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Hello all,

On Twitter, I heard someone say good things about Christian Blackshaw's Mozart cycle on Wigmore hall. Sampled them, and... hm... maybe the first sonata is a nice performance, but kv 570, 311, all a bit "too" much performer and too little of Mozart... I've put the CD's on:

http://classicalspotify.blogspot.nl/2015/01/christian-blackshaw-mozart-piano.html

What is your opinion about these recordings?

Rolf, Netherlands

"Oh, so they can be played that way, too......"

otterhouse, I only listened to K311. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

If I wanted to quibble, well, ok,sometimes things got a little too "pretty" .....and some more spirito in the first movement would've been nice(r). But, hey, today's my day off and I just want to be a fan, y'know?

I would be thrilled to hear this cycle live. I like how he creates dynamic sense through voicing, instead of always plainly switching on and off between forte and piano - though when he does do that, it makes the overly piano sections much more effective (Whether or not that is "correct" I don't want to go into....).

The fact that he can pull this off in a hall (I bet it's more easily done in a small room or recording studio) impresses me. At times, the way he colors and projects the top voice does remind me of one of his teachers, Clifford Curzon.

BTW, my current gold standard for the recorded sonata cycle is courtesy of the fortepianist Kristian Bezuidenhout (whose name I just had to google in order to spell!)

I heard all those performances when they were being broadcast live on BBC Radio 3.

Personally, I prefer more personality and sense of 'danger' in my Mozart than Blackshaw provides - he's too safe too much of the time, though undeniably the playing is very refined.

Kristian Bezuidenhout and Ronald Brautigam, both playing fortepianos, convey that sense of freshness of discovery which I really like. Among those playing modern grands, it's a pity András Schiff's BBC Proms concert from 2006 isn't commercially available - he played K310 and K311 plus several shorter pieces on a Bösendorfer Imperial, with a spontaneity and 'edginess' which eluded him on his Decca recording.