MOZART: Divertimento No. 11 in D Major, K. 251; Concerto for Two Pianos in E-flat Major, K. 365; Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, K. 550 – IITTI Festival Orchestra/Laura Mikkola, piano/ Philippe Entremont, piano and conductor – Cascavelle VEL 3147, 69:40 [Distr. By Albany] ****:
The Iitti Festival takes place in the northwestern corner of the Province of Southern Finland. The Festival lasts four days and focuses on chamber music, and it culminates in the hauling of a piano up to the site of an ancient hill fortress called “Devil’s Hill” for a midnight open-air concert, weather-permitting. The present recording dates from 13 June 2009 and features piano virtuoso and conductor Philippe Entremont (b. 1934) and the Festival’s guiding spirit, pianist Laura Mikkola.
The opening six-movement Mozart Divertimento in D Major (1776) ranks among the most melodious and infectious of his Salzburg compositions, possibly because Mozart plays with harmonic progressions and indulges in “splicing” minuet and variation form together inventively. Nice work from the Festival woodwinds and French horn, the tempos from Entremont lively without heaviness. An elegant Andantino moves briskly without drag, the string and woodwind gestures gallant and poised. Ostensibly written for his elder sister Nannerl’s birthday, the piece exploits dialogues between the oboe and violin in what one author calls “contentious harmony.” The work concludes with a spirited Marcia alla francese which has Entremont and his happy consort in a sanguine temper, at once charming, witty, and eminently musical.
The Two-Piano Concerto in E-Flat Major provides us another example of the Wolfgang-Nannerl virtuosity for which Mozart’s florid writing satisfies their considerable talents. Here, in 1779, Mozart composed this energetic piece as a fond farewell to Salzburg as he was to embark to Vienna. The two keyboards share many a busy interchange, often with the orchestra relatively silent. The sense of intimacy becomes no less palpable than the boldness of fioritura as the keyboards run through various keys and melodies while the orchestra holds long notes or plays pizzicato until a Mannheim rocket or two remind us that it too can be a force. The brief but explosively “orchestral” cadenza remains well within the confines of good taste and tonal accuracy, the resolution well earned. Once again, Entremont takes the Andante at a true “walking tempo,” not dragging, and the woodwinds add a special color to the keyboards’ musings. The peppy rondo nicely balances bustling filigree and elegant melodic gestures, lyricism and buoyant energy synthesized by alchemical magic into a satisfying whole.
Bruno Walter used to claim that no one under the age of fifty had any right to perform Mozart’s tragic G Minor Symphony, so Entremont’s gray hairs assume a musical legitimacy we cannot deny. Performing with reduced but not enervated forces, Entremont opts for a middle way among chosen tempi for the Molto allegro, the Festival woodwinds clear, alert, and responsive to the strings’ drooping or anguished figures. Entremont takes the first movement repeat. The oboes lead in this version. A staunch objectivity unfolds in the development, the plastic counterpoint insistent and resigned at once. The interior anguish having been reduced and subdued makes the poignancy that much greater. The sadly singular beauty of the procession ultimately forces us to admit, “O Welt ich muss dich lassen.” Happily, the Andante walks confidently without morbidity, Entremont’s allowing the music to sing, to “play itself,” as it were. Those anguished intervals that harken back to Gesualdo or any composer of subjective sensibility emerge in the midst of a strongly articulated flow, Nature in her indomitable progression–whither. A rather forceful approach to the agogically active Menuetto–interrupted by a thoughtful Trio in which the cellos, horns, and bassoons figure prominently–precedes the intensely concentrated furies of the Allegro assai finale. Taken furioso, the last movement quickens our sensibilities and alerts us as to the disciplined virtuosity of the Festival players whose string and wind players impart a studied intensity to this familiar music and its tragically sublime figures.
–Gary Lemco
1933 Les chefs proscrits – Ernst Viebig, Conductor – Forgotten Records
A fine conductor, unfortunately suppressed by the vicious political climate of the ’30s