Two Releases from The Cleveland Orchestra – Garrick Ohlsson, piano; Franz Welser-Möst, The Cleveland Orchestra (TCO 0015 & 0016)
The first featured disc is all Mozart. Franz Welser-Möst leads The Cleveland Orchestra in Mozart’s Symphony No. 29. Recorded in October 2023, the symphony is youthful and spare, allowing The Cleveland Orchestra’s transparency to shine. And Garrick Ohlsson opens the disc with a performance of Mozart’s final piano concerto, No. 27. Recorded in March of 2024, the concerto is strikingly serene, with signs of a new level of maturity in Mozart’s style.
The second release is a brand-new disc from the Orchestra, to be released on November 14. Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 4 is the only work on the disc and the performance was recorded live in Mandel Concert Hall in May of this year. Prokofiev first based this symphony on his 1928 ballet The Prodigal Son, then revisited it nearly two decades later to create a work of greater scope and vitality. The 1947 revision expands the symphony’s scale, moving from calm, reflective passages to bursts of energy, tender lyricism, and a finale charged with rhythmic drive.