Apollo's Fire - Mozart: Piano Concertos No. 20 and No. 23 (2005)

Among authentic re-creations of Mozart's piano concertos, this CD from Apollo's Fire surely must rank near the top. Its pulsing energy, vibrant color, and expressive depth would mark it as an exceptional achievement by any standard, but its even blending of scholarship and musicality approach the ideal of historically informed performances. John Gibbons plays a modern copy of Mozart's Walther pianoforte, and the ensemble, led by founder Jeannette Sorrell, plays period instruments and follows known Classical practices with great fidelity. That much is de rigueur for Apollo's Fire, Cleveland's celebrated Baroque Orchestra, but there is much more to their renditions than merely satisfying academic expectations or emulating the styles of Mozart's time. The tragic mood in the Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466, and the gentle, expansive lyricism of the Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, K. 488, come through with immediacy and spontaneous feeling; since the soloist and orchestra are so steeped in the period, their nuanced phrasing, light touch, fleet tempi, and warm timbres seem utterly natural and unaffected. One might quibble that Gibbons is slightly under-recorded, for his softest passages with the orchestra are a little indistinct, but this can be remedied with a higher volume setting.

Review by Blair Sanderson