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| View of Graben Street, in Vienna, in the time of Mozart |
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lived only 35 years, but in his short life he managed to compose 27 concertos for piano and orchestra. The early ones, created from age 11 onwards, were not written for the keyboard virtuoso but for the dilettante, the music lover who could afford buying the sheet music and then invite his friends, also amateur musicians, to play together and enjoy a pleasant evening.
A good example of this is the concerto No. 7 for three pianos, composed in 1776 for the two daughters of a certain countess Logron. In this composition, Mozart wrote an extremely simple part for one of the girls who was still an inexperienced beginner.
Years later, already established in Vienna, he produced concertos that were far more demanding for the interpreter. Mozart was a hard worker --between 1784 and 1786 he composed twelve concertos for piano and orchestra.
In 1783 he married Constanza Weber --Amadeus' father Leopold was not amused-- following the failure of a naive courtship with Constanza's elder sister Aloysia. Apparently, this was a good choice because after two years of, if his biographers are to be believed, intense marital life, the world saw in 1785 the arrival of three concertos, two of which ended up as probably the most famous to this day: the Concertos No. 20 and 21. Of these, the latter, also known as "Elvira Madigan", is the most popular and also, the more accessible of the two.
Since time immemorial, the Chilean National TV channel had made their inhabitants listen to the central movement --andante-- for the duration of the weather report, which proceeds from north to south. But, despite the inordinate length of the country, the weather report ends up well before the andante does.
As we all know, the piece begins with a very calm and relaxed introduction by the orchestra on its own.
Roughly by the region of Copiapó, where, if you remember, the 33 miners were trapped, the piano would key in with the main theme in F major (1:27).
The weather report closes with the forecast for the next three days just when viewers are about to hear the wistful tone modulation of the andante from C minor to A flat. At this moment, the melody slows down and the orchestra becomes silent for an instant, then the original theme is restarted in the new key (4:28). The viewers always miss this magic moment, but here you can enjoy it.
After all these years in which poor Chileans have had to endure the truncated piece, now we are releasing, for their sake, the entire andante, or 2nd movement of the Piano Concerto No 21 by WA Mozart, with the venezuelan pianist Pablo Arencibia.
