Klarinet Archive - Posting 000568.txt from 1996/01

From: DR VINCENT P DELUISE <VdeLuise@-----.COM>
Subj: WAM appreciation
Date: Fri, 26 Jan 1996 22:50:46 -0500

Hi all!
With all the technical discussion we have had on 297b, cork grease
etc, we must come back to basics.
Tomorrow, January 27th, 1996 is Mozart's 240th birthday. Of all the
composers, Weber,
Mendelssohn,Copeland, Nielsen, Reicha, Reger, Brahms, Corigliano,
Bernstein, Schumann, Schubert,
etc. none was more the apotheosis for the instrument as a composer
than Mozart.
The K498 trio, the K581 quintet, the K622 concerto the K580
attributed quintet torsos (torsi), the
masonic music, the basset clarinet and voices duets, the obbligato
clarinet part in Clemenza di Tito
(Sextus' and Vitellia's arias), the Harmoniemusik, the great Wind-
piano Quintet in Eb K 452,underscore
the importance the clarinet had to Mozart. From his friendship with
Anton and Johann Stadler inVienna,
Mozart understood intimately, through their playing and his own
genius, the clarinet's nuances and
possibilities.

The poignancy of Mozart's music for clarine has oft been discussed,
but it is as real as Brahms'. Both
met the instrument late in life. For both, the clarinet was the
instrument of the valedictory, their
penultimate expressions of love of life and music. As Alec Hyatt King
said "The adagio in the clarinet
concerto, (in D), is music of utter simplicity, which sems to reflect
the timeless and beatific visison of a
mind at peace with itself." Robbins Landon spoke of the paradoxical
nature of theallegro movements
flanking the great adagio of the clarinet concerto with the apt "The
heart dances, but not for joy."
Thank you and Happy Birthday Johannes Wolfgangus Crisostomus
Theophilus Gottlieb Mozart (Amadeus
was a late in life, ephemeral sobriquet, actually Aamade). We
clarinetists love you. Bravo!

All the best

Vincent deLuise, MD