Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Keyboard Music, Vols. 8 & 9 – Kristian Bezuidenhout (2016) [eClassical FLAC 24bit/88,2kHz]

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Keyboard Music, Vols. 8 & 9 – Kristian Bezuidenhout (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24-bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 02:33:26 minutes | 2,66 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Master, Official Digital Download – Source: eClassical | Digital Booklet | © Harmonia Mundi
Recorded: January 2013 (K.545), May 2013 (K.179) and December 2014 at Air Studios, Lyndhurst Hall, London

Kristian Bezuidenhout’s cycle of Mozart’s complete keyboard music concludes with this double album, which contains some real rarities that are ideally suited to Bezuidenhout’s tough, wiry style. As such, it may not be the item to pick if you want to sample the series, but it’s often fascinating. Bezuidenhout’s basic modus operandi is to give considerable weight even to works conventionally thought of as light, using his powerful fortepiano (a copy of an 1805 Walter instrument by builder Paul McNulty) and its unequal-temperament tuning to bring out dissonances and sinewy lines rarely heard elsewhere. Here he has some really radical experiments to work with, and even if you find Bezuidenhout’s readings idiosyncratic at times, you’ll likely appreciate the likes of the Modulating Prelude F-C, K. deest (it is indubitably by Mozart), or the Menuetto in D major, K. 355, with its daring harmonies barely matched elsewhere in Mozart’s output. Several of the sonata-form movements were abandoned by Mozart for one reason or another and have been completed by Mozart scholar Robert Levin; the joints are hard to hear. Some pieces, such as the Modulating Prelude and the Four Preludes, K. 284a, are examples of Mozart’s improvisational abilities, which were rarely captured in notation. In the larger and more usual works, Bezuidenhout applies a heavy touch to the Piano Sonatas K. 279 and 280, and to three large variations sets, which are generally given a touch of French elegance. But in the Nine Variations on a Minuet by Duport, K. 573, Bezuidenhout achieves utterly distinctive results in a work that has almost no harmonic content and is completely about register and space. Bezuidenhout’s Mozart is, to be sure, a matter of taste, but this is a fine conclusion to his series. -AllMusic Review by James Manheim

Tracklist:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)
Disc 1
Keyboard Music Vol. 8
Sonata in C major, K. 545 (1788)
1 i. Allegro 4’16
2 ii. Andante 6’38
3 iii. Rondo 1’52
4 I 8 Variations in F major, K. 352 (1781) 12’04

Suite in C major K. 399 (c. 1782)
5 i. Ouverture 3’51
6 ii. Allemande 4’13
7 iii. Courante 2’33
8 iv. Sarabande (completed by R. LEVIN) 4’38
9 Menuetto in D major, K. 355 (c. 1789-90) 2’27
10 Gigue in G major, K. 574 (1789) 1’35
11 Kleiner Trauermarsch in C minor, K. 453a (1784) 2’06

Sonata in F major, K. 280 (1774-75)
12 i. Allegro assai 4’39
13 ii. Adagio 8’07
14 iii. Presto 4’19
15 I 9 Variations in D major, K. 573 (1789) 14’20

Disc 2
Keyboard Music Vol. 9
1 Modulating Prelude in F-C, K. deest (K. 624/626a) (c. 1777) 4’24

Sonata in C major, K. 279 (1774-75)
2 i. Allegro 8’14
3 ii. Andante 7’19
4 iii. Allegro 4’59
5 Allegro in B-flat major, K. 400 (1781) 7’17
6 Allegro in G minor, K. 312 (1790) 5’36
7 Four Preludes, K. 284a (1777) 4’31
8 12 Variations in C major, K. 179 (1774) 19’03

Sonata in D major, K. 576 (1789)
9 i. Allegro 5’11
10 ii. Adagio 4’39
11 iii. Allegretto 4’35

Personnel:
Kristian Bezuidenhout fortepiano

Download:

mqs.link_MzartKeybardMusicVls.89KristianBezuidenhut201688.224.part1.rar
mqs.link_MzartKeybardMusicVls.89KristianBezuidenhut201688.224.part2.rar
mqs.link_MzartKeybardMusicVls.89KristianBezuidenhut201688.224.part3.rar