Mozart, Piano Concerto No 27

 
Between the years 1782 and 1786, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart published and premiered in Vienna a staggering fifteen piano concertos. They were part of his public performances which, apart from the lessons to his pupils, were the natural way for a composer who did not have the favor of a court to generate income in those years. According to custom, the performances included the presentation of singers and other various numbers to give the Viennese public a varied program so that interest would not wane during the four hours that the concerts usually lasted. Of course, the total income had to be shared among all the artists.

Letter from Mozart to Puchberg, requesting a new loan. August 14, 1790

The bad times
In 1787 Austria started an unpopular war against the Ottoman Empire. The Viennese aristocracy decided then to concentrate their interest on protecting their property and shielding their children from conscription. Accordingly, the number of pupils and the interest in attending musical performances decreased notoriously. As a result, two years had to pass before Mozart wrote a new piano concerto, the one called "of the Coronation", in 1788, and the last of them, the Concerto in B flat, dated in his catalog on January 5, 1791, exactly eleven months before his death.

Constanze Mozart (1762 - 1842)

M. Puchberg, the helping hand
At the end of 1789, with the laurels of The Marriage of Figaro (1786) and Don Giovanni (1787) somewhat withered, Wolfgang's financial situation was not of the best. When Constanze gave birth to a daughter in November of that year – who lived a mere six months – he had just two pupils, so he was once again forced to seek financial support from the incredibly generous Michael Puchberg, a prosperous Viennese merchant and fellow mason of Amadeus.

Not a few authors have ever sought help from a patron of the arts, but none have done so in a more compelling and heartbreakingly than Mozart.

In June 1788 Mozart wrote Puchberg:

"I still owe you eight ducats. Apart from the fact that at the moment I am not in a position to pay you back this sum, my confidence in you is so boundless that I dare to implore you to help me out with a hundred gulden until next week, when my concerts in the Casino are to begin."

Puchberg apparently sent the money. Then Mozart asked for an even bigger favor:

"If you have sufficient regard and friendship for me to assist me for a year or two with one or two thousand guldens, at a suitable rate of interest, you will help me enormously!" He made the feeble argument that this loan would enable him to "work with a mind more free from care and with a lighter heart and thus earn more."

The Mason merchant jealously guarded these letters, all, more or less, of the same tenor. Today they are worth far more than he ever lent to the Salzburg genius, who, by the way, was only able to pay off the debt on a couple of occasions.

Concerto No. 27 for piano and orchestra in B flat major, K. 595
In March 1791 Mozart gave one of his last public performances in Vienna. On that occasion, he gave the audience Concerto No. 27 for piano and orchestra.

Unlike the brilliance of the immediately preceding concerts, this is an intimate work, with a cozy character and without the slightest trace of spectacularity that the soloist or orchestra could make use of. At times mysterious, at others luminous or tragic, the work builds its unity on a brilliant mixture of intensity and elegance.

Movements:
Allegro  On a very simple accompaniment lasting a single measure, the strings begin a beautiful cantabile melody punctuated by short interventions by the woodwind instruments. The sense of elegance and restraint is enhanced by an instrumentation that omits trumpets and tympani. At 2:55 the piano makes its entrance redrawing the initial motif.

Larghetto (14:25)  Cataloged by some as "religious", a very simple theme is offered by the solo piano with the utmost innocence; it shows a little elaboration, only when Mozart considered it essential. A second idea, the most recognizable despite its brevity, in 15:17. It reappears at 18:57.

Allegro (21:08)  Of calm candor, its first theme recalls the song that Mozart consecutively added to his catalog, the celebrated Sehnsucht nach dem Frühling (Longing for Spring, K. 596).

The rendition is by the brilliant Portuguese pianist Maria Joao Pires, accompanied by the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, conducted by British conductor Trevor Pinnock.

After the concert, Maria Joao Pires offers us a couple of encores: Allegro and Andante from the sonata in D major for four hands (32:30), accompanied by the conductor who, of course, is also a pianist.

Franz Schubert, Impromptus Op 142

In the painting, a view of Kettenbrücken street, in the town of Neu Wieden, near Vienna. Ferdinand Schubert, Franz's older brother, and also a musician and composer, had his rooms in these buildings.
Franz Schubert moved there at the end of the summer of 1828 in search of healthier airs than those Vienna had to offer. He was ill and urgently needed his lungs to clear up, so that he could start composing again. Besides, he wanted to improve his knowledge of counterpoint and fugues technique.  For that, he needed time and a renewed mood.

Depression and the death of the idol
For two years his health had seriously deteriorated. The rejection of his nomination for the vacant post of court chapel director was followed by the death of the revered Beethoven in 1827. Franz fell into a severe state of depression. It is true that Beethoven's luster perhaps darkened Schubert's own brilliance, yet this did not prejudice Franz against him, although on one occasion he expressed serious doubts to a friend that anyone, including himself, was capable of surpassing the master. On Beethoven's death, despite his frail health and intolerable depression, little Franz, together with all his friends, accompanied the cortege, carrying one of the torches himself, as tradition has it.

Franz Schubert (1797 - 1828)

Despite his weak spiritual condition, Franz's creative genius did not wane. From that year are, among others, the Trios for piano and string, the Musical Moments and the highly celebrated eight Impromptus, composed in the autumn of 1827, and which make up Opus 90 and 142. It was not until that year that Viennese publishers began to glimpse that they might have before them a musician of true worth.

The end
Perhaps this explains that only the first two of the four impromptus of Opus 90 (or D. 899, according to the reviewer of his catalog, Otto Erich Deutsch), were published during the composer's lifetime.

The remaining two and the four impromptus of Opus 142 (D. 935) only saw the public light in the year 1857, almost thirty years after its composition and the death of their author, in the most absolute poverty and graciously lodged in the house of his brother Ferdinand.

His possessions at the time of his death, at the age of 31, were some clothing and a good number of scores, the value of which was estimated at 63 guilders. The funeral expenses amounted to 270.

Four Impromptus, Opus 142

Schubert's Impromptus are perhaps the composer's "little pieces" that have grown in popularity. More or less close to Chopin's nocturnes, they nevertheless possess their own personality and clearly show a deep and solid romantic musicality, even exhibiting a certain dramatism within the grace and charm that is proper to them.

The four impromptus are presented here as a complete work – following the concert tradition – in the rendition of the Russian pianist Alexei Volodin.

00:00  N ° 1 in F minor. Written in rondo form: a main theme alternates with a contrasting one.

09:28  N ° 2 in A flat major. Its opening bars are vividly reminiscent of those of Beethoven's Sonata No. 12. Schubert has likely "borrowed" them, it was not uncommon at the time.

16:49  N ° 3 in B flat major. Perhaps the most popular of all. A theme with variations. In this case, Schubert lent himself the main theme, taking it from the incidental music that he was asked to compose for the theatrical drama Rosamunda.

26:46  N ° 4 in F minor. An intense piece, the most demanding of all the Impromptus. It ends spectacularly with a right-hand scale that runs across the keyboard from one end to the other.

Brahms, Piano Concerto No 1 - Mov I

 
After Robert Schumann died in a sanatorium in 1856, leaving his wife Clara a widow and the breadwinner of the couple's seven children, family friend Johannes Brahms became as an indispensable support for Clara and, as far as we can imagine, they may have envisioned an eventual union at some point in their future lives, despite the seventeen years difference between Clara and the young musician.

In any case, dreams, if there were any, must have been postponed. Clara had to provide for the care for her children through an endless series of concerts. The young Brahms, a twenty-four-year-old musician, had for his part the urge to consolidate a career as a composer.

In 1857, and after successfully passing a measured examination, Johannes Brahms obtained his first official position upon being hired as a musician of the modest court of Detmold, to serve from September to December of that year. His duties consisted of giving piano lessons to Princess Friederike, directing the choir, and performing as a pianist at the concerts scheduled by the court.

The position had several advantages: the three-month salary was enough to live modestly for a whole year, the princess was a diligent pupil, the choir leadership served his purposes as a professional musician very well, and, above all, he had free mornings, and could dispose of them at will. Johannes occupied them in walking around the surroundings and continue to work on his own compositions, especially those that were already beginning to show a long process of gestation.

Brahms, at 20

Since 1854 he had been working on the composition of a symphony which, not having come to fruition, he tried to transform into a sonata for two pianos, which also did not come to fruition. But the material was there, available. So after his second season in Detmold, and based on the elements that perhaps had resisted taking another form, the Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor finally was born.

Composed in three movements and with a somewhat extended duration, the concerto had a lukewarm premiere in Hanover on January 22, 1859, with Brahms at the piano and his friend Joseph Joachim conducting. Five days later, in Leipzig, it was received with whistles. Today it is considered a masterpiece. Apparently Brahms was right when, at the end of the Leipzig performance, he sent Joachim these words:

"After all, I am still in the experimental phase and am groping my way along. However, come to think of it... the whistling was indeed excessive."

The first movement, maestoso, is presented here in the rendition of the Hungarian pianist Dénes Várjon, accompanied by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of the spirited violinist and conductor, also Hungarian, Gábor Takács-Nagy, in a performance at the Béla Bartók National Hall, Budapest, in 2010.

Antonio Soler, Sonatas for harpsichord

Created in 1373 by Pope Gregory XI (then in Avignon), the monastic order of Saint Jerome prescribes a religious life in solitude, silence, prayer and penance. Delivered to the Lord to such an extreme, the daily activities of the monks of this order would begin at five in the morning and between prayers, lessons and prayers before the Stations of the Cross, they ended at twelve at night with a last exercise of contemplative life and prayer.

Padre Soler
But the Spanish harpsichordist and composer Antonio Soler y Ramos, better known today as Padre Soler, was not deterred by so much personal sacrifice. When he was just over twenty years old he joined the order, ready to lead a life of penance. He had started his musical studies at the age of six, and ten years later he was serving as a chapel teacher in the cathedral of Lleida. In 1752 he held the position of organist and director of the choir of the monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, where he became part of the community of Hieronymite monks of the monastery, and in whose company he remained until his death in 1783.

A huge production
It is amazing, then, that the degree of devotion already mentioned has not been an obstacle for Padre Soler, as a Hieronymite monk, to have composed more than 200 sonatas for harpsichord, 6 quintets for organ and string, 6 concertos for two organs, 9 masses, 25 ecclesiastical hymns, 5 requiem and 60 psalms, in addition to a large number of Magnificats, motets and Christmas carols.

Other contributions
To this vast musical production must be added the construction of an instrument of keys and strings that he called afinador or templante, and the writing of a treatise on harmony, Llave de la modulación y Otras antigüedades de la música (Key of modulation and Antiquities of music), published by the Hieronymite community of El Escorial in 1762, which aroused some controversy for its advanced theories on modulation.

The sonatas
A student of Domenico Scarlatti while he was at El Escorial, Padre Soler is perhaps the most important musician of the 18th century in Spain. Although he differed from his tutor, Soler's music is undoubtedly influenced by the footprint that the Italian composer left in Spain, which is clearly seen in his harpsichord sonatas, especially in the repeated use of crossing hands and large leaps.

Soler's "sonatas" (as well as Scarlatti's) are very short one-movement pieces; They bear that name as the equivalent of "instrumental music" to differentiate them from vocal music ("cantatas") and were intended for the practice of the instrument and the amusement of the performer.

Presented here is the Sonata for harpsichord No. 88 in D minor, performed on piano by the Swiss musician Jean Baptiste Muller.

Moisés Moleiro, Joropo

 
The joropo is a dance and a folkloric rhythm native to the llanos of Venezuela and Colombia, probably originated in the flamenco and Andalusian dances that the conqueror brought from the Old Continent, acquiring here a new appearance although it retained some features such as, for example, the zapateado. As the national dance of Venezuela, it is danced in pairs, on the occasion of popular, cultural and religious festivals, to the beat of music sung by a group of singers accompanied by Venezuelan cuatro, llanera harp and maracas.

Reaching the academy
After the natural decay of the romantic waltzes of the nineteenth century, which in all fairness gained access to a space in academic and salon music in their time, at the beginning of the twentieth-century Venezuelan composers took up an interest in creating works that would elevate indigenous rhythms at the academy level.

Moisés Moleiro
Among many others, this is the case of the pianist and composer Moisés Moleiro, author of sonatinas and toccatas somewhat "scarlattian" but with both syncopation and Venezuelan accent, and whose most popular work ended up being, precisely, a joropo for piano.

Moisés Moleiro (1904 - 1979)

Born in the Guárico state in 1904, Moleiro graduated as a pianist in 1927 and gave his first recital in 1931. True to his customary style of simplicity and transparency, the composer was able to transport to the piano – in 1941– the flavor, the rhythm and the festive character that, in principle, only the cuatro, harp and maracas, could deliver.

Joropo, by Moleiro
A piece of a high technical difficulty, in 6/8 time, Moleiro's Joropo should be an obligatory work in the repertoire of every Latin American pianist aware of his roots, although it is only intended to be performed as an encore, due to its brevity. From beginning to end, the piece rests (the pianist not so much) on an "Alberti bass" as accompaniment. Huge syncopated leaps deliver more rhythmic richness and add another bit of difficulty.

The rendition, magnificent, is by Basco pianist Josu Gallastegui.