Customer Reviews

Mozart: The Violin Concertos

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In listening to this album, one inevitably draws comparisons with Mutter's earlier recordings. Her DG album of the 3rd and 5th Mozart Violin Concertos with von Karajan had the unmistakable freshness of youth, with clean lines and impeccable intonation. That remains one of my favourite albums to date. As for her EMI recordings of the 2nd and 4th with Muti, and of the Sinfonia concertante with Giuranna on viola, I can't say that they ever really "spoke" to me.

Which is why this album is a must-have for the anyone's CD collection. I must admit that given the patchiness of Mutter's recent recordings, I was slightly apprehensive about this album. However, I was pleased to hear that Mutter has lost none of the technical prowess that I so admire her for, and that while this album does not have the childish charm of the von Karajan recording, it commends itself in other respects.

As Mutter says in the CD liner notes, she plays with the London Philharmonic as a first among equals, and indeed, these are much more "interactive" interpretations than the standard offerings of a solo instrument concerto with the orchestra in a supporting role.

While still prone to taking liberties with the tempi, Mutter is much more restrained here than in her recent recordings, and plays the slow passages beautifully, and the fast passages with energy and technical assuredness.

The Sinfonia concertante is especially brilliant, and the pairing with Yuri Bashmet is inspired. It is worth buying this 2CD set just for that recording! I have always been able to listen to Mozart "in the background", but this rendition of the Sinfonia Concertante is of "stop what you're doing and listen" quality.

It has been a while since I have been enthusiastic about a Mutter release (the last one that got me really excited was the Brahms with Masur), and this recording reminds me what a brilliant violinist she is. She's been performing for 30 years (!), and let's hope for many more.

I have never heard Mutter's earlier recordings of Mozart's Violin Concertos. Therefore, go to previous reviews on this board for comparison of this new recording to her old one(s). I do, however, own many recordings of these works by other violinist. To me, this new recording by Annie-Sophie as violinist and conductor is simply beautiful if not down right gorgeous. The tone of her playing is simply beautiful. To me, she always allows Mozart to come through very clearly not allowing her technique and powers as a violinist to smother Mozart's wonderful melodies. I truly was moved by this recording. A lovely example is the Sinfonia Concertante K. 364 (wherein she's joined by violist Yuri Bashmet). That performance moved me to tears.

For some beautiful Mozart playing (DO ignore the circa 1955 Old Hollywood glamour photos on the outside and inside of the album; I guess it does sell classical albums!) buy this album by one of today's top violinist at the peak of her powers.

By the way the London Philharmonic Orchestra play wonderfully and the sound is first-rate.

I compared this recording with Manze, Grumiaux, and Perlman's recordings.

First, no. 1 and 2. are the outstading performance with gorgeous sound.

Regarding No. 3, I prefer her earlier recording to it in especially in first movement. But, 2nd and 3rd movement are really great and probably second to none.

No. 4 and No. 5 is also great.

Sinfonia Concertante, I bet nobody else can do better than Mutter and Bashmet.

My suggestion :

If you wanna background music --> Manze OK.

If you wanna more classical music --> Grumiaux

If you love sweetier sound --> Perlman

If you love song (I think this recording shows more operatic and more lirical aspects in Mozart musics than other recordings do) and really want to be absorbed into music --> Mutter !

Every so often you find an almost perfect performance and recording that leaves you smiling and shaking your head in awe: Mutter Mozart -- The Violin Concertos and Sinfonia Concertante is definitely one of those.

Ms. Mutter's power, range, and stylistic sophistication are at their acme. She soars ethereally where it's required, sings sweetly in slow rhythms, and pushes forward like a commander where that's what's called for. The London Philharmonic is beautifully in concert with her every move and timing. Yuri Bashmet's viola in Sinfonia Concertante is equally sublime.

For those who first knew Ms. Mutter's Mozart playing when she was but a budding teen, it's fun to see how much her skill and interpretive abilities have expanded in 30 years. It's astonishing to see someone with that much experience can still appear quite young. And of course, there's the irony to appreciate of Ms. Mutter now being older than Mozart was at his death.

Above all this is a confident performance by players who know Mozart well, understand what they want to accomplish, and are in complete accord with what needs to be done. The bright optimism and energy of Mozart are beautifully displayed . . . reminding us with wonder of how his own life was often filled with problems even as he produced such astonishingly bright works one right after the other.

If you like Ms. Mutter and Mozart, I encourage you to purchase this two CD-set and the four CD-set, Mozart: The Violin Sonatas.

When I was a little younger and a lot less wise, I read a few reviews and, prompted by cheese-paring parsimony and a slavish respect for received critical opinion, foolishly opted to buy the bargain Arte Nova set with conductor David Zinman and American violinist Pamela Frank. I played it once or twice, then wondered why I never felt the urge to play it again nor found much pleasure in the music per se. Then I heard an earlier recording of Mutter with Muti playing concerto no.4, loved it and decided to go the whole hog and buy the newest double CD set with Mutter directing the London Philharmonic. Suddenly I found what was missing in the dry, anodyne Frank performances, which (despite being played on modern instruments) artfully combine the worst of sterile, pusillanimous "fidelity to the score" with HIPster inflexibility. Listening to Mutter was like watching a heavy, barred and bolted door swing open to reveal a sunlit garden (if I may be permitted a moment of whimsy). Mutter's technique is astounding and her range of colours, from a slightly breathy rasp on the gut to a shining, metallic singing, to a rich, vibrant drone, infuses this glorious music with life. Bashmet's lush tone makes the perfect match for her unashamedly Romantic interpretation in the famous Sinfonia Concertante; two great virtuosi in harmony. The sound is unimpeachable, the packaging a triumphantly rococo indulgence of pale blue and gold kitsch, enshrining the wasp-waisted diva in musical apotheosis. Don't buy this if you like your Mozart refined and wispy and find her style too calorific - but Mozart can take it. Never was the artificial distinction between Classical and Romantic in Mozart more clearly laid bare.

I bought this CD set a couple of months back. I'm glad to to say that I've enjoyed it throughly so far. I also have a copy of the rather polished recording of Violin Concertos 3 and 5 that Mutter made with Karajan, and I find the new one seems to have greater energy and emotions. Both the set of recordings are to be cherished in their own right.

The Sinfonia Concertante is to die for! I've not heard a better recording, especially the Presto.

This new CD set of the complete Mozart Violin Concerti is a "must-own". Mutter's violinistic approach is quite Mozartian, but still has the huge variety of colors and expression one usually hears from Ms. Mutter. She is also "conducting", and I suspect that being responsible for "the whole" makes her approach to "time" more centered. It should be noted that the orchestral playing by the London Philharmonic is spectacular, vital and fresh. And the sound quality of the recording is first rate. I highly recommend this recording.

I wil be brief. These remarable pieces are played beautifully and insightfully by Ms. Mutter. No Mozart worshiper should be without these recordings.

I think is a case of the girl who cried "me" too often. Several reviewers here, echoing the amazon review and the one in the Gramophone, have treated Anne-Sophie Mutter's Mozart concertos as another example of self-regarding romantic display. She is famous -- or infamous -- for filtering music through a peculiar personal filter. Every piece feels as if it has something foreign done to it. Fans adore the diva pose; serious musicians envy and criticize Mutter's star power. but in Mozart she says that she wants to return to a more modest, pure style. On the whole I think she has. Mozart was always a sympathetic composer, going back as far as her early recordings with Karajan when she was a child prodigy. that sympathy serves Mutter well here.

The best thing is a refined but vivacious Sinfonia concertante that surpasses in every way her early rendition with Nevile Marriner on EMI. She has YuriBashmet to rival her on viola; the recording is up to date; even the conducting is more alert and energetic. In fact, leading a reduced Londn Phil., Mutter reveals herself to be an impeccable Mozartian. There is barely a trace of the excessive romanticism that she is being thoughtlessly accused of. Her phrasing is a bit sensuous, but why not? This isn't gruel in a monastery; this is the joyous Mozart. Some won't like the new, overdone cadenzas. The Debussy-like hush in the slow movement of K. 216, prolonged to nine minutes, comes off as a gimmick, but it is certainly entrancing on its own terms. One has to concede that Mutter feels all the slow movements too slowly and sweetly, without enough spine. But that's about all I could criticize, and I am by no means a devoted follower, either of Mutter or of these youthful works.

Even though she is only old-fashioned to a small degree, the period police will never let Muter off--she is guilty as charged before the first note is heard. For anyone else, this is playing that s full of variety and interest. The lack of a fifth star is because there are too many moments where Mutter becomes too impersonal, polishing jewels when she should be smiling form the heart.

These Mozart's concerti have sometimes been considered slightly lesser works of art in the classic violin repertoire, certainly in comparison to the ball-busting warhorses--Brahms, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky--that the big boys from Heifetz to Oistrakh to Perlman have played for decades on the international circuit. Annie Sophie Mutter, who can hold her own any day with the guys when it comes to the grand operatic style of fiddle playing, has chosen this time to place herself in front of a moderate sized string ensemble with horns and oboes, where, as in Mozart's time, she is only one amongst equals, neither overpowering or subduing herself to the total tonality of the music. A true soloist. To lovers of Mozart, these pieces are full of unexpected surprises and invention, and Anne Sophie Mutter, is the ideal player to reveal these works all over again for a new generation of listeners who may not know them, and the older generation who may have grown bored. Mutter always makes you listen again, as if for the first time, to her unique way of singing: sometimes sweet and tender, others times raging with passion, reminding us that so much of Mozart's orchestral works for solo instrument sound as if they could have been great soprano arias in operas he never got to write. Particularly wonderful is her articulation in the presto movements where the notes fly forth like bullets. Virtuoso playing at its most spectacular but always in the Mozart style. A revelation and highly recommended.