A Lot of Mozart in Small Doses

The sheer quantity of Mozart on CD received in recent months has precluded earlier attention to the composer, 200 years dead and never more alive than in 1991.

This first Mozart column of the new year and of his year is devoted to the divertimentos and serenades--occasional pieces in which Mozart could be as witty, as lyrical, as superficial or as deep as he wanted to be, as long as he obeyed the conventions and kept the music in motion.

The divertimentos for strings and winds begin with K. 113, written in 1771, when Mozart was 15, and end with K. 525 (“Eine kleine Nachtmusik”) of 1787, four years before his death.

They were most likely intended to be performed one player to a part: a total in the biggest and best, K. 287 and K. 334, of seven (string quartet, string bass and two horns). They are performed as such, that is, as chamber music, in Volume 7 (422 504, 5 CDs) of the Philips Complete Mozart Edition--45 mid-priced boxed sets, whose release is scheduled for completion in November of this year.

Volume 7, whose contents were previously available on full-price Philips CDs, is presented by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble, with Kenneth Sillito as first violinist and de facto director. It is a triumph in all respects, most importantly for showing the inexhaustible variations of mood, technique and sonority Mozart could invent within a formal context that was to other composers hopelessly confining.

The set makes one wonder too whether our local chamber-music performers will see fit to present any of these great scores, very rarely encountered in their original formats, e.g. the aforementioned K. 287 and K. 334 (which, incidentally, offer splendid display opportunities for the first violinist), “A Musical Joke,” K. 522, and even ‘Eine kleine Nachtmusik’ which, familiar as it may be, is usually misrepresented in bloated string-orchestra versions.

In the latest release, the seventh, of a series of individual CDs devoted to various divertimentos and serenades, conductor Sandor Vegh and the Camerata Academica of the Salzburg Mozarteum offer the breezily elegant orchestral Divertimento in D, K. 131, with its quartet of horns--to compensate for the limited pitches available to the valveless instruments of Mozart’s time--and two more intimate pieces, K. 113 and “A Musical Joke” (Capriccio 10 333).

The latter two are played by a small, finely honed string orchestra, rather than one to a part, with the appropriate winds added. But Vegh is a tactful, tasteful Mozartean who propels the scores and keeps them airborne.

The Serenades for orchestra package (422 503, 7 CDs), Volume 3 of Philips’ complete Mozart, has Sir Neville Marriner conducting the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields in configurations ranging from 15 to perhaps 40 players. Included are several of Mozart’s grandest entertainments, the “Haffner” Serenade, K. 250 (with Iona Brown playing the violin solos with terrific panache), the “Posthorn” Serenade, K. 320, “Serenata notturna,” K. 239, and, again, “Eine kleine Nachtmusik,” this time with a small string band.

Recorded between 1981 and 1989, the performances are prime Academy and prime Marriner: technically irreproachable, stylish, wittily robust. While Marriner and Vegh apply the light touch without trivializing the material, the charmless, aggressive approach of Nikolaus Harnoncourt, directing his period-instrument Vienna Concentus Musicus, very nearly blows it to bits (Teldec 244 809).

They slam into the galant Divertimento in D, K. 251, like a marauding army; “Musical Joke” is weighted down by too many players and is uglified--beyond anything Mozart might have intended in his satire of inept composers and performers--by the raucously blatting horns of which the conductor is inexplicably fond. “Nachtmusik,” done with relative simplicity, comes off best. But who really needs it?

Another period specialist, Ton Koopman, leads his expert Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra (Erato 2292-45471) in readings of the elegant string divertimentos, K. 136-138, that respect their charm and intimacy. But in avoiding Harnoncourt’s brutality in K. 251, Koopman imposes mannered dynamics and phrasings on the surface-simple score, with the oboe solos frequently often reduced to precious, short-breathed whispers.