Mozart: Piano Sonatas, K. 281, K. 333, K. 570, Vol. 1

Album review

Mozart’s singing line and its translation to the piano has served as Orli Shaham’s constant guide in her interpretations of Mozart. While analysis of, harmony, rhythm, and phrasing have played an important part, Orli Shaham is adamant that the vocal nature of each sonata is paramount. K. 333 starts out as would Mozart’s operas, as a single melodic idea as Orli Shaham says, “Mozart taught the keyboard to sing.” The B-flat sonatas stand individually as emblems of Mozart’s inventive brilliance, three distinct universes, albeit all formed from the same raw materials. The artistic genius in Mozart is that he leaves the performer to capture the mood in the music, and this Orli Shaham does with aplomb, the studio environment for this recording encouraging her to experiment and “go all out” with ornamentation, adding or subtracting trills and grace notes with successive takes. This is the first volume of a complete Mozart Piano Sonata series. Orli Shaham embarked upon this project in August 2019. © Canary Classics