It is sad that a figure so interesting, so important and so justly respected in his day as Antonio Salieri should have been the victim of a myopic view in the public eye because of the fictions of Peter Shaffer's Amadeus. Salieri was a protege and successor of Gluck, court Kapellmeister at Vienna for 36 years, highly influential in Parisian opera, and a greatly esteemed teacher (his pupils included Beethoven, Schubert, Liszt and one of Mozart's sons). He was a talented composer, too.
The three works of his included on these records show a polished and lively invention, a pleasant Italian lyricism, and a good deal of wit. They are all early works, dating from 1773-4 (he lived 1750-1825), and are typical of their date in style—they are contemporary with Mozart's first original piano concerto, K175, and of course the first movements are much less highly developed than those of Mozart's mature examples. Both the piano concerto slow movements are attractive, that of the C major work a charming siciliano in A minor with pizzicato accompaniments, that of the B flat an Adagio with muted strings and a richly ornamental piano line, using suspensions and chromaticisms to touching effect; both finales are minuets, the B flat with seven variations (some of them agreeably playful) and the C major a rondo including a stormy, virtuoso episode. Listening to this music gives one a little more perspective on Mozart's later, greater achievements in the form. The double concerto for flute and oboe is again an ingenious piece, written with grace and humour; it has of course been recorded before, more than once.
It seems a shade curious to me that the same orchestra should have recorded the B flat Concerto twice over with different soloists, the more so in that one soloist uses a period instrument and the other doesn't. That Aldo Ciccolini gives a technically better finished performance is clear; but I feel that he is seduced by his modern piano into giving a reading that is often markedly out of style. In fact, an 'A/B' test with these two discs—made the easier in that one is LP and the other CD, so that I could readily switch between them—illustrates forcefully the merits of using period instruments. The quickish tempos favoured by Badura-Skoda (though they cause a little uneven playing in the first movement and some awkward moments, with clumsy emphases, in the finale) make excellent sense for the music, but they would work indifferently on the modern instrument, and Ciccolini goes a good deal slower (his timing overall is nearly 27 minutes, not the 23'15'' alleged on the disc, against Badura-Skoda's 24 minutes). Ciccolini is inclined to overload the music, to make the accents too heavy and the expression too intense—more intense than the music can stand, in fact, which in the end makes it seem ambitious beyond its pretensions. Turn to Badura-Skoda, and the true scale of the music and its limited objectives and accomplishment are clear. In the C major Concerto too Ciccolini tends to overdramatize, notably in the first-movement cadenza, and to make the Largo seem more deeply pensive than it really is. Great music, like Mozart, can stand such inflationary treatment; lesser cannot without damage.
The Badura-Skoda performance, however, is marred by the uncertain match between soloist and orchestra. The tone of his piano demands a lighter, more sharply articulated string sound than I Solisti Veneti, playing modern instruments, can supply. Period and modern instruments, can supply. Period and modern instruments are mixed only at peril. Still, compelled to choose between these two, I would not doubt that Badura-Skoda's version represents the music altogether more sensitively and more truthfully; his handling of the slow movement's elaborate lines and his shading of the instrument's tone (it can speak crisply or in a more veiled way) give much pleasure.
The wind concerto on the Erato LP is neatly and musically done, and as bonus there is a little symphony by Salieri's elder brother, Francesco, a Tartini pupil from whom Antonio had his first instruction: it is a neatly written piece, not at all tempestuous (as its title might be thought to promise), a conventional, light-weight Italian sinfonia from (I imagine) the 1770s, entertaining and unassuming. Both recordings tend to give the piano a little more prominence than would seem natural in the concert hall; the sound of the CD is the most vivid but the tone of the period piano is well caught on the Erato LP.'