Mozart: Complete Sonatas for Keyboard and Violin, Vol. 3

You know you're in audiophile territory when an album's credits list the provider of audio cable, and even the specific model involved. Heard on an ordinary CD player, the level of detail captured in this recording is startling (but never overbearing). And one can only guess at the sonic riches available to anyone with a Super Audio CD player. This is the third volume in a series of Mozart's sonatas for keyboard and violin by the fortuitously named British fortepianist Gary Cooper and Baroque violinist Rachel Podger. They make a fine pair. Podger, mostly known for performances of Baroque works, has a flashier, edgier sound than Cooper, with lots of quick little crescendos played off against Cooper's more suave phrasing. They come together in moments of intense expressivity, such as the passages of neo-Romantic harmonies in the Sonata in B flat major, K. 454, and then Cooper draws back and Podger resumes making her sharp comments. The CD is framed by two major sonatas, K. 454 and the Sonata in E flat major, K. 380 -- works in which Mozart virtually created the modern violin and piano sonata by equalizing the balance between violin and piano. In between are two short works of Mozart's extreme youth and two obscure two-movement works written perhaps in the early 1780s.
There are a few possible complaints here. Although Paris was one of the first cities conquered by the new fortepiano, the works from Mozart's childhood seem to call for a harpsichord and for a lighter touch in general than they are given here. And the editorial presentation is sloppy. The word "français" is given as "françois"; a strange-looking small capital B is used for the musical flat symbol; there are grammatical errors in the English translation from the Dutch liner notes. Worse, there is no discussion at all in the notes of the two-movement works (tracks 7-10) at the center of the program. They are small pieces of questionable origin and authenticity, and in a complete-recordings set they needed some kind of justification or at least information. The two major sonatas of Mozart's maturity presented here, however, are given exciting performances that make the listener appreciate their breakthrough status within Mozart's output.