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TWENTY FINGERS IN AN ALL-MOZART EVENING AT CARNEGIE

Dan Davis

Carnegie Hall, New York; February 20, 2006

Even in a Mozart Anniversary Year, when Carnegie Hall is filled to the rafters for a Mozart program of duo-pianism, you know star power is at work. Monday evening, the stars were Daniel Barenboim and Radu Lupu – traditionalist pianists playing music written for domestic consumption in a 2700 seat hall on one modern Steinway and a second rolled out for the birthday boy’s Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major, K. 448. To some, this constellation of properties spelled trouble, and before the concert began one heard mutterings of “traditional,” “hall’s too big,” “old-fashioned” and other pejoratives. The reality though, was quite different – an evening in which Mozart worked his magic, casting a spell of contentment over all but the most die-hard carpers. It may not have been the 21st century Mozart as we’ve become accustomed to hearing, but it was an evening of mostly wonderful music, mostly wonderfully played, even though it wouldn’t have sounded out of place had the date been 1956, not 2006.

That two-piano Sonata was well chosen as the final piece on the program, with its wide range of effective pianistic effects in the first movement, the aching beauty of the operatic duet that is the Andante, and the dynamic Finale that leaves the audience smiling. In the delectable exchanges where each pianist repeats phrases just played by the other, we heard what was already abundantly evident – that while Barenboim is a far better pianist than any full-time conductor has a right to be, one was transfixed by Lupu, who invested each phrase with an essential rightness, not to mention a tonal richness, a natural legato, a sparkling treble and a deeper, fuller bass, than his partner. The performance as a whole made its effect, notwithstanding some moments of muddy texture in the first movement and another of impressionistic haze in the Andante.

The evening opened with a work somewhat removed in quality from the heights of K.448, the Sonata for Piano Four Hands in C major, K. 521, whose virtuosic first movement and serene Andante were succeeded by a witty Allegretto finale whose simple, if not simple-minded, melody was put through its paces. Closing the first half was another great work, a qualitative companion to the K. 448, the F Major Sonata for Piano Four Hands, K. 497, full of great moments, not least of them being one of the most beautiful of all Mozart keyboard Andantes, an operatic duet in all but name and instruments. It was also a welcome treat to hear the Fantasia in F Minor K. 608, originally written for a mechanical organ, with its enchanting fugal writing, and the Andante and Variations, K. 501, a lesser but charming work that doesn’t outlast its material. Throughout the evening the two pianists exchanged places, one at the treble, the other at the bass, but in all, the ear was drawn first to Lupu.

Dan Davis

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