Anne-Sophie Mutter - Mozart - The Violin Concertos (2005)

When she was a fresh 15-year-old violinist in 1978, Anne-Sophie Mutter made her recording debut with a coupling of Mozart's Third and Fifth Violin Concertos with Herbert von Karajan conducting the Berlin Philharmonic. Now as an accomplished 42-year-old virtuoso in 2003, Mutter has recorded all five of Mozart's violin concertos plus his Sinfonia Concertante with herself conducting the London Philharmonic. The inevitable question is "how do they compare" and the unfortunate answer is "not too well." As a violinist, Mutter's tone has grown more gorgeous as her technique has become more effortless, but the ineffable charm and evanescent delight of her earlier recording is nowhere to be found. Where the 15-year-old was discovering and savoring the joyous beauty of Mozart's music, the 42-year-old woman is using that beauty to display her tone and technique. And where the younger violinist had as an accompanist a conductor of consummate control in Karajan, the older virtuoso has nobody between her and the overly responsive but often clumsy London Philharmonic and the results are just about technically acceptable and a far cry from the completely commanding Karajan. Like a pitcher needs a catcher and a writer needs an editor, a soloist needs an accompanist. Violist Yuri Bashmet plays Cary Grant to Mutter's Katharine Hepburn and while the sparks do fly in the Sinfonia concertante, there's no one in the director's chair to yell cut. Deutsche Grammophon's sound is very clear, very close, and very cool.