Mozart/Classic Style vs Horowitz

[piano121]

I added a topic  a couple of months ago, looking for a horowitz playing mozartīs piano con 23. Finally I got to watch it.  I used to like it a lot as a teeager 10 years ago, and I still do. But now I kind of understand how Horowitz played Mozart in a complete non classical fashion.

My teacher told me that his way of playing mozart is quite inadequate, in a sense he doe not respect the classical arpoach to mozart, he doesnīt follow what is considered by most people the right way to aproach mozrtīs music. On the other hand he says Horowitz is a fantastic interpreter of Scriabin, or Scarlati for exemple

He creates his own way of doing the articulation, the dinamics and every think looks very romantic in his interpretation of mozart. Thatīs very comprehensible due to the fact that he was a romantic hiwself, contemporary of Rachmaninov en Prokofiev, and have many influences from this school.

Even some reporters kind of say that his aproach to mozart is not correct, when horowitz say he plays in "good taste" one of these reporters repplies "in your taste"

Personaly, I think itīs totaly allright for hiw to create shuch interpretation on mozart, because he got a very large background on music, anda teh tecnical competence to do it. The same with Glen Gould to. But I donnīt think I would aproach it in horowitz way miself.

I would like to ask you guys on the forum, experts on mozart or not, waht your thoughts are? Do you think this kind of atitude makes the interpreter more importat than the composer? Should whe still worry about the way people played instruments in 17th, 18th century, or invent new ways to aproach the instrument, once it also technicaly evolved a lot to. I think booth thinks are important miself, to respect the past, and to bring inovation. But to what degree?

Tell me what u think

[pianistimo]

very good question!  a lot of contemporary pianists and teachers approach mozart in a modern way - interpreting him romantically, and even modernistically (is that a word) because it is music that is repeated so many times over and over - that as a teacher, it is hard to bear metronomically.

all that said, i tend to like consistency at least - whatever you do - be consistent.  for instance, if you play a certain tempo in an A section - when it reapeats - don't suddenly do it in a different tempo.  most teachers don't like this anyway.  what they are looking for is a reason for your madness.  for instance, in the c minor fantasy - my teacher was looking for a very romantic version of the beginning (extremely slow!).  i reached a happy medium with him over this (because i have a hard time interpreting it that way in my head) and tend to like it 'happier and lighter.'  it helped the 'flow' of the piece, to me, to go one or two clicks faster.  he could have cared less about the metronome but is always particular of the rhythm being correct.

now horowitz, being a mature musician probably would have slowed it down (just as my teacher said) and made it into a very developed beginning.  and, perhaps, rightly so - since as one ages one becomes more in tune with life, experiences, and know what the music means to them in a more advanced and patient? way.

murray perahia is my type of classical mozart interpreter because he doesn't have to put  ALL his emotions in his music.  to me, the mozart sings for itself.  but, for others, it doesn't.  murray plays light, pleasing, classically 'inhibited' and yet exposed (but not over done).  i tend to be the same - and not like to expose all emotion (as having all your eggs in one basket, so to speak). 

this is a very interesting question and appeals to the artistic sense that people usually have by the time they are 8 - 10 years old.  if you are very emotional - then your music will be an expression of the emotional side.  if you are more reserved, then your music will have a reserved 'feel.'  i think both types of students need to be exposed to the other side - and sort of 'pushed over the edge' sometimes to explore the other side.  for the overly emotional - to put reins on here and there in places that maybe they take too much liberty with (teacher has to explain about too much rubato - or not enough precision in playing) - and for other students maybe not to worry about the precision so much and to try to 'emote' more.  then, you may have a melding of the two ideas into a balance for each performer.  making them both more pleasing and interesting to listen to.

i am learning how to 'emote' more. believe it or not, it is something that you CAN learn.  it takes a teacher that knows how to put feelings into words and tell you something - or ask you what you 'feel' in a particular passage.  at first i thought this was bordering on ridiculous with mozart (since he was loony and who knows what he was feeling at any particular moment).  i used to pair my feelings as close as i could to the composer or an image of something.  my teacher wasn't satisfied with that (which was fairly shocking to me - because noone really ever asked my feelings about a piece - just the notes and a pleasant interpretation).  it's the difference between making a peanut butter sandwich and making a gourmet meal.  you dwell over the meaning of things (which i tend not to do - and just 'get it done.')  maybe i'm afraid if i put too much emotion in, i will get sidetracked by my emotions and have memory slips. 

anyway - this subject is highly interesting to me - because it is the difference between having an audience fall asleep when you play or not.  when i grew up, we were taught to control our emotions.  (not that i always did, but i tried).  now, it seems that i have to 'work' to pull up deep emotions, sort of as an actor.  i'd have to sit for maybe 10-15 minutes to accurately say what emotion i feel from a piece and then get into that emotion.  this may seem silly to people who have an easy time expressing emotion - but it makes an audience much happier if you are giving them something more than spare change.  now - i fully engage myself - instead of taking a step back and just playing the music like a background musician.  (i've accompanied a lot).  to be a foreground musician you are intimately involved in pulling emotions out of your audience - so you have to have it yourself, too. 

i would be interested to hear 'exercises' for the brain in terms of pulling different emotions out.  i think these are just as handy to teachers as finger exercises.  not suggesting abusing students or anything - but giving them certain pictures of emotions perhaps (as psychologists do) with more than just color ('i see yellow).'  you have to go farther.  what do you see in the yellow.  what emotion?  what does this passage make you feel.  that question stumped me in a certain area of mozart because i was just focusing on getting it right (the notes, the phrasing, the dynamics).  but, that comes together when you add purpose and emotion.

[zheer]

My teacher told me that his way of playing mozart is quite inadequate, in a sense he doe not respect the classical arpoach to mozart, he doesnīt follow what is considered by most people the right way to aproach mozrtīs music.

  I am madly in love with the way Horowitz plays Mozart, Horowitz plays Mozart the way he did because he could, piano teachers play Mozart the way they do because they cant in any other way.

[westley]

When I finally heard Horowitz's recording of this concerto I was actually shocked at how classical it was - much more so that I expected.

His Haydn recordings surprised me even more for the same reason - they are shockingly "straight-ahead".

One of the greatest things about Horowitz's playing is the extremely sharp stylistic differences between different composers.  For many pianists (Kissin comes to mind right away, although I do not loathe him the way many here seem to) Chopin Schumann and Liszt are all "romantics", and get the same treatment, but for Horowitz these composers are in completely different realms emotionally, as in fact they were.

Continuing in the same vein, his mozart is wonderful partly because he realizes that mozart is no less expressive than the music of the romantics, but that it is expressive of different things, such as order, proportion, and the physical joy of passagework. 

[franz_dwarak]

  I am madly in love with the way Horowitz plays Mozart, Horowitz plays Mozart the way he did because he could, piano teachers play Mozart the way they do because they cant in any other way.

I agree with Zheer, I am yet to see any pianist play better than Horowitz the Andante Cantabile of Mozart Sonata K 330 (Horowitz in MOSCOW!!!), Wow!! Horowitz cast a spell with that piece alone, beautiful interpretation, tonal colors and darkness and great cantabile. Horowitz knows how to make the piano sing when Mozart says "Andante Cantabile". I doubt if Mozart ever envisioned anyone play his piece like that.

Last year I happen to watch Lang Lang interpret the same piece in Kennedy Center and he completely f***** the piece. He played like a ROBOT mainitaining the metronome as written and he wasnt able to make the piano sing like Bel-canto singers!

[piano121]

  I am madly in love with the way Horowitz plays Mozart, Horowitz plays Mozart the way he did because he could, piano teachers play Mozart the way they do because they cant in any other way.

Rest assured that this is not the case here. My teacher is not some teacher next door. He is wonderfull pianist. He Studied with masters In Viena and Hungary for a decade, Was a teacher in Germany, lectures all over the world and is a very respectable pianist. His interpretations are based in deep study of the form, and composers, not in limitations. He plays diferently than Horowitz does, for a single reason, he has his own aproach to it, actualy a more Classical one, but in anyway less colorfull, or less expressive.

I think Horowitz is beautifull, but in any way it diminishes pianists that play it in a classical way such as Brendel, wich by the way is my favorite interpreter for mozart.

[martha argerrrrrich]

I think Horowitz is beautifull, but in any way it diminishes pianists that play it in a classical way such as Brendel, wich by the way is my favorite interpreter for mozart.

Brendel, Uchida is good too...but they both lack colors and sometimes can be boring, but may be mozart being mozart his comp speaks by itself!

[mikey6]

Brendel, Uchida is good too...but they both lack colors and sometimes can be boring

WHAAAAAAAT!!!
I have Uchida's Mozarts sonata's and considering her dynamic range is extraordinarily limited, her range of colour has to more than make up for it and it certainly does.  Brendel on the other hand is known for his wide range and use of colour - one of his trademarks is changing during fast passages.

As for Horowitz, Mozart playing has changed in 50 years (not sure when he played it but he is an old school pianist).  I've heard Lipatti's Concerto 21 and it really is not very good, it doesn't hold together and his tempo's are all over the place.   An ineresting comparison between 'romantic' Mozart and for lack of better word 'correct' Mozart is between Barenboim and Perahia.

[martha argerrrrrich]

WHAAAAAAAT!!!
I have Uchida's Mozarts sonata's and considering her dynamic range is extraordinarily limited, her range of colour has to more than make up for it and it certainly does.  Brendel on the other hand is known for his wide range and use of colour - one of his trademarks is changing during fast passages.

Whaaaaaaaaat?

Lucky U, U have heard them colorful....not me..but anyway  I said with a "Qualified" "Sometimes", sorry I shud have said sometimes they lack color and boring..., ofcourse anybidy can record in a studio wonderfully, given the acct of modern electronic and digital techniques, all audio comes out equally good...I was talking purely in terms of live concert(), I recently watched Brendel live, the first half of the concert was good and the second one was so boring....thank god it was Mozart that kept me alive

[superstition2]

It's the best Mozart piano disc I have. It's wonderful. Horowitz plays Mozart's sonatas extremely well.

[zheer]

Rest assured that this is not the case here. My teacher is not some teacher next door. He is wonderfull pianist. 

I think Horowitz is beautifull, but in any way it diminishes pianists that play it in a classical way such as Brendel, wich by the way is my favorite interpreter for mozart.

    Firstly , i obviously dont know who you piano teacher is, but personally i think very little of piano teacher, infact i think piano teachers are an obstacle which you must overcome inorder to make any progress and to lead a normal and healthy life, i feel that they are the least intresting , the least musical,the least creative,the least talented people you can come-across in any life-time, infact they are almost as bad as school teacher.
   Like i said i dont know you piano teacher, so he/she might be the most wounderfull person in the word. However all progress this includes interpretation of music, such as Mozart, plus progress in repertoir development, can only be done with-out piano teachers.


  Secondly what do you mean diminishes pianist,  do you mean he plays a lot better so the other pianists are blown away back into there tunel vision.

[m]

My teacher told me that his way of playing mozart is quite inadequate, in a sense he doe not respect the classical arpoach to mozart, he doesnīt follow what is considered by most people the right way to aproach mozrtīs music. On the other hand he says Horowitz is a fantastic interpreter of Scriabin, or Scarlati for example

By no means I am questioning your teacher, but I do question such approach.

For some unexplainable reason some modern scholars desided they "know" something about "classical approach",  and for some even more unexplainable reason, those scholars feel they have rights to dictate how classical music should be performed (and BTW, the situation with baroque music is the same).

What do these scholars actually know about "classical approach"? Have they ever heard how it should actually sound and how do they know how it  actually should be?


Let's be logical and think for a second:

As a person Mozart was a wonderful creature--he was talented, he loved life and was incredibly energetic, lively, and harmless person.

He knew how to be funny and  he loved fun, jokes, wine, parties, women, and they loved him.

He could equally be incredibly emotional or careless, moody or completely open, be totally wasted, driniking for days and having fun with questionable girls or like posessed work for 26 hours a day...

He was living life and cared for domestic details--money, shopping for food, clothes, or anything else...

He loved, hated, suffered.....

sometimes he was scared, sometimes he was happy, sometimes he did not want to live, sometimes he...  

I will tell you more... Sometimes he was taking a bath (it is not nice to girls to be stinky), or even more....

"sometimes" he even used a toilet

Yes, he WAS a genious and he was writing MUSIC, but the fact that he was genious does not take anything from the fact that he was a HUMAN BEING... like you, like me or anybody else.

The only two differences that separates him from me or you were:
1) He did not have a TV, computer, electricity, or central heater, or other conviniences of modern life, and
2) In his music he could COMPLETELY and FULLY express all the range of human emotions so naturally and with such an ease, with such a limited vocabulary as "classical music".

In my arguable opinion, only TWO other composers, ever lived, could express their emotions with such an easy language and greatness... but it is already out of topic...


And afer all of these... after a few centuries, because some scholars have an "opinion" (for what it's worth), saying: "Common, this is the classical approach", Mozart is reduced to something like a man in toxido with metronome in front of him...
Common, it just does not make any sense.

Mozart (and BTW, Scarlatti) was much more romantic than some "romantics". It just happened he was born about hundred years earlier.

But for now.... we have to be practical...

When you play Mozart you have four choices:
1) Express Mozart
2) Express yoursef
3) Express Mozart through yoursef
4) Express scholars' opinion on "classical approach" of Mozart

Any of those, if done convincingly would make perfect sense.

As for Horowitz' Mozart...

In my humble opinion, Mr. Horowitz wonderfully expresses this lively, emotional, youthful, half joking, half serious, or for that matter jokingly serious character of Mozart's music, which ultimately expresses Mozart HIMSELF, and to me it makes perfect sense.

Comparing Horowitz' earlier recordings of some Sonatas to the ones he did later, it is actually very interesting to see WHAT kind of artistic transformations Horowitz had thoughout his life, when we can see ALL the ranges from above classification, depending on the year of the performance, or movement of the piece.

One of my favorites is Concerto A major.

I might argue with some Horowitz mannerisms in his late recordings--you can like it or not, but it is impossible not to agree that in every note you can recognize--every note was played by one of the greatest artists and one of the most amazing musical minds ever born.

It is impossible to put such an art into any classifications because unlike some musical scholars (sometimes I am wondering if they ever loved), SUCH artists like Vladimir Horowitz actually CREATE classifications.

Hopefully I was not too boring and my point went through.

[pianowelsh]

There is a big argument here.  the fundamental is that the composer is the composer the artist is the artist.  Once the composer releases the score into the public domain he really ceases to have control outside of what is the printed page. An artists job is to take the printed page and communicate it to an audience in a way which the artist can believe in and hopefully convinve the audience in too. Each artist will bring to that job their own life experience.  We really cant check that at the door even if we try. This is why each individual performance will be different.  Now there are different schools of thought on what is here 'historically informed' or 'authentic' performance. Some artists believe we should study the score holistically and delve into each corner of it and research what was mozart doing? How would this work on a harpischord or early piano? What were the style conventions in mozarts era (from various books and sources), what was the approach to pedalling etc etc etc etc behind every note and every phrase.  On the flip side other artists say. Look at Mozarts operas and how dramatic and colourfull they are He was really romantic at heart! and their interpretations are perhaps less literal and more gestural. They often dont consider the piano of mozarts day except in the regard to extreme pedalling or over-legato (legatissimo) saying the instrument i play it on is Not Mozarts piano but then why should i attempt to make it sound like one.  If mozart had a piano like ours today he would have usedit accordingly - not played the same way.
As you can see there is quite a divide of opinion and Horowitz tended to the latter principally because He grew up in the romantic era of pianism where the interpreter of the music was at least as important as the composer if not more so.  This is why as a generation they had so many interesting and varied pianists and even why there are so many tombes on 'how to play the piano' topics.  Hope that prooves to be a catalyst

[m]

    Firstly , i obviously dont know who you piano teacher is, but personally i think very little of piano teacher, infact i think piano teachers are an obstacle which you must overcome inorder to make any progress and to lead a normal and healthy life, i feel that they are the least intresting , the least musical,the least creative,the least talented people you can come-across in any life-time, infact they are almost as bad as school teacher.
   Like i said i dont know you piano teacher, so he/she might be the most wounderfull person in the word. However all progress this includes interpretation of music, such as Mozart, plus progress in repertoir development, can only be done with-out piano teachers.


  Secondly what do you mean diminishes pianist,  do you mean he plays a lot better so the other pianists are blown away back into there tunel vision.

Dear Zheer,

While I was writing my previous post, which took me more than a couple hours of thinking and putting ideas into right words (as a non native speaking person as I am, it naturally takes much longer time), I noticed your post.

It is quite amazing to see and understand why did you take this position.

Hopefully, this post will take much less time to reply...

The whole humanity history is not about the individual experiences taken out of context, but about PASSING those experiences and adjusting the person into a real life.

It is like a child coming to our world--first, teaching what is good and what is bad, then to walk, to speak (along with how to read, math, literature, and so on...), and then let the child (already adult) go.

A great teacher is not a person who is trying to supress your individuality, telling you what to do and what is the "classical approach" for performing Bach, Mozart, of Prokofiev, but the one who knows how to open your individuality and let it flourish.
The main subject of a GOOD  teacher is not to teach you certain tasks, which would let you play by age of fifteen or sixteen such pieces as La Campanella, Islamey, or Brahms-Paganini, but show you how to approach different styles, different techniques, and ultimately, show you the ways of finding yourself, and giving you tools for EXPRESSING YOURSELF. In this context, these pieces just piece of cake.

Once you have those tools, you are free to go...

Don't dismiss a good teacher so easily.

I strongly believe if there where no great teachers we very well would not have known such names as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Rachmaninov, or... Horowitz.

[m]

  Hope that prooves to be a catalyst

Yeah Pianowelsh,

Once I posted, I found your message.
It seems like a wonderful discussion is going here, but after almost 2 and 1/2 hours of typing I am tired. Since it is almost 3 AM here, and I am still to check a couple other forums to post my stupid "insides" before going to sleep, I am logging off. You guys keep the boat floating...

Best, Mark

[zheer]

Dear Zheer,
I strongly believe if there where no great teachers we very well would not have known such names as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Rachmaninov, or... Horowitz.

   They had a good foundation in music, they then developed music through their God given talent. Had it not been for people like those you mentioned, we would still be living in caves hunting for food with a stone and making fire by rubing to bits of wood together.

   Personally i have decided not see another piano teacher in my life time, its hard to say this with-out sounding that i have a head as big as the moon, but books's, CD's, what composers have composed is all one should need to play the piano, the sky is the limit when you dont need a piano teacher to tell what they think is right and wrong.

  BTW your english is very good.

[m]

   They had a good foundation in music, they then developed music through their God given talent. Had it not been for people like those you mentioned, we would still be living in caves hunting for food with a stone and making fire by rubing to bits of wood together.

   Personally i have decided not see another piano teacher in my life time, its hard to say this with-out sounding that i have a head as big as the moon, but books's, CD's, what composers have composed is all one should need to play the piano, the sky is the limit when you dont need a piano teacher to tell what they think is right and wrong.

  BTW your english is very good.

Since I saw that before signig off I want to say a couple things...

First, thanks for a nice word about my English.

Second, as I stated before, good teacher is not about what is right and what is wrong. A GOOD teacher is about what do YOU think is right and what is wrong. The good teachers just gives you tools to distinguish those two.

Third, (about your decision of not seeing teachers again)--never say never.

And last fourth, I would certainly disagree that without those people we would still live in the caves.  But I would agree that without those people life would certainly look like living in a cave.

OK, it is 3:34 AM. I am off.

You guys keep going...

Best, Mark

[piano121]

Waw, so many interesting opinions here... thank you guys for the insights. I kind of agree with most that was said here. Like most people here I love Horowitz playing mozart, and I also like the Geln Gould handles some things in mozart.

Although booth interpretations might not be suitable for miself, beeing a student, I fell Iīm much more inclined to play " amore safe interpretation" for several years and then see what happens next...

I have this dilema in my mind lately, because when i first studied mozart I played sonata 331, in a reasonably classical way, and some time later on, fantasia in D on a very romantic aproach. On that time I sort of couldnīt tell why I was playing that way. Now I realize that my diferent aproach to these 2 pieces, was because of some recorded reference that I had on that time, the sonata, classic, and the fantasia, much more romantic.

Now Iīm studing some mozart again, and iīm more interestd in understanding better the choises Iīm taking here. Be more concious about where I am going when it comes to interpretation. Hopefully, in some time, Iīll share my atempts in the audition room.


best ,
Carlos

[arensky]

    Firstly , i obviously dont know who you piano teacher is, but personally i think very little of piano teacher, infact i think piano teachers are an obstacle which you must overcome inorder to make any progress and to lead a normal and healthy life, i feel that they are the least intresting , the least musical,the least creative,the least talented people you can come-across in any life-time, infact they are almost as bad as school teacher.
   Like i said i dont know you piano teacher, so he/she might be the most wounderfull person in the word. However all progress this includes interpretation of music, such as Mozart, plus progress in repertoir development, can only be done with-out piano teachers.


  Secondly what do you mean diminishes pianist,  do you mean he plays a lot better so the other pianists are blown away back into there tunel vision.

HAHHAAAHHHH!!!!   BAAAAHHHHHHAAHHH!!!!!     

Arensky teacher! Very imaginitive talented and musical!!! HAH!!!   

Not dried up unemotional ****head of an autodidact! NO!!!! 

The music always fresh new and beautiful because different student play it differently in different lesson, always unique! 

Horowitz MASTER!!! Make evryone look like tunnel vision!!

Perhaps zheer needs to look outside the establishment, and find a teacher who knows MUSIC as well as PIANO!! Piano only TOOL!!! Not and end in itself! HAH!!! The majority of teacher s forget this.

Fools, traitors..... 

[zheer]

HAHHAAAHHHH!!!!   BAAAAHHHHHHAAHHH!!!!!     

Arensky teacher! Very imaginitive talented and musical!!! HAH!!!   

Not dried up unemotional ****head of an autodidact! NO!!!! 

The music always fresh new and beautiful because different student play it differently in different lesson, always unique! 

Horowitz MASTER!!! Make evryone look like tunnel vision!!

Perhaps zheer needs to look outside the establishment, and find a teacher who knows MUSIC as well as PIANO!! Piano only TOOL!!! Not and end in itself! HAH!!! The majority of teacher s forget this.

Fools, traitors..... 

   No arensky, i do actually think highly of you for more reasons than one. ( if what i think means anything)

[arensky]

   They had a good foundation in music, they then developed music through their God given talent. Had it not been for people like those you mentioned, we would still be living in caves hunting for food with a stone and making fire by rubing to bits of wood together.

   Personally i have decided not see another piano teacher in my life time, its hard to say this with-out sounding that i have a head as big as the moon, but books's, CD's, what composers have composed is all one should need to play the piano, the sky is the limit when you dont need a piano teacher to tell what they think is right and wrong.

  BTW your english is very good.

Very few of us can do it alone, self taught without instruction; maybe you are one of those few, but I think you just haven't found the right person to help you. This teacher probably exists, you should just look a little harder. Most of us have had bad experiences with at least one teacher. You are not alone. You have something to offer and shouldn't cut yourself off from anything that could help you share that.

Back on topic Horowitz came to Mozart after his legendary technique was gone, he recorded the F major Sonata K. 332 (?) and the Rondo alla Turca in the 40's, in the 60's the A Major Sonata K.331. These recordings are good but one gets a sense of the music being overpowered. Af ter his disastrous 1983-84 season he retreated to a less technically challenging repertoire, which allowed his musicality to express itelf without technical worries, which had been increasing from the 1970's on. I think in Mozart's music he found in his old age a challenge he could surmount; he could no longer thunder, but he could still sing; His recordings from the 80's of the Sonata in C major K.330, the A Major Concerto K.488 and particularly IMO the Adagio in b minor K.540 are among the most extraordinary Mozart piano interpretations ever. Very unique and individual, and maybe that's why some pianists/listeners/critics don't care for them; some people are afraid of the individual nature and personality, particularly a very strong one like Horowitz' ...I guess we're all supposed to tow the party line; or so the party would have us think. To hell with them!  

[pianistimo]

i don't think it's party line, per se.  no one tells you that you have to play it this way or that.  you can take your teacher's advice, or not.  but, i agree that having a teacher at least exposes you to different ways of interpreting a piece.  also, i think 'taste' is a word that mozart used himself.  he wanted his music played in a 'tasteful' way.  i tend to like the viennese and hungarian way of playing (light and with period instruments) because it gives you a flavor for what mozart was working with in his time.  you don't see pounding fortes.  when you try to put too much into mozart - it's like taking a soufflee and making it a heavy cake or something.

all that said - i've also heard 'boring' mozart.  so i completely understand why people don't like the 'metronomic' artists either.  maybe there's a fine balance.  putting your heart into the music maybe is the important issue.  if it becomes 'background' music too much - it's more 'courtly' - since some of the time mozart was playing for the court and who knows what they were doing when he was putting out his music.  perhaps that is why there is so much humor and puns in mozart - little digs at the aristocracy to see if they are listening or not.  and, sometimes he would compose for a specific person and you can see the intense thought he put into modifying or teaching that person a certain thing about piano/technique and keeping it playable for them.  mozart was a FANTASTIC teacher and pianist and composer.  rare to have all three in one.  plus - an operatic composer (and well aware of the voice ranges and instrument ranges).

what i like about murray perahia's mozart is that you don't get a feeling of being overwhelmed when you come to a cadenza in one of his mozart piano concertos (that needs a cadenza improvised - as with the ones that are missing).  murray has an INNATE sense of what mozart was about.  i think that is what piano121 is saying about his teacher.  that a person takes the time to study mozart, his time period, the form, the instruments, and to learn from scholars (which isn't as bad as people make it out to be).  i learned tremendously from dr. white at wcu and more recently from dr. murray sterling (both scholars of the classical era) and found their classes WAY less 'boring' than i ever imagined.  you have to open yourself up to what someone has to offer before judging them.  they have studied and researched and yet come up with ways that the classical era is relevant to us today and what the word 'classical' means in a deeper way.  i could never have learned what i did (from their years and years and years of research and study) on my own as quickly.  sure, they write books, and you can read books - but they take you into the period as though they were giving a tour of a foreign country.  pretend you don't know the language and are trying to get around.  a teacher helps you find your way quickly and gets you settled and having fun messing around with stuff you didn't even know existed before. 

if you opt for learning alone - journals are extremely helpful (in mixing up your mind).  scholars do disagree.  if you have one teacher - at least for one semester you learn enough to make some kind of thought out judgement of an interpretation with vaid reasons for or against a stylistic change in a composition.  i don't like to change the music or what the composer wrote if i can help it - unless there's a valid reason (original manuscript has better markings, oversight, publishers added or took away something, period tendency -figured bass, whatever).  the modern piano can be an effective instrument without resorting to clavichord or early fortepiano - but if i had a choice - i'd at least try another instrument to see what it sounded like.  many fast passages show that the keyboard was a fairly light one -and that if mozart 'flows like oil' you're not dealing with a stiff keyboard.  also, being knowledgeable about ornamentation is not 'boring' but just informative.  i'd take lessons with piano121's teacher any day - and also, my own.  it's good to learn from a lot of people - because usually all teachers have some strengths and weaknesses. 

[PaulNaud]

Unfortunately, some piano teachers are narrow-minded. My piano teacher said to me last time that no Russian pianist is able to play Mozart. Because in the Russian school they don't count 1-2-3, they don't put an accent on the first beat, they don't follow the Classical period "rules". According to him, we should follow the "Urtext" score and all slurs indicate attack and release. Whenever a slur stops at the bar line it is the prevalence of a nonlegato playing even with a scale or a trill that ends in the next bar. Short articulative groups played an important role in the development of other aspects of interpretation in seventeenth and eighteenth century performance. I am exasperated with this kind of approach................

[pianistimo]

maybe it breaks up the flow of the line with amateur 'readings' of the music.  but, if done within the context of a phrase, isn't terrible and entirely goes along with bowing techniques of the violin.  or, singers taking breathing breaks here and there. 

[PaulNaud]

maybe it breaks up the flow of the line with amateur 'readings' of the music.  but, if done within the context of a phrase, isn't terrible and entirely goes along with bowing techniques of the violin.  or, singers taking breathing breaks here and there. 

Why applying violin technique to piano technique? I still don't agree. By the way, in all "Urtext" editions, I noticed a lot of inconsistencies. E.g., a Mozart slur would embrace let's say a four-note motive within a measure. When the motive crosses the bar line his slur stops at that psychological barrier. In other cases, The same motive has a slur that stops at the bar line, but 8 measures further the slur crosses the bar line for the same motive.
Unfortunately we forgot what Czerny (Beethoven's pupil) said as late as 1839:
 "When, however, slurs are drawn over several notes, although the slurs are not continuous, but are broken into several lines, they are considered as forming but one, and no perceptible separation must take place.
 Here the last note of each bar must not be played short or detached; but it must, on the contrary, be connected with the following one. Should the Composer desire to make it detached, he must place a dot or dash over it."
ALL THIS NONSENSE ABOUT THE SO-CALLED CLASSICAL STYLE MAKES ME ANGRY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[simoncowellforclassical]

Why applying violin technique to piano technique? I still don't agree. By the way, in all "Urtext" editions, I noticed a lot of inconsistencies. E.g., a Mozart slur would embrace let's say a four-note motive within a measure. When the motive crosses the bar line his slur stops at that psychological barrier. In other cases, The same motive has a slur that stops at the bar line, but 8 measures further the slur crosses the bar line for the same motive.
Unfortunately we forgot what Czerny (Beethoven's pupil) said as late as 1839:
 "When, however, slurs are drawn over several notes, although the slurs are not continuous, but are broken into several lines, they are considered as forming but one, and no perceptible separation must take place.
 Here the last note of each bar must not be played short or detached; but it must, on the contrary, be connected with the following one. Should the Composer desire to make it detached, he must place a dot or dash over it."
ALL THIS NONSENSE ABOUT THE SO-CALLED CLASSICAL STYLE MAKES ME ANGRY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am with u on this. I mean, it gets me super angry not that it matters but I think this is one of the reasons for the death of classical musical industry, even pop stars like Lang Lang cant save this music industry. I mean come on, who ever put these rules, CURTIS, JULLIARD, Vienniese idiots, Mosscow Morons.. I get super-super angery when people say Oh Mozart u have to play in a classical style, I mean do these people even know what they are talking.  If Mozart were alive today he will laugh or probably cry at some of the pianist attempting to interpret him, so metronomic, so boring that there is no spontaneity whatsoever.

If I can come back to the topic of this thread, I mean Horowitz is pure Genius, he did what he did best introduce beauty, spontaneity and a natural flow of singing mozart music. Mozart is ever indebted to that. But there are other classical music So called pundits, WHoever gave them these titles, nobody knew, that says " Whow .whow...Mozart , you cant play like that! Its classical, its not romantic " All these distinctions are very meaningless with respect to music, Music is Music... I mean like theyhave some kinda weird telepathic connection with Mozart's grave and they bring in these concepts of classical playing whatever crap that is, Oh dont use pedal, dont do that, dont do this, play whats written, and play to the beats...ofcourse I am not suggesting an extreme use of flexibilty to whats written but as long as its enjoyable and pleasant Which nobody dis-agrees of horowitz's playing it has to be fine.

I think the job for teachers ought to be to teach their student how to play music, how to play the Piano, technique, correct practise etc etc  but never about how to interpret music, thats the JOB OF THE STUDENT. thats very personal, it has to come from deep within. So i would quit teachers that force me to interpret music in certain ways(the way they like it)

[mikey6]

I haven't read all the replies here so I'm not sure if it's been mentioned - but there is such a thing as stylistic playing.  It just would make no sense to play Mozart as one would play, say, Liszt - the writing is totally different, there are 2 different personalities at work, and they wrote for a different instrument.  If one wants to categorize into classical/romantic playing, they're are certain attitudes in the music and playing style that are not in common.
Plus, if everyone played how they felt it should be played without guidlines, there's be no standards or competitions 

[piano121]

Thanks Pianistimo, very nice thoughts here. Thatīs what I was talking about indeed.