Denis Matthews (piano)
The London Mozart Players
(Leader, Max Salpeter )
Conductor, Harry Blech
Haydn's Military' Symphony is so called because of the use (in the slow movement and the finale) of Turkish military instruments: triangles, cymbals, and bass drum. The Symphony was first performed at Haydn's benefit concert on May 2, 1794, during his second visit to London. Points of special interest are the unusual scoring-for flute and two oboes — of the principal theme of the first movement (after the slow introduction); and the fact that the second movement, the Allegretto, is a re-orchestrated version, with an altered ending, of a slow movement from a Divertimento in G written for rhe King of Naples in 1790. A dark splendour characterises the opening movement of Mozart's Piano Concerto in C minor; a tender simplicity the Larghetto. The finale, a series of variations on a rather demure march-like theme, ends in a mood in which defiant energy and pathos are curiously mingled.
Harold Rutland