Mozart - Piano Concerto 21 [Schmidt/Masur-Dresdner Philharmonie] I played Mozart's Piano Concerto 20 [my favourite Mozart Concerto] last month [17th April 2011], and now it's time for its companion piece on the disc, they were composed about a month apart, and even though there's certain similarities, they are in fact like opposites of each other, one minor and troublesome, the other major and sweet, but perversely they always seem to crop up as a pairing.
Annerose Schmidt is East German i believe, and these lovely Berlin Classics 'basics' are really that, a disc, a DigiPak, and a track listing, there's no biography, and no explanation of the music inside, it is not Annerose Schmidt on the cover, but it is a nice cover shot [by Elke Van De Velde], at first glance seemingly upside down, it's a nice clever idea, a girl laying on the grass, hair all over the place, and the logo / lettering is nicely laid out, but what has the picture got to do with the music?.
Even though it's written in a major key [C Major], there's still dark overtones in the music, as suggested by the opening in the orchestra [0:00-0:08], and by the more forte gestures almost after it, with frantic high strings [0:21-0:35], making a lovely inventive beginning, Annerose Schmidt is deeply in the same intensity as the orchestra, not merely an accompanist, there's a lovely sweet section where she makes her piano sing [3:55-4:24], and a little later provides some excellent background accompanying notes to the orchestra [4:32-4:44], the orchestral tutti comes back in force like early in the opening [5:54-6:14], Mozart really knows how to blast us with previously presented material, which comes back to reinforce and remind us just how great this music is, from negative to positive, the music is nicely switched by the piano [7:42-8:02], a lovely aching moment, and soon after the orchestra returns to the opening moments all over again [8:19+], coming back in power, especially that sweet tune [9:31-10:00], and the piano accompaniment right after [10:09-10:41], restatement is just heaven from Mozart, i loved this Concerto today.
Here's Nikolai Lugansky playing the first movement on YouTube.
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