BEETHOVEN, L. van: Piano Concerto No. 3 / Piano Concerto in D major, Op. 61a (Mustonen, Tapiola Sinfonietta)

Album review

Lithe but still muscular, Olli Mustonen and the Tapiola Sinfonietta's performances of Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto and Beethoven's arrangement for piano of his Violin Concerto are thoroughly musical and wholly delightful. Mustonen has a strong technique but a subtle delivery that grants Beethoven's C minor Concerto both power and nuance and his D major Concerto both vigor and vivacity. There is plenty of drama in his C minor Concerto's outer Allegros, but also rapt inwardness in his central Largo. In its guise as a piano concerto, the D major Concerto does not quite have the same sustained legato line as the violin original, but the wit of the composer's transcription and the wild virtuosity of his newly written codas are brilliantly portrayed in Mustonen's performances. With supple strings, pungent woodwinds, brazen brass, and a timpani player who sounds like he is having the time of his life in the D major Concerto's cadenzas, the Tapiola Sinfonietta shines under Mustonen's direction. Ondine's super audio digital sound is essentially transparent.
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