Sviatoslav Richter & Elisabeth Leonskaja plays Mozart K.533 / K.494 with freely added accompaniment for a second piano by Edvard Grieg.
I. Allegro
Part 1.
Part 2. • Mozart - Grieg Sonata ...
II. Andante
Part 1. • Mozart - Grieg Sonata ...
Part 2. • Mozart - Grieg Sonata ...
III. Rondo, Allegretto - • Mozart - Grieg Sonata ...
On 27 May 1877 Edvard Grieg wrote to his publisher: "During the winter I have been engaged on a task that I found particulary interesting - adding a free, second piano to several of Mozart's sonatas. The work was intended in the first insatnce for teaching purposes but by chance found its way into the concert hall, where the whole thing sounded surprisingly good."
Grieg himself went some way towards preempting potential protests by insisting that his arrangements were intended for teaching. Such a line of argument obliges to examine the customs of the time - an age in which the gramaphone was barely a glint in its investor's eye and there was no opportunity to hear and follow interpretations at second hand. As a result, it was common practice around 1880 for piano teachers to accompany their pupils on a second piano, either to ensure the correct tempo or, perhaps, to make the soloist's solitary existance somewhat less intolerable...
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