Cristian Sandrin playing three Mozart concertos with simplicity,radiance and beauty with players from the London Mozart Players. Two of them especially prepared by Cristian for string quartet in an evening in which the genius of Mozart was celebrated by master musicians with humility and integrity.
I heard FouTs’ong play the three concertos K 413 – 414 – 415 in a concert that I have never forgotten. These were three concertos that Mozart had written especially with string quartet in mind .Other composers too have written for strings alone and include Saint Saens,Busoni and Liszt as adding wind instruments can be costly and tip the balance where a single violin or cello cannot merge so easily with a wind instrument. Cristian has prepared the A major K 488 and E flat K 482 for string quartet and as he says ‘ I uncovered unexpected connections between various themes across the concertos, during the process of re-writing the orchestral score. It made me realise that the overflow of constant new melodies and tunes from these later concertos are part of a complex web of motifs, something that I would have normally associated with Beethoven’s music. The simple act of re-writing music down enforces certain connections in the brain. In one sense it is a remarkable method to internalise the music and the orchestral score.’
Cristian playing with impeccable clarity and rhythmic drive, he has a way of touching the keys with fingers that seem to belong to the keys as they hover with horizontal expectancy swooping with poetic beauty as they etched out sounds of radiance and crystalline beauty. Trills that seem to be born above the keys as sounds are allowed to vibrate with natural fluency.
Strangely enough it was the two new recreations of K488 and K482 that were more memorable than K 415 where the ensemble played with more knife edge urgency than they had in Mozarts original , where legato phrases from the violins seemed to loose their poignant simplicity.
Mozart too easy for children but too difficult for adults, it is not always easy even for master musicians like these LMP soloists to gauge the just equilibrium.
The vibrant dynamic drive from Sarah Butcher’s cello kept an even keel and was the anchor on which marvels were created. George White like a cat on a hot tin roof ready to pounce and follow these marvels of recreation that were being created.
The most satisfying and revelatory performance came after the interval with the E flat concerto K 482 . A concerto that I had never been aware of as being a continuous outpouring of mellifluous beauty as is the better known K 503 .
ChristopherAxworthy-MusicCommentary 