Search - Mozart :: The Complete Mozart Divertimentos: Historic First Recorded Edition: CD 1

This first of six CDs containing the complete set of Mozart Divertimentos, the only recording ever made of this repertoire, contains Divertimentos Nos. 1, 13, and 2. The program demonstrates extraordinarily rich and varied instrumentation. Divertimento No. 2 is most rare, showing off three winds, a highly unusual four horns, and strings sized to what Mozart had in Salzburg. The ensemble is led by violinist Felix Galimir, liner notes by famed scholar and pianist Robert Levin. Also available as part of a six-CD boxed set, containing the entire Divertimento collection. The first work in this series, Divertimento No. 1, was given the double title "Concerto or Divertimento" by Mozart. It exists in two different versions: the original, recorded here?written in Milan in November 1771, for strings, two clarinets and two horns?and the Salzburg transcription, made in approximately 1773? which substitutes pairs of oboes, English horns, and bassoons for the clarinets and horns. The fourth Tafelmusik sextet, Divertimento No. 13, has just three movements. The first is an Andante theme with variations, in which Mozart?s growing expertise in wind writing is evident. The other two movements are more typical?the standard minuet and trio, and a lusty rondo. Characterized by ebulliently high spirits, Divertimento No. 2 is enormously rich in its wind writing. The minuets also contain an interesting innovation: rather than a literal repeat of the minuets themselves after the end of the succession of minuet-trio alternations, Mozart writes out an embellished variation, with fuller orchestration. © 2002 Robert Levin