recommendations for Mozart's "Gran Partita" please...

The only version of Gran Partita I’m familiar with is by Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields which is on the Phillips label.

Recorded in London, July 1984 : Serenade in B flat KV 361/370a for 2 oboes, 2 clarinets 2 basset horns, 4 horns, 2 bassoons, and double bass.

It's available within a 6 x CD box-set (pictured above) for all Mozart serenade & divertimenti diehards, or on it’s own single CD (pictured below).

This is an excellent, sincere and warming version imo and I highly recommend it.

The recording is excellent too.

However, time having moved on since 1984 so there most probably are other excellent versions around by now, and perhaps a few that are excellent plus…?

It will be interesting to see what others recommend, especially if they're recent recordings.

I seem to associate this musik [quite wrongly I know] to the Yule tide time of year, because this was the time of year I purchased my box-set in 1994 : )

Debs

I would not argue with Debs suggestion of Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields offerings as we have great affection for their work and would probably go that way if I were looking today.

I can suggest an alternative should you already have a copy of K.375, the other offering on the single disc Debs suggests (I believe), and that is the Daniel Barenboim and the English Chamber Orchestra’s offering. A 2CD set which adds K.297b, K.313, K.315 & K314 to K.316 ‘Gran Partita’.

So, an alternative, but if all else is equal, I’d go for Debs suggestion. The box set would be best of course.

Peter

Thanks for the replies. I always wanted to buy the Marriner recording, but it now seems quite rare. I have a recording by Mackerras that I like, and I just ordered Herreweghe because I think he has the right feel for this music, and it is easily available through Amazon.

The Gran Partita is great music for a warm sunny day; having a few Gin Collins on the deck...

BBM

Yes, i usually enjoy it in December but tried it out yesterday and can confirm it sounds just as marvelous in a heat wave, and if you like 'Gran Partita', you will probably love the Divertimento in C, KV 188/240b for 2 flutes, 5 trumpets, and timpani. Recorded: June 1989, London by Academy of St Martin in the Fields again but this time with Michael Laird, and not Sir Nev.

This is the first part on the second disc in the Philips box-set, and what follows is a wonderful version of the more famous Nacht Musique Serenade in C minor, KV 388/384a for 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, and 2 horns, Recorded: July 1986 by members of the Holliger Wind Ensemble.

Heinz Holliger is there with his oboe.

The other very fine contributor to this 6 x cd box-set is, Edo de Waart conducting the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, with various recordings from Amsterdam.

Again all are exceptionally good 1980s recordings

The 3rd to 6th CDs are a collection of lesser known divertimenti works which finely example how well Mozart could compose interesting and entertaining tunes for various wind/brass configurations, he wrote many of them when freelancing for customers who were wealthy enough to have just a few selected musicians at their disposal, so Mozart himself didn't always get to choose the instruments.

The cost of the Box-set: the only place i can find it is Amazon uk: new for £50.

But if it’s any consolation, mine still has the ‘Opus Records’ £45 price tag stuck on,

so it’s only gone up a fiver in twenty years : )

Debs

Re the Philips recordings, pop along to the Decca Classics site. Its now an 11 disc set for £40. Another fan of ASMIF and Sir Neville here.

Andy

The Gran Partita (Mozart's 10th serenade - other famous ones include no. 13 "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" and no.7 "Haffner") is scored for 12 wind instruments and a double bass. It is often performed by wind ensembles who substitute the double bass for a contrabassoon. The recording by London Winds is a good example, although to be honest I prefer a performance with double bass - the contrabassoon isn't nearly as effective in the bass regions.

One of Klemperer's last recordings was of this work - and it's quite good if middle of the road (not slow at all, in case you're wondering) and recently re-issued by EMI. Karajan recorded a very sugary performance, to be avoided (and this coming from an admirer). I haven't heard Marriner, he has a good pedigree, and I'm curious to hear Herreweghe in this work.

Cheers,

EJ

Seeing this, and the superb collections of recommendations, I think there is little to add.

Of course, I'd say that the Klemperer recording has much to commend it. It is my first choice, but I tend to recommend more modern recordings for others, and with luck let them listen to it here to decide for themselves. 

Furtwangler made a recording in 1947 that is more perhaps for admirers of this famous conductor than those wanting a good first choice recording of the music.

There is a great recording led by Alexander Schneider, but this may not be currently available. I heard it once on Radio Three and thought it was superb. Another that is also superb is certainly not available, though I have it on CD. Alan Hacker and the Music Party on period instruments. With double bass as well just as it should be! I have never heard a contra-basoon make much of the marking pizzicato!

I played the piece once in a concert in Worcester, and strange to say it is far harder to play well than the recordings mentioned so far make it seem! The bass is easier to play nicely than the contra as well. When Furtwangler recorded it in 1947, the VPO was not perhaps in the best of corporate musical health, and it took several months to come up with a complete recording where the tuning was fine enough to bear repeated listenings. There was even the possibility of abandoning the whole effort and recording the music with the Philharmonia in London.

ATB from George

I am familiar with most of the versions mentioned here (and they are good) but I certainly agree with George about the Music Party version. This is not only my favourite version of the composition but the recording is one of my all-time favourites of any music. Fantastic alert playing, captured beautifully, from the call to attention at the beginning, right through to the end! And the EKNM on the flip-side is a good one too.

Pity it's not available on CD but I have a very nice vinyl copy.

Dear Chris,

Hacker's recording of the Gran Partita was issued on CD on the French "NATO" label, and was a quite short CD without any coupling.

I also had Hacker and the Music Party in the Clarinet Concerto [Mozart] and the Kegelstadt Trio on a NATO LP.

A funny story about the performers was that I knew Hacker quite well, and he was responsible for me playing the double bass. He thought the idea should be followed up, and that was the spur. Within twelve months I had played my first concert in public on the instrument with my teacher as the lead bassist!

But for one Hacker concert I had to turn the pages in the Kegelstadt Trio with his wife, Catherine Evans, playing a two hundred year old fortepiano, with a lovely viola player, and Alan of course on the [period Boxwood] clarinet.

This would have been fairly al-right except that they took all the repeats including the pages long one in the first movement, so not only did I have to co-ordinate turning the pages with Catherine but also get the turn back right.

I was more exhausted at the end than the players, and have no recollection of how it went - very well apparently! - but it was total concentration reading the piano part and keeping the corner of an eye on the player!

It was for this concert that I was given both the LP and the CD.

Alan died in Spring 2012, but I never posted the Obit, because I was fairly sure that few would appreciate it. Look it up on the Telegraph website. He had a fascinating life, and was one the truly great if unsung musicians of our time!

ATB from George