MW EXCLUSIVE 4CD sets £18 each or £28 for both postage paid
Search
What's New
Classical CD Reviews
Live Reviews
Jazz CD Reviews
Composers
Resources
Contact Us

Classical CD and DVD reviews. MusicWeb is not a subscription site and it is our advertisers that pay for it. Please visit their sites regularly to see if anything might interest you. Purchasing from them keeps MusicWeb free.
  Classical Editor: Rob Barnett  
Founder Len Mullenger   
 



CD REVIEW
RECORDING OF THE MONTH

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

About MWI

Site Map

More Reviews
How to find a review

Books

Film Music

Interviews

Nostalgia

Records Of The Year

Recommendations

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands

Classical blogs

Reviewers Logs

Announcements

Don't Go Here!

Community
Bulletin Board

Reviewers

Helpers invited!

Resources
Composers

British Light Music Composers

Indexes
   Label
   Masterwork

Discographies
   Composer
   National

Themed Review pages

Complete Books

Programme Notes

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Web Ring
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

Editorial Board
Classical Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Seen & Heard
Editor and Webmaster
   Bill Kenny
MusicWeb Webmaster
   Len Mullenger
Assistant Webmaster
   David Barker

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office
Helping MusicWeb
Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools

Would you like a hyperlinked weekly summary of the CDs we have reviewed?
Click for further details

Sample: See what you will get


Buy through MusicWeb for £12.49 postage paid.
You may prefer to pay by Sterling cheque or Euro notes to avoid PayPal. Contact for details

Musicweb Purchase button

Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)
Piano Concerto No 24 in C minor K491 (1786) [30:42]
Piano Concerto No 25 in C K503 (1786) [32:25]
Fantasia in D minor K397 (1782) [6:22]
Imogen Cooper (piano & director)/Northern Sinfonia; Bradley Creswick (leader & co-director)
rec. Hall One of The Sage, Gateshead, 8-11 November 2007
AVIE AV2175 [70:00]

Experience Classicsonline


I expected that this would be good, but not just how good. These performances capture the individuality of each work in what sounds like a delightfully spontaneous way. There is no sense of routine; each phrase, each note, even, is given its individual character. In particular, the various additions that the piano makes to material previously presented by the orchestra is always treated as a comment on or intensification of that material, rather than as mere decoration of it. The equal billing given to Imogen Cooper and Bradley Creswick as co-directors is explained by the real sense of co-operation and interplay between soloist and orchestra. Tempi are well chosen and recording and balance are generally well managed. I assume that the unusually quiet second clarinet triplets in bar 156 of K491 to be a musical decision rather than a fault of the recording.

None of this should surprise those who have heard the soloist playing Schubert, Schumann or Mendelssohn, as she displays exactly the same virtues of sensitivity to both the moment and to the whole here that she does with those composers. Indeed as played here parts of the slow movement of K491 do occasionally sound like pre-echoes of Schubert. There is no exaggerated display of technique, but the variety of articulation and colour show her very considerable technical ability in every bar. I was gripped from beginning to end by the intensely concentrated music-making of all concerned. These performances are comparable with those of Curzon, Solomon or Brendel in their complete naturalness and understanding of the works.

The occasional unobtrusive decorations to the solo part add to the apparent spontaneity of the whole, and the use of cadenzas by Alfred Brendel is a welcome change to more usual choices. It is good to have the Fantasia for solo piano as a filler at the end – and indeed it whets the appetite for a further disc of purely solo music. The only slight reservation I have concerns a couple of moments, in the first and last movements of K491 of what seem like rhythmic instability. I remain unsure whether this is a deliberate musical choice or a result of editing. It is however a minor matter at most, and does not seriously detract from what has immediately become one of my favourite discs of these concertos. It follows the success of their recording of the Concertos No 9 and 23, and I look forward to hearing more Mozart from these marvellous players.

John Sheppard


 

Advertising Rates
Visitor stats
MusicWeb International
has over 30,000 Classical CD reviews on offer


Gerard Hoffnung Concerts &
The Bricklayer Story

Naxos Classical



Australian Eloquence CDs on Buywell.com


New Releases

Hyperion
New Releases






MusicWeb sells the Polish
catalogue CDAccord
£10.50 post free W-W


MusicWeb sells the
Arcodiva catalogue
£12.00 post free W-W


£11.50
post-free
world- wide
Try it and see - Sale or Return

MusicWeb can now offer you discs from the following catalogues:
Prices include postage

[Acte Préalable £13.50]
[Arcodiva £12.00]
[Avie from £6.25]
Brilliant Classics
[British Music Society £13.49]
[CDACCORD from £10.50 ]
[ClassicO £12.50]
[Hallé from £11]
[Hortus £14.99 ]

[Lyrita ONLY £11.50 ]
LYRITA Sale or Return
[Onyx £12.00
]
ONYX Sale or Return
[REDCLIFFE £11 ]
[Sheva £11]
[Tactus £11.50 ]
[Talent from £12.00 ]
[Toccata Classics £12.50 ]

Musicweb
Special Offers

Google Ads - for information about privacy matters, click here

 



Return to Review Index



Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.


You can purchase CDs and Save around 22% with these retailers: