Mozart: String Quartets K.421, 458, 464
Cuarteto Casals (Harmonia Mundi)
(scroll down for English review)
卡薩爾斯弦樂四重奏在完成貝多芬全集錄音後，回到莫扎特，完成「海頓四重奏」的錄音，第一集早在2014年推出。他們在貝多芬，尤其是早期四重奏，有用到無揉弦或低揉弦的原音式奏法，在莫扎特也不例外，更是很快便令人注意到。
本來我覺得他們這樣奏很不自然，因為我猜他們琴線應該是用鋼弦，他們不揉弦時就頗為刺耳，然後我就覺得音符之間往往有點空隙，是比一般現代奏法或倣古奏法大的空隙，就連一弓過的連奏也是這樣，只是沒那麼礙耳。
之後應該是聽慣了，就覺得好像他們這種分句，以及音符沒有拉足時間、提早消退的發音，倒是和彈鋼琴的聲音性質類似，可能是早兩天才聽過奧勒夫遜的「莫扎特和同代」的專輯，有這種聯想。弦樂奏者如果右手穩定一弓過、左手揉弦一直揉，是不會有這種聲音的。
卡薩爾斯弦樂四重奏選用的速度，非但不像原音派樂手會比較快，反而是和現代奏法差不多，甚至是偏慢。但他們這種（我稱為）倣鍵盤發音，卻令樂句沒那麼呆板不變。我不肯定這是否他們本意，亦不知從原音的考據角度正不正確，至少這是我對這個聽不習慣的演奏的解釋，受不受落就由各位自己決定。
After completing their Beethoven cycle the Cuarteto Casals returned to Mozart and finished recording the “Haydn” quartets, a project they started around 2014. They often use no or very little vibratos in their Beethoven, and they did the similar in Mozart. I might even say that’s the most noticeable characteristic in their Mozart.
Initially I thought this was so unnatural, more so as they were probably using steel strings. And from one note to another, the gap was a tad larger than usual, even in HIP playing. Such effect didn’t just occur in staccato or détaché but also in legatos that were supposed to be played in one unbroken bow.
Then I got used to this sound where notes decay faster than usual. Probably because of the Ólafsson Mozart album I just heard, I came to associate such sound with the keyboard.
Cuarteto Casals adopted slower tempi than in typical HIP Mozart playing; some modern quartets might play faster than them. But to me their quasi-keyboard tone production somehow made the phrases less uniform because the early decays made some notes stand out. This is just my hypothesis, I don’t know if that’s what the players were aiming at, nor was this allowed in a musicological standpoint. But I never thought a Mozart quartet could be played this way.