Oh, to have been in Vienna on today’s date in 1785! Wolfgang Mozart had just finished a new piano concerto a week earlier and quite likely performed it himself for the first time as an intermission feature at a performance of the oratorio Ester, by Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf, conducted by Antonio Salieri.
Now wouldn’t that have made for a good scene in the movie Amadeus?
Fast forward 11 years for another memorable concert at the Theater an der Wien, when on today’s date in 1806, it was Beethoven’s turn to premiere one of his new concertos in Emanuel Schikaneder’s Viennese theater. Alongside works of Mozart, Méhul, Cherubini and Handel, Beethoven’s Violin Concerto was introduced to the world, with Franz Clement as the soloist.
Beethoven’s friend Czerny recalled that Clement’s performance was greeted with “noisy bravos.”
But a contemporary Viennese music critic wrote: “While there are beautiful things in the concerto … the endless repetition of some commonplace passages could prove fatiguing.” The reviewer’s final assessment? “If Beethoven pursues his present path, it will go ill with him and the public alike.”
Wolfgang Mozart (1756-1791) Piano Concerto No. 22; Mitsuko Uchida, piano; English Chamber Orchestra; Jeffrey Tate, cond. Philips 420 187
Wolfgang Mozart (1756-1791) Magic Flute Overture; Zurich Opera House Orchestra; Nikolaus Harnoncourt, cond. Teldec 95523
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Violin Concerto; Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin; New York Philharmonic; Kurt Masur, cond. DG 471 349