Mozart: Piano Sonata No. 11 in A major, K331 'Alla Turca'

Noriko Ogawa follows her recordings of Debussy’s solo piano works (BISCD1955/56) and Rachmaninov’s First and Fourth Piano Concertos (BIS-CD-975) with three piano sonatas by Mozart.

The three sonatas here are often grouped together as ‘the Paris Sonatas’.

At the time, Mozart was establishing himself in Vienna, and composed piano sonatas to exploit the growing market for printed music and to use as teaching material.

More than 200 years later these particular sonatas remain among Mozart’s best-loved compositions.

Released for the first time in 2003 and 2005, this two-CD set combines two Mozart recordings in which Andreas Staier raises the questions of ornamentation and improvisation with a hefty dose of impishness in his interpretative options (as in ‘his' Rondo alla turca!).

Andreas Staier plays a fortepiano by Monika May, Marburg, 1986, after Anton Walter, Vienna, 1785.

In its prodigious diversity, a blend of lightheartedness and sharpness, elegance and severity, Mozart’s music is the mirror of his life, which was marked by a succession of harrowing crises and wonderful breakthroughs. Moreover, he himself said he was constantly torn between anguish and joy. In 1778, while he was staying in Paris and in a sad and sombre mood, Mozart composed several piano sonatas, including the dramatic K.310 Sonata, written in that key of A minor which Alfred Einstein said was the key of desolation, the celebrated K.331 Sonata, in the French style and ending famously with its joyous rondo Alla turca (with a coda added in 1784), and the K.333 Sonata over which hovers the shade of Johann Christian Bach, youngest son of Johann Sebastian, to whom Mozart was bound in sincere friendship.

Completed on 20 May 1785, the tragic Fantasia in C minor, K.475, was published under Mozart’s supervision in the same year, together with the Sonata in C minor, K.457. This seemingly free and improvisatory but in fact cleverly constructed work comprises several sections in which lyrical episodes of striking pathos mingle with tormented passages with intense emotional content. The variety of Mozart’s thought and the boldness of his harmonies are here quite exceptional.

A collection of four of the most popular of Mozart's sonatas, including the Alla Turca with its famous Rondo finale and the C major, KV545, sometimes called 'for beginners' and certainly played by many of them. Haebler delivers suitably eloquent performances.

With this CD, dedicated to the friendship between Mozart and Haydn, we are far removed from a studio atmosphere. Recorded live, the recording is very faithful to the concert, to that special communication which exists between a musician and his audience. Following two of the most famous Mozart sonatas, two Haydn sonatas in two movements combine seriousness and exuberance, apparent simplicity and studied sophistication.

Most often, when it comes to Mozart’s works for piano, one forgets that, like Chopin and Liszt, Mozart was a great piano virtuoso. In his lifetime, his fame is due to a large extend to his gift to interpret. Indeed, he wrote a certain number of cycles of variations which bring out both the talent of the composer and that of the performer.

Composed in Paris, the 11th sonata in A major K.331 begins with a slow movement.

The Minuet and its Trio seem very close to a theme by Gluck and the last famous movement Alla Turca: Allegretto which is known for the French as the Marche Turque comes from the overture of the Pélerins de La Mecque by Gluck.

The Six Variations in F major on “Salve tu Domine” are the notation of improvisations given by Mozart on the 23rd March, 1783, in front of Joseph II. On this very day, Mozart was improvising the Ten Variations on the “Pélerins de La Mecque” from an opera of the same by Gluck. However, Mozart finishes them one year later.

The Twelve Variations on an allegretto were finished on the 12th September, 1786.

Mozart’s variations for the piano stand between two brillant successes, over a century apart, the variations Goldberg by Johann Sebastian and the variations Diabelli by Beethoven.