convince everybody, and I dare say that my approach to the music will evolve over the next two years.

To begin with, though, I want to listen to a Mozart performer who I love. Walter Klein was not someone I knew, actually. As I started to collect lists of pianists who had recorded complete Mozart Piano Sonatas, his name came up and I started listening, and was hooked. There is so much in his approach to Mozart that I admire and want to recreate in my own way. His Mozart is full of extroverted characters, obvious phrasing, and colorful textures. To get a sense of this, I thought I would focus on the Sonata which I'm learning this month: #1, K 279 in C Major. 

You can hear nearly everything that I love in Klein's playing in the first few lines:

• M. 1: a strong forte to start
• M. 2: the eighth notes in the left hand are prominent, they're given an important role leading us forward. If this was a string quartet, and these notes the violist: our violist is allowed to be musical and expressive, whereas so often these notes are relegated to un-phrased background 
• M. 2 & 4: there's articulation in the right hand's 16th notes, you can especially hear the two-note slurs, especially in M. 2. We love to talk about singing at the piano, and of course Mozart should be vocal. But we have to remember that singers use vowels and consonants. Words can only be clearly communicated by annunciating consonants. These two-note slurs are the consonants, when so many other pianists play long uninterrupted vowels, which is meaningless. 
• M. 4-8: more articulation in the right hand. It's not soft-edged articulation, either. He lands on the appoggiatura in beat 3, and yet each of the appoggiaturas do not get the same emphasis. So not only is he articulating clear words, but not all the words are of equal importance.
• M. 4-8: left hand is not hidden. It doesn't overshadow the right hand melody, but it is no mere accompaniment. It has vibrant rhythmic energy, and it has shape in the harmonic line. Each harmonic chord is not equal. As my coach Louis Nagel says: your viola and cello went to conservatory too!
• M. 9 vs.M. 11: Consider these two measures. Exact same notes, vastly different atmospheres. Not only does he play the different articulations written, he exaggerates them, helping himself to some unwritten dynamic contrasts while using the damper pedal to reinforce the legato. 
• M. 12-16: I just need to draw attention to his left hand one last time. It does so many different things, and so he makes that apparent. The left hand plays such an important role in the musical drama. 

Overall, the thing I like about Walter Klein's Mozart playing is that he doesn't aim for delicate consistency. Many pianists underplay the variety that is in Mozart's scores, like they're apologizing. Klein does not. The first measure of the last system on the second page is quirky, the grace notes snappy and tempo rushing, before he returns to a melodic texture. Everything has shape and articulation, and those shapes are not even, smooth and rounded. 

The Development of the first movement does not have quite the variety I'd have expected. The sequential elements are often played with the same momentum, rather than each measure phrased internally, as well as having a specific role in the entire sequential shape. But perhaps this is intentional; he's letting the harmonies speak for themselves. It's like this Development section is no-man's-land, harmonic anarchy, and such phrasing would be out of place without a tonal hierarchy. After all, he makes much of the harmonic differences in the recapitulation, where even in the first theme (bottom of the 3rd page), Mozart is making creative changes. 

I've always found the second movement of this Sonata to be very awkward. The fortes and pianos seem rather arbitrarily placed (i.e. 3rd system, page 9), and many sections seem to disregard the time signature entirely (i.e. last two systems of page 9). But the phrasing taken by Klein makes the movement make sense. Nothing is very extreme here, the dynamics, nor the rubato. But he uses enough create phrases that have internal logic, and thus, the whole movement seems to make sense.

​The finale begins with a typical 4-measure phrase. The second phrase begins with the same thematic material, but ends up as a 6-measure phrase. Klein makes this phrase sound normal by playing M. 7-8 exactly the same, rather than cheapening the repeated measure with hackneyed trick like the echo effect.  M. 11-18, to contrast, is a typical 8 measure phrase, except it sounds uneven: Mozart fills these measures with nearly sequential material, except he always changes something: compare M. 13 and M. 15. Or take M. 12 and M. 14, which are sequential, vs. M. 16 which begins the same, but takes a new turn. In these instances, Klein plays up the subtle melodic shifts so that this typical phrase seems asymmetrical. Because his left hand is prominent, the extra quarter note on beat 2 of M. 16 makes the shifty composing unmistakable. Ignore left hands at your own peril!

Consider Klein's treatment of the repeated note motive in the second theme: measures 23, 25 and 27 each have repeated notes but each instance is treated differently in terms of dynamic and rhythmic drive. Nothing is monotonous, even though it looks monotonous on the page.  This, in short, is what I love about Walter Klein's Mozart playing. It's full of vitality and variety, and perfectly encapsulates the operatic elements that I wrote about on August 6th. 

​

Mozart wrote four of these works, and I’m listening to an iconic quartet-the Emerson-playing with Carol Wincenc, a flautist I’ve known of but never listened to before. 
 
On first glance at the track listing, these do seem to be mini-quartets. Either two or three movements long, and glancing at the score, I don’t even see an obvious Sonata form movement, but several that are marked minuets, themes and variations, or rondos. Glancing through the score, these seem a little like mini-concertos, in that the flute has the primary melody most of the time, often with the violin doubling a third below, and the viola and cello providing chordal and rhythmic accompaniment. Not that this will be mundane: I’m anticipating Mozart’s great melodic abilities on full display here.
 
I’m digging in to the last of the 4 quartets, in A major, K 298 by following along with the score as I listen. I was surprised that I found the instrumental mix not very pleasing at first. Somehow the flute didn’t seem to sing out. But as I listened through the first movement, I grew more accustomed to it. This movement is a set of variations: the flute has the melody in the theme and first variation, then the melodic variation role works its way down the string instruments. I really liked the instrumental mix during the viola and cello variations. I actually liked the flute better in an accompanying role, where neither high treble instrument had a primary melodic role!
 
In the minuet movement, it’s such a joy to listen to the accompanying instruments, especially when all three strings take this role in the trio. Pulsating repeated chords can be so musical! And they play such a crucial role, not just as background sound but as integral shape and body to the sound world in which the melody can truly shine. This is akin to the left hand for the Mozart pianist!
 
The finale, a rondo, is true Mozart. The first two movements are very simple, straightforward, perhaps stereotypical classical era music. But the finale is chamber music. The texture varies, the instruments interact with each other. It’s a typical rondo form but Mozart is a little more inventive harmonically than he’s been in previous movements. When each instrument was truly an independent part of the whole ensemble, I really bought into the genre. 
 
Upon reading up about these works a little more, I see that Mozart was quite a young man when he wrote these works-21, though of course he had written significant works at the time-and likely that he had written these for an amateur flautist, and in fact it seems these works were written mostly as busy work. Of course chamber music during his lifetime was never meant to be a grand concert work that a famous composer put his best work into. Perhaps it’s best to consider these flute quartets testing grounds for the great works he would produce throughout his lifetime. Still, the great performances I’ve listened to show that they are well worth their while, enjoyable to listen to once in a while, and surely very rewarding to play with dedicated chamber partners. 
 
As I understand, the Flute Quartet in D, K 285, is the most famous of the set, and listening casually to it, you can tell why. The adagio movement is exquisite. Such a long, beautiful flute melody accompanied by pizzicato. This movement is a must-listen. ​​

The funny thing about me dedicating 2 years to learn and perform all of Mozart's Piano Sonatas is that I used to HATE Mozart. 

I had avoided playing him until my final year of High School. That year, my teacher had me work on several things to fill in some gaps: J.S. Bach (shamefully, I avoided him till that year too), Haydn and yes, Mozart. She had me work on two Sonatas, F major K 280 and G major K 283. I hated them, especially G major. 

I was all about Beethoven and Brahms at that point in time. I liked bigger, meatier sounds. I liked the passion. Mozart was lean and gangly, light and frothy. 

I remember working on that G major Sonata and declaring to my parents that he was the worst composer ever. It didn't hold together, there was no continuity. Thinking about the finale of that Sonata, I can understand why. Thinking back to what I wrote about Mozart and opera just a few days ago: Mozart writes differently for different characters. And, Mozart Sonatas are mini-operas. If those two things are true, then Mozart's piano Sonatas will feature many shifts of idea, texture and technique. It will seem discontinuous, but that's because the focus is shifting from one character to the next. I was expecting one continuous character, but what Mozart was giving me was a scene full of interactivity. 

As for the passion...I just wasn't a mature enough listener, analyst or technician at the piano to hear, see, or perform the passion that was there. Mozart's music is passionate, but it's passion that requires nuance of dynamics, and shadings of rubato. With Beethoven, his approach to piano technique and texture practically writes the passion onto the page. In Mozart you have to search for it. That doesn't mean that Mozart should be subtle in sound, but that little of his passion is obvious just reading the notes. 

Overtime, I came to appreciate Mozart one way or another. I worked on K 331, 332 and 333 at one time or another, as well as the Concerto K 467.  As I became more aware of classical performance practice, the possibilities of Mozart's music became more and more real. As I studied opera, I understood how to connect that dramatic music to the piano. Eventually I developed a certain sound and approach to Mozart's piano music that I could get very excited about.

Thus, sometime in the spring of 2018, the idea of diving deep into a composer came to me. My first thought was actually Bach, but then the alliterative "Mozart in a Month" came to mind and I never looked back. I'm so excited to discover all of this music bit by bit, and to develop my sound, and revisit this composer again and again, always coming back to him with new ideas, better ears and more refined technique. I'm excited to listen to other works, watch operas, and read books that will illuminate style. I also want to explore the idea that Mozart is an essential element of human love and flourishing. I'll visit the 'idea of Mozart' every month, talking about what I've learned from him and hope to get from him as this project moves on.