Robert Levin: ‘Mozart recordings will complete our legacy’

It has taken more than 20 years, but a landmark recording project started by Christopher Hogwood - founder of the Academy of Ancient Music - and American classical pianist Robert Levin has finally been completed against all odds.

In 1993, Robert and Christopher set out to record Mozart’s complete works for keyboard and orchestra, but the series was discontinued and Christopher sadly passed away.

It looked as though the project would never be finished, but finally new funding has been found and the last recordings are about to be released. It has been a labour of love for Robert, who told the Cambridge Independent about his part in the project.

“It’s a true legacy project and the advent of it back in 1993 was something of a dream for me,” says Robert.

“I couldn’t quite believe that this was happening. So when the project was suspended in 2000, that was, of course, a heartbreaking moment and the years went by and the likelihood of our ever achieving the end of it seemed to fade with time. But as a consequence of Covid, public concerts were reduced by a large amount. The idea arose of taking advantage of this time and actually bringing the project to completion.

“So we got under way with the first session in August of 2021. We were scheduled to start earlier than that, but Covid interfered and we had to respond. But between August 2021 and August 2022, we recorded the contents of five CDs, thus bringing them to fulfilment.”

Five albums remain, featuring some of the most famous Mozart concertos, lesser-known works and the world premiere of Mozart’s recently identified first concerto movement, written when he was eight.

The recordings will be released to celebrate AAM’s 50th anniversary season in 2023-24. The first release became available on AAM Records on March 3.

Robert, who is an authority on the works of Mozart, explains that he has loved the composer since childhood.

He says: “I have a connection with Mozart which I inherited from my father, who was a real fanatic of Mozart. He owned 150 Mozart albums before I knew anything about music. In those days if you wanted to own The Marriage of Figaro on 78rpm shellac you would need many, many records. If one of them broke you were just out of luck. You'd have to buy them all over again. It was a different age. I grew up listening to them all and it definitely became a central part of my love of music.”

So when he was asked by Channel 4 to take part in a series on improvisation in music from different cultures around the world, he jumped at the chance. Mozart famously included improvisation in his works and Robert had become an expert at this. It led directly to Robert Christopher working together after being introduced by Channel 4.

Robert says: “During Mozart’s lifetime, he did a lot of improvisation and was famous for it. Yes, he was respected as a composer, although some people complained that his music was too complicated. He was revered for his dazzling, pianistic abilities, but it was truly his faculties as an improviser that astonished people and brought him Europe-wide appreciation.”

Robert had spent years honing his abilities at improvising in Mozart’s style, and became one of the only people in the world capable of doing so, and so was well placed to take part in the series.

He explained: “We would play through the movement of the Mozart concerto. And at the end of the movement, there’s a moment when the soloist is expected to play what we call a cadenza, which literally means a phrase ending the cadence. And what I would do is I would make one up, just like that.”

Robin adds: “For a long time, I was pretty much the only person in the modern era who was improvising these cadenzas. And when we went into the concert hall, every time we did a performance of a particular piece, I would make up a cadenza and make up decorations. And when we went into the recording studio to record these concertos, we got to the point that it should have been I would make something up and we had several takes, of course, and so in each take I improvised the different cadenza. And the recording engineer would choose which one to use for the recording….

“Nowadays, younger musicians are beginning to enjoy the challenge of improvising. But it’s still something which happens relatively infrequently. Most of the time, people will play the Mozart cadenzas which survive. All but six of the the Mozart concertos have written down cadenzas that Mozart wrote for others - his pupils and his sister - but where there isn’t one, they will either play a cadenza composed by somebody else or they will invent their own.”

So, when Channel 4 asked Robert to demonstrate the art of improvising cadenzas, he told them: “We need to get a band together” to play the concerto. And he suggested the Academy.

Robert says: “I’m very proud of the fact that the first time I worked with the AAM and Chris Hogwood was not because he engaged me but because I led to them being engaged.”

The partnership between Robert and the AAM continued afterwards and the idea of recording all of Mozart’s works was struck.

“Chris Hogwood was at the apex of his fame at that point,” says Robert. “This was literally a dream come true. And so in 1993, we started working and we did approximately three disks every two years. We managed to get eight of them done before 2000 when regrettably, the project was cancelled. We received wonderful reviews and the discs were very popular but it was down to the economics of these things.”

He says: “Chris was a wonderful musician with a wicked sense of humour and wit. I miss him dearly.”

Upon completion, the cycle will become the first-ever recording of Mozart’s complete works for keyboard and orchestra on either modern or historical instruments.

Speaking about the importance of the project, Robert says: “This cycle is a central element both in Christopher Hogwood’s legacy as founder and leader of AAM and within my own career, and completing it represents the successful realisation of a project of outstanding significance.”

The full release schedule for the new recordings is:

• March 2023 | Volume 9 | Piano Concertos Nos. 21 & 24
• June 2023 | Volume 10 | Piano Concerto No. 5, Church Sonata No. 17, Concerto movement in G major from Nannerl’s Music Book (reconstr. R. Levin), and Piano Concertos K107
• October 2023 | Volume 11 | Piano Concerto No. 7 (for 2 pianos), Piano Concerto No. 10, and Concerto for Violin, Piano, and Orchestra K315f
• February 2024 | Volume 12 | Piano Concertos No. 6, Piano Concerto No. 7 (for 3 pianos), and Piano Concerto No. 8
• June 2024 | Volume 13 | Piano Concertos Nos. 25 & 27, and ‘Ch’io mi scordi di te?’ K505