Joseph WOELFL (1773-1812)
Piano Music - Volume 1
Sonate, précédée d’une Introduction et Fugue, in C minor, WoO 113 (c.1804) [30:36]
Piano Sonata in B minor, Op.38 (1808) [17:40]
Piano Sonata in F major, Op.27 No.2 (1803) [24:46]
Adalberto Maria Riva (piano)
rec. July 2016, Griffa & Figli, Milan
TOCCATA CLASSICS TOCC0383 [73:05]
Joseph Woelfl was born in Salzburg, taking lessons from Leopold
Mozart there, and after his mother’s early death was even taken into
the Mozart household. There he was given piano lessons by Nannerl, Wolfgang’s
older sister, so intertwined were the Woelfl-Mozart relations. A sojourn in
Poland, on Wolfgang’s recommendation, led to tours and to a celebrated
gun-slinging piano duel with Beethoven about which much has been written.
In 1805 he moved to London where he was to write by far the majority of his
extensive compositions before dying, aged only 39 but wealthy, in 1812.
The three works in the first volume of this edition from Toccata presents
music composed between 1803 and 1808. Only the Sonate précédée d’une
Introduction et Fugue, in C minor, WoO 113 has been recorded before.
It’s a large-scale half-an-hour piece that shows only the vaguest Beethovenian
lineage. Rather more to be encountered are elements that may remind the listener
of Clementi, but there are also personal qualities that will intrigue, such
as the quasi-improvisational opening section that seems to be striving for
proper direction. The Fugue that follows, arguably influenced again by Clementi,
ends in dramatic arpeggios and the play of stormy and more limpid writing
in the fast central section of the Sonata is well calibrated. Lyricism and
terpsichorean elements ensure that the work has plenty of contrast and is
full of Viennese spirit.
The B minor Sonata is the most compact of the three works in this disc, its
singing lyricism, said in the notes to anticipate Schubert – one can
take that with a pinch of salt – having nevertheless sufficiently complex
harmonies to intrigue the ear as well as delight the senses. There is some
dissonance here, too, that provides grit enough to dispel easy simplicity.
The opening of the F major Sonata marries lyricism and structural probity,
added to which the melodies have a delicious quality that tends to stop one
in one’s tracks. Woelfl has a pronounced habit of ending works with
extensive Allegretto finales and does so here in two of the works, the exception
being the B minor.
Adalbarto Maria Riva plays with real tonal richness, finding plenty of colour
in his well recorded Bosendörfer Imperial. This is a fine inaugural volume
to what looks like being an intriguing series.
Jonathan Woolf
Previous review:
Philip Buttall
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