ALC 0119 Mozart Sonatas for fortepiano and violin vol.1

The Six Sonatas Op.2 pour le Clavicin, ou Pianoforte avec l’accompagnoment d’un Violon, known as 'Auernhammer sonaten’ were published by Artaria in 1781 and comprise the compositions K 296 and K 376-380. The sonatas K 296 and K 378 were composed in 1778 the former and in 1779 the latter, while in 1781 the sonatas K 376, 377, 379, 380 were composed.
Mozart having moved to Vienna in the same year, this work represents the first important chamber work published in the new city, the composer's calling card for his new audience.
The late 18th-century public had by then lost interest in the solo sonata of Baroque descent and a musical language conceived according to the criteria of the figured bass. G.B. Rangoni in his treatise “Saggio sul gusto della musica”, written in Livorno in 1790, became aware of this dichotomy between audience and genre and noted how the beauty of the solo sonata began to be associated with an ‘esausto’ ('exhausted') sense of taste which was replaced by “una tremenda velocità ed una mancanza di grazia; molta leggerezza e poca espressione e profondità; molte difficoltà stravaganti e bizzarre che sorprendono senza toccare.” ("a tremendous speed and lack of grace; much lightness and little expression and depth; many extravagant and bizarre difficulties that surprise without touching.").