Prior to the recording era, it was only a small slice of the population that could hear orchestral works as they were written, and even if you were one of the lucky ones and had a hankering to rehear something, you had to turn to chamber arrangements. Such arrangements form an important part of the reception histories of major works. They've been recorded from time to time but intelligent treatments like this one, by a chamber group headed by pianist David Owen Norris, are rare, and listeners will be delighted here. The ...
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Prior to the recording era, it was only a small slice of the population that could hear orchestral works as they were written, and even if you were one of the lucky ones and had a hankering to rehear something, you had to turn to chamber arrangements. Such arrangements form an important part of the reception histories of major works. They've been recorded from time to time but intelligent treatments like this one, by a chamber group headed by pianist David Owen Norris, are rare, and listeners will be delighted here. The arrangements are all from London. Norris does well to focus on a single composer, Mozart, for in this way, you can readily hear the various ways the arrangers went about their tasks. The real find here is the arrangement by Muzio Clementi of the Mozart Symphony No. 41 in C major, K. 551 ("Jupiter") (it was from this milieu that the symphony acquired this nickname). He uses the same piano-flute-violin-cello quartet as the other arrangers, but Clementi was a talented pianist, and he puts...
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