Anton Eberl / Saonatas & Variations
New recordings of keyboard music by a now-unfamiliar Viennese friend of Mozart, once admired by the likes of Haydn and Gluck, and whose pieces were previously attributed to Mozart himself.
This recording presents early and later works by Eberl :
The piano sonata Op.1, the two Grand Sonatas Op.27 and 43, the sonatina Op. 5 and a set of Variations on Mozart’s Zauberflöte.
About the CD
By then Eberl had also become well acquainted (perhaps not so friendly) with Beethoven.
Sayuri Nagoya’s personal selection from Eberl’s keyboard output encompasses the earlier and later stages of his career, beginning with a set of variations on ‘Bei Männern’ from Die Zauberflöte which was composed within months of the Singspiel’s premiere at the Theater an der Wien. Dating from a year or two after Mozart’s death, the Sonata Op.1 was originally published under his name, and Eberl’s Sonatina Op.5 (1796) likewise inhabits a Mozartian grammar.
By the time of the G minor Sonata Op.27, however, Eberl had developed a bolder and more dramatic idiom of keyboard writing, doubtless also under the influence of the intervening decade of technological innovation which brought about instruments with a wider compass and broader dynamic range. The C major Sonata Op.43 opens with a grand introduction before launching into an Allegro of high contrasts. The album leaves the listener with a full appreciation of Eberl’s gifts as well as a tantalising sense of where his talents might have taken him next.
(From the official Brilliant Classics page.)
