Cantability as the overriding principle
The pianist Patrizio Mazzola plays and characterizes Domenico Scarlatti.
It is rather rare that an interpreter has as much to say in his own introductory text, if such a comparison can be made at all, as he does in his presentation of the work. The Swiss pianist Patrizio Mazzola, who teaches in Bern and Lucerne, has succeeded in creating a verbal presentation of 35 sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti that deserves special attention for two reasons. While the first CD, released several years ago, was accompanied by a general text with a portrait character, the introduction to the second presents the Italian contemporaries of Bach and Handel not only as "piano prophets". With short, excellent characterizations, Mazzola prepares the listener for the pieces and their emphatically cantabile design. The Sonata in F major L 474 / K 107 may sound different after reading the work commentary than without it: "The cheerful mood in the major changes in both parts to dramatic doggedness, which no longer brightens up. An example where a major sonata ends in a minor key - a natural logic with Scarlatti, a very rare exception with other composers."
The variety of Scarlatti's melodic, harmonic and technical ideas is ideally reflected in the selection. A sensitive, rhythmically profiled sonata such as the one in G minor L 488 / K 8 is followed by L 388 / K 2 in G major, a playful, almost toccata-like work. With subtle use of the pedal, artfully savored cantabile and attacking motoric alternate fluently, the differences could not be greater, the radius of the many tonal shadings and dynamic subtleties could not be wider. The extent to which Mazzola, as a native southerner, is able to empathize with Scarlatti's expressive cosmos is also illustrated by his own "Encore" in the style of the Neapolitan composer, born in 1685.
Domenico Scarlatti: Sonatas Vol II (20 sonatas and "Encore"). Patrizio Mazzola, piano. Müller & Schade M & S 5072/2. (Vol. I, 15 sonatas, M & S 5067/2)
