The Week's Music...

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 886, 27 July 1956, Page 31

The Week's Music...

by

SEBASTIAN

AA Y diet has been pleasant this week: ‘" 1 have been eating my words. The uniformity of repertoire of visitirg pianists that I complained about a short time ago has hed a \rude shock from Faul Badura-Skoda (YC links), It’s a long while, for instance, sirce I heard the Schumann F Sharp Minor Sonata played at all, let alone played as efficently as this, Peul Badura-Sko: a has a reputation chiefly as an exponent of Mozart; the Schumann Sonata, thoueh technically all thet could be desired, seemed impersonal end rather cooler than one expects; but I was impre*sed with the sonorous bass passages, which I think owed little to my radio, The Kinderscenen which followed (with no "repeats") was a little scamped but very charming in spite of it. The other programmes were devoted to Mozart-but not by any means run-of-the-mill Mozart. Admittedly the A Major Sonata ("with the Alla Turca’’) featured prominently in one recital, but that was played superlatively well-how many little fingers have we heard toiling laboriously over it?-with something of a different approach to the composer, the familiarity of old friends, not that which breeds contempt, The Fantasy and Fugue in C, a much-neglected relic of the days when Mozart discovered

Bach for himself, was played with almost the solidity of the latter composer, Meticulous in every detail, it was still in no way strained, and the hooming cadences could not disguise the Mozartean gooi taste which is, after all, the essence of this music. The little Rondo in F, usvally played with the Sonata K 533, was an enitome of grace, and an object lesson in the art of not hurrying. More Mozart, with the National Orchestra this time, and the Concerto in E Flat, K.482; again a work which is not on the Mozart Hit Parade, but an attractive and finely-constructed specimen of the form, The blatant utterances (comparatively speaking) of the first movement, interspersed with fine filigree from the soloist, contrasted effectively with the gentle plaintive variations. The folksy finale was pure joy, with everyone revelling in it, orchestra included: the latter, apart from the usual few blues from the wind section, sounded most at home. Mr. Badura-Skoda brings strength to his interpretation es well as delicacy, and obviously regards Mozart as no musical namby-pamby-an attitude all too common among pianists. After hearing such performances, it is an attitude that should rapidly become extinct. t