The piano duo of
Adrienne Soós and Ivo Haag turn to the music of Ignaz Moscheles and Carl Maria von Weber for their second disc for Hungaroton. The two works here are contemporary to each other (from 1818-1819) and of similar natures, despite one being a sonata and the other a set of character pieces. Both Moscheles and Weber were piano virtuosos -- although Weber is remembered as an opera composer -- so it's no surprise that the works here tend toward the ornate or colorful, but for all the fancy fingerwork, they are extremely well-constructed and balanced for the two performers at one keyboard and are also quite attractive in tunefulness and energy. Moscheles' Grande Sonata is as large as a Beethoven solo sonata. It features an extended opening movement, a song-ful middle movement, and a final introduced by a march-like Adagio. The second movement has some denser, chordal accompaniment that sometimes threatens to overpower the relatively simple tune, but the sonata as a whole is good-humored, almost jaunty. In both the first and second movements, the primo part even gets a mini-cadenza to show off, and throughout the sonata you can hear tradeoffs of lines not only between the two performers, but also between each one's two hands. Weber's set of Eight Pieces, Op. 60, has many of the same characteristics as Moscheles' sonata: energetic, tuneful, optimistic-sounding, some sense of pianistic pizzazz. Of course, there's more variety of form in the pieces: there's a rondo, a march, a set of variations, a couple of folk dances, and a sonata-allegro movement, but all of it is just as enjoyable.
Soós and Haag's ensemble work is flawless and makes this essentially unknown music something that not only fans of piano duets should hear, but something that any fan of early Romantic piano music should investigate.