Mozart's Piano Sonatas

I am currently working my way through Siegfried Mauser's paradigm shifting Mozart sonata cycle, which prompted me to dredge up comments I've written on a few other cycles. Not as extensive or systematic as my Beethoven collecting, I still like to look for some out-of-way cycles, or some that have been unjustly neglected. (Okay, Mauser isn't really paradigm shifting, but his cycle is unique, idiosyncratic, insightful, and delightful.) More to follow, probably.) When I started somewhat systematically collecting Mozart, my three go-to sets were Michael Endres, Walter Klien, and Lili Krauss' mono set (since reissued is a much better transfer by Warner). That hasn't really changed, though another has joined the top tier already, and Mr Mauser maybe doing the same soon.

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Rather fancying the pianism of Eric Heidsieck – his LvB cycle is astonishingly good, his old EMI Faure, too, and his Debussy Preludes, especially Book I is superb – I decided to try his Mozart cycle on Victor, even at a very high price (over $25 per disc). I was not disappointed, though there’s one caveat: sound. The recordings, made between 1991 and 1993, all sound a bit bright and metallic, which seems standard for Heidsieck recordings. The fifth volume, recorded in a different venue than the others, is a bit more distant than I care for as well. To the playing, it was essentially what I expected. Heidsieck indulges himself. He plays around with tempi quite a bit, dragging out some passages and hurrying others. Yet, ultimately, it all works. Heidsieck brings a sense of joy and, for lack of a better word, discovery, to many of the works. Though it’s all well prepared, it sounds fresh. It doesn’t displace my favorites in this repertoire – Walter Klien and Lili Kraus among older sets, and Michael Endres among newer ones – but it will earn repeated spins, that’s for sure.

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Mozart's Piano Sonatas