All four of these recordings offer a thoroughly enjoyable account of what are surely Mozart's finest violin concertos. To allow myself some elbow-room I shall say little of the Grumiaux/Philips version which seemed lovely when it first appeared in 1962 but now sounds too smoothly lyrical for modern taste; also the orchestral playing is not very distinguished. To take the new versions first, Zukerman, who is his own conductor, adopts much more leisurely tempos than Kantorow, being especially self-indulgent in the slow movement of the G major. This in itself would be enough to make me prefer the Dutch recording which is also more sprightly in the quick movements. Kantorow pays much more attention to staccato markings, his cadenzas—by Ysaye—are shorter and more musicianly than Zukerman's, and his grace notes in the A major more likely to be what Mozart wanted. But I'm far from sure what Mozart wanted in the Andante interruption to the finale of the G major. Zukerman's and Perlman's (DG) four-in-a-bar sounds usual enough, but Kantorow has noticed that the Common Time marking is barred, so he plays these few bars with only two beats each; this of course means that they go much faster. At bar 382 Zukerman, alone of the above soloists, makes the open-string Ds which accompany the tune pizzicato, which sounds pleasant and might just be what Mozart hoped for. Zukerman is perhaps a more personable soloist than Kantorow, and he is supported by some polished orchestral playing, but I have a slight preference for the Dutch version. Perlman too plays with a little more character than Kantorow, but I'm not sure that I want this. Kantorow is a most deft performer, and he does somehow lead you to give more attention to the delicious music than the other soloists.
All three soloists have been well recorded. In September, 1983 NA found the woodwind too backward in the Perlman version; details are certainly a shade clearer in the other two.'