Gianluca Cascioli plays Mozart. And he records it. Cascioli is credited as being recording engineer as well as pianist, and no producer is credited, leading me to believe this was his show start to finish.
As he micromanages the recording, he micromanages the playing. K310 opens with an Allegro maestoso slower than normal. As the movement goes on, Cascioli manages to maintain an impressively even tempo overall, and he lavishes attention, maybe too much so, on every note and phrase. The playing sounds very deliberate, and there's little in the way of overt urgency or drive. The Andante cantabile is likewise a bit slow, and rather lovely, with Cascioli embellishing as he pleases. He maintains impressively even, low volume trills in places, and as in the opener, he maintains a gently relentless forward momentum at all times. It's not so much classical or romantic Mozart as it is post-modern Mozart, but with plenty of surface attractiveness intact. The very Andante-like Presto keeps up the slow, deliberate, slow-motion and relentless sound. He once again embellishes freely and deploys rubato and accents and (micro-) dynamics in a mannered way.
K333 offers more of the same, with a slower than normal opening Allegro with idiosyncratic playing throughout. Some of his accenting late in the movement really stands out. The Andante cantabile sounds lovely, slow, deliberate, yet with an unusual forward momentum all the same. In the middle section, he plays even more slowly, and plays the left hand notes with a dark, tolling sound. The Allegretto grazioso is closer to conventional, with a relaxed tempo and feel overall, though Cascioli makes sure to insert his individual touches throughout.
Cascioli includes the Prelude and Fugue, K394 in his recital. This is a work I have a couple copies of buried in complete or expanded sets of his piano works, but I basically never listen to it. As such, I came to it with basically fresh ears. Cascioli's style is more aggressive, brighter, and a bit brisker in the Prelude and quite formal, clear, steady, and well paced in the fugue, with more of that gentle relentlessness on display.
K570 closes the disc. Again, Cascioli plays the opening Allegro slower than normal, though he throws in a lovely, intellectual approximation of fun playing, and he shifts between underscoring right and left hand playing. The Adagio is stretched out to just shy of eleven minutes, with Cascioli lavishing attention on notes and phrases. The playing maintains the musical line well enough, but others can do the distended thing better (think Pogorelich), though Cascioli's playing is at its most beautiful and delicate here. The slow Allegretto is back to standard Cascioli traits, and while non-standard, they work well in his conception of the piece. It is the strongest work on the disc.
Overall, this is somewhat difficult to assess Mozart. It is highly mannered, and analytical to the Nth degree. Nothing sounds spontaneous or fresh, or light, or fun. And if some of the ideas don't really work, it's fascinating to listen to such thoroughly deconstructed Mozart.
Sound is superb, and nearly SOTA, and obviously exactly what Cascioli wanted.
Amazon UK link