👉 Spunicunifait — Mozart: 6 String Quintets
Alpha Classics, 2025
Works
- String Quintet No. 1 in B-flat major, K.174
- String Quintet No. 2 in C minor, K.406 (arr. of Serenade K.388)
- String Quintet No. 3 in C major, K.515
- String Quintet No. 4 in G minor, K.516
- String Quintet No. 5 in D major, K.593
- String Quintet No. 6 in E-flat major, K.614
Performers
- Lorenza Borrani
- Maia Cabeza
- Max Mandel
- Simone von Rahden
- Luise Buchberger
By Damián Autorino
Editor at Moto Perpetuo
It’s a stroke of good fortune for listeners when five first-rank European players join forces for a single project. Formed in 2018, Spunicunifait set out to live with Mozart’s six string quintets in depth—studying, performing, and now recording the complete cycle on period set-ups. Their name, drawn from a playful coinage in Mozart’s letters to his cousin, hints at the irreverent sparkle that sits alongside his genius.
Heard chronologically, these works trace Mozart’s full creative arc: from the youthful B-flat, K. 174, to the farewell glow of the E-flat, K. 614. Along the way you hear hallmarks of his world concentrated in chamber scale—the operatic give-and-take of the lines (you can almost imagine stage characters stepping forward), symphonic turns of phrase, late-style counterpoint, and moments that look towards Romantic language later treasured by composers like Brahms.
The great pair from 1787—the C major, K. 515 and the G minor, K. 516—set out complementary paths: one broad and architectural, the other taut and inward. The C minor, K. 406, reworked from an earlier wind serenade, is a special case: here the strings shape the music so that wind colours seem to ghost through the texture; at times you’d swear you hear oboes and bassoons in the grain of the violas and cello. The late diptych—D major, K. 593 and E-flat, K. 614—shows Mozart testing concise means and clear profiles, from spare transparency to quick wit.
Playing on period instruments and faithful modern copies, Spunicunifait offers a sound of striking clarity and warmth, giving us the rare chance to hear these quintets much as Mozart and his contemporaries may have heard them. The engineering is immaculate, letting the inner voices—so crucial in these “viola quintets”—speak with natural presence.
Each player brings serious credentials to the table. Lorenza Borrani leads the Chamber Orchestra of Europe; Maia Cabeza plays with the COE and Kammerakademie Potsdam; Max Mandel is principal viola with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Simone von Rahden teaches at the Hanns Eisler School in Berlin; Luise Buchberger is principal cello of the OAE. The result is not museum-piece Mozart but alive, characterful playing that lets the music argue, sing and dance.
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