Mozart: Piano Concertos 17 & 20

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Composer), Piotr Anderszewski (Conductor, Performer), Scottish Chamber Orchestra (Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Piotr Anderszewski
• Orchestra: Scottish Chamber Orchestra
• Conductor: Piotr Anderszewski
• Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
• Audio CD (February 7, 2006)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Virgin Classics
• ASIN: B000BU996K
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #202,526 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 17 in G Major K453 - Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus

2. Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor K466 - Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars D-minor Mozart, January 23, 2007

By 

F. W. Brownlow (Holyoke, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mozart: Piano Concertos 17 & 20 (Audio CD)

I can see why some people won't like this, but after all Mozart did compose "Don Giovanni," and a pianist needs to approach K.466 with the opera in mind.

Even so, I've never much liked the concerto, but Anderszewski plays it with a grandeur, urgency, and lyricism that, for me anyway, transform the piece. I'd like to think that this is how Liszt would have played it, on a day when he resisted every temptation to tinker with the details.

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Richard Nilsen of The Arizona Republic says...., April 5, 2006

By 

Gail J. Edwards (Sedona, AZ) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mozart: Piano Concertos 17 & 20 (Audio CD)

"The hell with good taste: For all of us tired of pianists of such objectivity and refinement -- the Murray Perahias and Andras Schiffs --that you doubt there is a human being involved in the performance, we seem to be entering a new age of piano playing: Along with Leif Ove Andsness and Mikhail Pletnev, Piotr Anderszewski gives us piano playing with real personality. This is his second Mozard disc and his D-minor concerto is full-blooded and large-boned. Mozart had something to say, and Anderszewski says it: flat out, full speed, all stops open. Reminds one of the days of Serkin, Kempff or Tureck. Only some weak string playing in the G-major concerto keeps this from the highest recommendation." Richard Nilsen

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Anderszewski is refined and musically impeccable, but he miniaturizes these scores, September 30, 2010

By 

Santa Fe Listener (Santa Fe, NM USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mozart: Piano Concertos 17 & 20 (Audio CD)

Piotr Anderszewski is a rare enough talent that everything he records is worth listening to. for some reason the other reviewers are all over the map about what they hear. What I hear, in the first place, is the biggest and most heroic of the concertos, the D minor, being miniaturized, a strange move on the pianist's part. For decades, when other concertos were reputed, quite wrongly, to be dainty, K. 466 was admired because it prefigured Beethoven and because its dramatic thrust paired it with Don Giovanni. Anderszewski rises to some grandeur in passing moments of the first movement, but his overall conception is refined and at times cautious, quite a contrast with his earlier, daring recording of the C minor concerto K. 491.

I do't know what brought about this change of heart. In other respects he knows what he's doing; the conducting form the keyboard is accomplished -- but a previous reviewer may be right to suggest that too much attention had to be paid to this role, because the pianist for once seems to lack conviction until he reaches the big Cadenza. It is played with wonderful inventiveness, originality, and personality. The slow movement displays lovely touch, and Anderszewski finds just the right pace, but once again he seems to underplay. This feels more like somebody reflecting on Mozart than fully engaging him. the finale is straightforward and impressive. Both orchestra and recorded sound are exemplary.

We jump back a year, from 1785 to 1784 -- the annus mirabilis so far as Mozart's piano concertos go -- and immediately the sun comes out in the G major concerto K. 453. Anderszewski is all smiles, and every phrase is elegance itself. I wish a little more blood ran in his veins and a little less Champagne, however. There is simply not enough force, and he could have discovered more inflection. In the end, your love for this CD will depend on whether you consider Mozart a more robust composer than this. I do, and as much as I admire Anderszewski, I hear the old, discredited dainty style trying to make a reappearance.