Lars Vogt: Mozart – Piano Concerto no.9 & 24 (24/96 FLAC)

Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Performer: Lars Vogt
Orchestra: Orchestre de chambre de Paris
Conductor: Lars Vogt
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Ondine
Catalogue: ODE1414-2
Release: 2023
Size: 1.02 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes

Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat major, K271 “Jeunehomme”
01. I. Allegro
02. II. Andantino
03. III. Rondo (Presto)

Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K491
04. I. Allegro (Cadenza: Lars Vogt)
05. II. Larghetto
06. III. Allegretto

The early death of award-winning pianist and conductor Lars Vogt on September 5, 2022 shocked profoundly the international music world. Some 16 months earlier, already aware of his diagnosis and in the middle of his treatment sessions, the artist had an urgent desire to record a Mozart piano concerto album together with the Orchestre de chambre de Paris. He believed that performing these fantastic works that he so much admired would also be the best medicine for his condition. For this Mozart album Lars Vogt coupled two concertos: the early, exuberant Piano Concerto No. 9, ‘Jeunehomme’, written by Mozart in his early 20s, together with the melancholic and nostalgic Piano Concerto No. 24, which is considered by many as Mozart’s greatest piano concerto – a perfect closure to Lars Vogt’s final concerto album.

This is the final concerto recording by the late Lars Vogt, made at his insistence despite considerable difficulties as he was undergoing cancer treatment; he conducts the Orchestre de Chambre de Paris as well as playing the solo part. It is no surprise that the album vaulted onto classical best-seller lists soon after its release in the summer of 2023, for it has a truly haunting quality. Vogt includes the most serious of the Mozart concertos, the Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K. 491, and this performance has all the gravity one might expect. Perhaps even more extraordinary, though, is the reading of the Piano Concerto No. 9 in E flat major, K. 271, the first of Mozart’s mature concertos and one of the most expansive in structure. Sample the opening movement, where every detail in the orchestral exposition is carefully shaped and held in reserve for later exploration by the piano. It is an extraordinarily dense performance but one that never loses a sense of grace, and it is one for the ages. It is hard not to feel a sense of sadness while hearing this music, but that sadness is fully counterbalanced by joy.