Orfeo’s decision to release this ordinary performance of Mozart’s “Haffner” Serenade is puzzling. Recorded live in August 1999, the playing is not especially distinguished and the interpretation comes across as bland and uninsightful (with repeated sections offering no stylistic variety or dynamic subtleties). As part of Orfeo’s Salzburg Festival document series, you would expect this recording to offer something magical or at least interesting, but what we really have is a run-of-the-mill reading intended as a pleasant diversion on a nice sunny afternoon. Finally, as a value proposition, this full-price disc also is a non-starter, even with the two-minute March in D K. 249 as filler. Better to go for the excellent two-fers from Böhm on Deutsche Gramophone and Marriner on Philips, or Mackerras’ recording on Telarc (which is paired with the Serenata notturna).
Conductor Hubert Soudant takes all but one repeat in the Serenade (omitting the very last one in the “Allergo assai”). The first movement moves along nicely, and there is fine solo violin playing in the inner sections by Frank Stadler. It’s too bad, though, that the violinist has the annoying habit of sucking in air before every upbeat (and downbeat) and all the syncopated phrases in between. His cadenzas are full of double stops and virtuosic grandeur, but they sound overwrought at times and better suited to Paganini. Coarse horn playing mars the first Menuetto, and the Rondo is drab and seems to go on forever (and is rewarded with 30 seconds of applause, no less). The Menuetto galante is anything but, as it lumbers along with some odd distended fortes in the lower strings just after the first repeat. The following Andante section fares better, thanks to the well-shaped and tonally opulent oboe playing.
