Mozart Piano Concertos: No. 15 in B flat, K450; No. 16 in D, K451; No. 17 in G, K453 Claire Huangci (piano); Mozarteumorchester Salzburg/Howard Griffiths Alpha Classics ALPHA928 71:50 mins
This fifth volume in the series ‘Next Generation Mozart Soloists’ features the American pianist Claire Huangci, a frequent soloist around Europe, though not so far in the UK. Billed as a representative of the next generation, her Mozart playing stylistically reflects, rather, a previous generation: always charming, fluent, with plenty of finger staccato and good phrasing, but ignoring some of what we know of Mozart’s practice. The convention that the soloist played continuo with the orchestra, emerging from the ensemble – actually made explicit in a figured-bass part for K451 – is here ignored. And while the few bars of elaboration Mozart provided for his sister Nannerl in the central movement of K451 are followed to the letter, they are not used as an example of how one might improvise elsewhere: Huangci plays every note even in Mozart’s cadenzas exactly as he wrote them out.
These three concertos are lively but not deep works from Mozart’s first months in Vienna, the B flat making a cheeky point from the outset that the wind will be as prominent as the strings. Balance between Huangci’s forward-balanced piano and wind is good: it is the upper strings that suffer in the imitative passages between piano and strings. Tempos are flowing, articulation is crisp and the rhapsodic arpeggios of K450’s Andante are well drawn. The more subtle chromaticism in K453 tends to be smoothed over, but the chirruping finale (the theme that Mozart noted that his pet starling could sing) is delightfully driven by Howard Griffiths.
Nicholas Kenyon