{TABLE} Divertimento in F K138 ............... Mozart Piano Concerto in B flat ............. Mozart Piano Concerto in G K453 ............. Mozart {/TABLE} THE final concert of the first leg of Hugh Tinney's Mozart piano concerto cycle began with a nicely chamber styled performance of the early Salzburg Divertimento in F. Lightness was here the order of the day from the strings of the Orchestra of St Cecilia under Geoffrey Spratt. With airier articulation, the double bass line was kept better in scale than in earlier concerts, and the progressive excursions into the lowest register in the second half of the slow movement worked all the more impressively as a result.
The opening Allegro of the Piano Concerto in B flat, with its jaunty, chromatic theme in thirds, found Tinney in particularly golden toned form, shaping phrases with a liquidity that's not frequently encountered in Mozart playing these days. Much as period performance advocates might argue against it, I found the approach musically persuasive (though there were some uncharacteristic lapses of concentration in the first movement, one of which came close to being dangerous).
There was a brittler air and some sharper edges in the Concerto in G major. The high point here was the serenely multi faceted central Andante, where the concentrated rapport between soloist and orchestra was a particular pleasure. Hardly less pleasurable was the closing Allegretto, paced to perfection for the gradual wind up of velocity and the almost operatic calls to attention of its rippling, Presto close.
