Mozart: Piano Sonatas, Volume 5 – William Youn

   in Piano International (Sep, 2017)
Korean-born, Munich-based William Youn presents sensitive, always perfectly textured performances in this varied programme, volume five of his cycle on Oehms. The first movement of the D major sonata (with the repeat of the exposition) sets the scene: light, impeccably judged textures, always well- mannered. The huge quarter-hour finale to that sonata, a theme with variations, finds Youn at his most ruminative and perhaps too introspective in the slow movements (think Arrau but minus the magic).

There is a tameness here, too. While the Fantasia is nicely shaped, the C minor Sonata’s opening movement is lacking in drive, and its Adagio sags. The Sonata K309 has a rather studio-bound first movement, …