Re: Mozart's 24th Piano Concerto

[Bradley P Lehman <bpl@umich.edu>]

On Tue, 29 Aug 2000, Cline, Eric wrote:

> Daniel Baldwin wrote : "Does GG's justification for their inclusion actually
> conform to historical performance practice, or is this just another instance
> of his eccentricity running amok?"
>
> To answer your question: It does follow historical practice. In Mozart's
> Piano Concerto No.26 for example, Mozart didn't write a left hand part for
> much (or all ) of the score. He did perform the work and must have adlibbed
> the left hand part. IIRC, the modern printed scores have a left hand part
> written in by an editor. Malcolm Bilson's recordings of the Mozart Piano
> Concerti on a forte-piano with a period instrument orchestra have many such
> embellishments in both the right and left hand parts to conform to
> historical practice. BTW, I really like the Bilson Mozart recordings. I
> recommend them as an alternative to the more modern recordings.

Me too, along with the performances by Robert Levin who does as much or
more with the improvisations.  Levin improvises quite a bit in the
Beethoven concertos, too, and it's marvelous.  (So does Anthony Newman.)

There were some recordings of Mozart concertos with Friedrich Gulda and
Harnoncourt on modern instruments, Gulda "continuo-izing" (GG's term) all
over the place.  Nice.  I miss it when the piano's not in there doing
stuff in the tuttis on other people's recordings.  Oh yeah, Chick Corea
also did quite a bit of it in his disc with Bobby McFerrin conducting.
(And Corea and Gulda played the double concerto together with
Harnoncourt...)

I attended the "MozartFest" symposium in Ann Arbor in 1989 - Bilson,
Levin, and half a dozen other well-established fortepianists were there
for the week to play and discuss the Mozart concertos.  There were
presentations by scholars, too, and Norrington was there to conduct.  I
remember especially a presentation by Levin (who's both a player and a
scholar) where he demonstrated a passage in the concerto #23 that has
isolated low and high notes...his point was that the player is supposed to
fill in a melodic line between those two points, while most pianists
simply go bing, bing.  When he demonstrated it it cracked up the whole
room...I can't listen to that concerto anymore and hear the bing, bing
without laughing.  Really a fun week overall.

In a lot of the Haydn symphonies, keyboard continuo was pretty much
expected, though modern practice varies.  It's done with fortepiano,
harpsichord, or not at all.  My favorite illustration along that line is
in the finale of #98...there's a harpsichord solo written by Haydn, while
the harpsichord has nothing else notated to play during the rest of the
symphony.  Obviously, the hpsi should have been comping along the whole
time and it is to emerge from the normal texture here for this solo.  But
you hear so many recordings where either a loudly miked hpsi or a celesta
shows up for just those few bars.  It sounds pretty silly.

I agree with Daniel that the GG performance of the Mozart #24 with
Susskind is excellent.  The one weird thing to watch out for is his
first-movement cadenza which is (if I remember correctly) by Czerny...it
jumps out of the style a bit, and it uses some high notes that didn't
exist on any piano of Mozart's day.  Oh well, it's entertaining.  He did
the same cadenza in his live performance with G L Jochum and the Swedish
Radio Symphony (1958: Virtuoso 2697062), but it sounds less comical there.
GG didn't play continuo in that performance, and it's interesting to
compare the two.  As I mentioned above, I miss the "continuo-izing."

And that Czerny cadenza doesn't go as far "out of the style" as
Corea/McFerrin do in #20 and #23.  That's totally out there.  And
delicious.  Music is supposed to be fun like that, anyway.  Style,
schmyle.

Bradley Lehman | http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/ | Dayton, VA, USA

"Music must cause fire to flare up from the spirit - and not only
sparks from the clavier...." - Alfred Cortot