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Rating: It is a Mozart balancing between pride and emotion, who in a letter from 1785 entrusts six fundamental string quartets, composed over the previous three years, to the benign reception of his friend Franz Joseph Haydn with the same mindset of "a father who, having resolved to send his children into the great world" chooses to relinquish his rights over these works, "the fruit of long and laborious toil" to this "very famous man at the time, who luckily was also his best friend."
There is the pride of a genius aware of himself and the abyss that separates him from the average tastes of his era, with respect to which he travels a few decades in advance, and there is the almost obligatory choice to dedicate the quartets to the only one who will be able to understand their greatness, that Haydn who can be considered the inventor of the string quartet in the form in which we know it, the architect of its evolution from a frivolous "amusement" for violin with string accompaniment to a calm and balanced conversation between four soloists with equal dignity and importance.
But there is also the emotion linked to the symbolic detachment from these chamber music masterpieces. On one hand, it is implied that they will have no trouble circulating in the "great world": they still do, and will continue to as long as humanity isn't entirely re-barbarized; on the other hand, there is the admission, extremely rare if not unique for Mozart, of the effort made to reach this milestone. We are talking about a perfect music-making machine capable of composing, when required to survive, even mechanically and unwillingly, but never forgetting, not even in such cases, to sprinkle here and there fragments of genius (a classic example being the Flute Concertos). Here, however, we see him forced to turn to his inexhaustible reserves of inspiration, drawing abundantly and straining unusually, almost in a Beethovenian manner, to produce a series of quartets of thematic depth such as to make previous works pale in comparison, including those pleasantly light and gentle ones composed by Mozart himself at age sixteen, when he was in Milan, thus marked with the original label of "Milanese quartets."
True milestones of chamber music, the six "Haydn Quartets" will influence the late masterpieces of the same master who received them in guardianship (the old Haydn will outlive the young Mozart) and, further ahead, the first attempts by Beethoven in a genre that will later become fundamental in his stylistic evolution. Discussing them all in one review is almost impossible, given that each has a very distinct individuality. Let's then take a disc of the series, the one that attracts me the most. I don't know how intentionally, but it pairs the Quartet in B-flat major K 458 and the Quartet in D minor K 421, which is like saying the devil and holy water.
Those familiar with Mozart won't be too surprised: it's typical of this composer to shock us with his almost schizophrenic ability to alternate moods to their exact opposite, and it's more astonishing if achieved through works belonging to the same musical genre, sometimes (why not?) even placed side by side in the Köchel catalog (which is then the gentleman to whom the famous K is owed). There are illustrious examples in the Symphonies (K 550 and K 551) and Piano Concertos (K 466 and K 467); in our case, the two quartets are respectively numbers 4 and 2 of the precious gift package for his friend Haydn.
The "Allegro vivace assai" that opens the Quartet in B-flat major K 458 immediately raises serious doubts about the "long and laborious toil" noted by Mozart in his letter. Nothing seems more spontaneous, pervaded by simple and pure joy, than these festive flares of the strings in which someone has wished to hear echoes of the horn, attaching an entirely inappropriate nickname like "The Hunt" to the whole quartet. The only thing that might match something with a hunt is a serenely bucolic setting, but rather than in frantic chases for game, this placid perpetual motion, which does not stop even in the subsequent intricate developments of the basic idea, immerses us in broad, idyllic countryside scenes. An impression reinforced by the subsequent "Menuetto moderato - trio," placed in the unusual position of the second movement instead of the third as befits a respectable minuet. The vigorous but not disquieting jolts of the opening Allegro settle in an almost stagnant atmosphere, in which it's hard to distinguish the usual pause for reflection within the Trio, which actually encompasses the entire minuet.
It's the ideal step to descend even deeper, into the highly expressive density of the sublime "Adagio," the only movement of the quartet where melancholy doesn't just peek behind the bright evolutions of the strings, but creeps in with a sweet progression into the extended lyrical phrases offered by the two main themes and their combinations. The listener is hypnotized, participates in the refined dialogues between the violins and the cello until a decisive snap of fingers brings them to Earth: it's the "Molto allegro" finale that, as those who know languages say, serves as an ideal "pendant" to the first movement, but with a greater dose of quicksilver. Here, the violins are like playful dolphins leaping over the waves, high but not stormy, stirred by the viola and cello.
Turning the page is indeed the right expression with the Quartet in D minor K 421. The key itself is already particular: it's the one used for "great occasions" (Concerto K 466, the finale of Don Giovanni, and especially the Requiem), used by Mozart sparingly. Now, the sunny Mozart of the previous quartet no longer exists: in his place is a changing Mozart, agitated by an inhuman tension, shaken by a despair without escape. Beethoven is really just around the corner, and not the youthful one of the early quartets or the "Septet," but precisely that of the sad, disconsolate adagios of the "Razumovsky" quartets, just to stay within the genre. The violins that we left in jubilation now seem pulled by the hair, hysterically screaming the tragic theme of the initial "Allegro" ("Allegro with a couple of zeros," they might say in Empoli, but we classic music lovers use "Allegro" for "lively": I can assure you there are "Allegros" by Brahms that make you cry like masks). The furious rises of the violins are almost passively supported by the viola and cello, and when the movement ends, the accumulated tension is such that one can easily empathize with the strings of the instruments. The wise Mozart at this point provides, this time in the canonical position, an "Andante" which, while tenderly melancholic, compared to what we've just heard, reveals itself as a sort of soothing herbal tea.
And in its natural place would also be the minuet, ("Menuetto. Allegretto - Trio"), but who could find any residue of the worldly joy usually associated with the dance that originally bore this name? Tense and rigid, perhaps a bit less solemn than the much-known one in Symphony No. 40, but equally moving, if not more. To find a final resolution to the unrest of this work extraordinarily ahead of its time, Mozart turns to an "Allegretto ma non troppo" in the form of a theme with variations, a theme, by the way, "recycled" from his Violin and Piano Sonata (K 374). Although both the theme and the variations have a rather mournful tone, the repeated exposure of extended musical phrases and the further idea of an unburdening final surge make this finale quite suitable for the above purpose, even if it can't completely "detox" the listener from what they've absorbed.
The Alban Berg Quartet, whose Beethoven interpretations are rightly renowned, contains within its very name the idea of "modernity," which would suggest a preferred approach towards the turbulent K 421. As far as my ear can catch, I haven't noticed this hypothetical difference between the performances: both are impeccable, as are the works in question.
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