Muzio Clementi was renowned in his own time as a piano virtuoso, composer, conductor, publisher (Beethoven’s in England) and co-owner of a piano factory. His encounter with Mozart in a musical ‘duel’ at the court of Emperor Joseph II in 1781 is well known – Mozart does not leave his senior much credit and in his letters calls him a mere mechanicus . But we know that Clementi played his B flat sonata on this occasion (track 13), and a theme from this was later to appear in the overture to The Magic Flute. 

 

In comparison with the Viennese fortepianos, the English instruments of this time are bigger and have a darker sound. Also the sustain of the notes produced is longer, taking the music even further away from the harpsichord idiom. When Liv Glaser came across an original Clementi instrument in 2001, the colour of sound and the dynamic possibilities she experienced made new sense of the composer’s scores. The original Clementi was not in shape for a recording, but in 2003 Chris Maene had built a copy of this instrument. Its owner Malcolm Bilson generously placed this piano at Glaser’s disposal and it was brought to the Glenn Gould Studios, where tuner and technician Rob Loomis made sure it was in top condition for this recording.

 

Liv Glaser studied in Oslo with Robert Riefling, and in Paris with the legendary Vlado Perlemuter, and later with Lev Oborin at the Moscow Music Conservatory and Wilhelm Kempff. In 1990 she once again became a pupil, taking lessons with Paul Badura-Skoda in Vienna, studying original manuscripts of Mozart at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, along with in-depth studies of the fortepiano with Malcolm Bilson at Cornell University. This resulted in a recording of Mozart’s complete piano sonatas (Simax Classics PSC 1066, 1092, 1125, 1148 and 1149).