Mozart: Christian Blackshaw

The Wurttembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen presents a Mozart program on ARS PRODUKTION with two Swiss guests, conductor Christian Erny and pianist Hans-Jurg Straub, that is full of contrasts: On one hand, Mozart's festive, life-affirming so-called Haffner Symphony K385 and, in stark contrast, the sombre, emotional Piano Concerto in C minor K491.

The Wurttembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen presents a Mozart program on ARS PRODUKTION with two Swiss guests, conductor Christian Erny and pianist Hans-Jurg Straub, that is full of contrasts: On one hand, Mozart's festive, life-affirming so-called Haffner Symphony K385 and, in stark contrast, the sombre, emotional Piano Concerto in C minor K491.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Piano Concertos Nos. 20 & 21
Jan Lisiecki / Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks / Christian Zacharias
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 224 MB | Full Artwork: 77 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Deutsche Grammophon # 479 0061 | Country/Year: Germany 2012
Genre: Classical | Style: Viennese School, Piano

"…The Canadian pianist played Mozart's piano concertos with obvious assurance and skill, despite his youth . . . obviously a pianist to watch out for."

Were just one example to be given of the richness and diversity of Mozart's achievements, Concertos Nos. 23 & 24 would undoubtedly make excellent candidates. Completed almost simultaneously in Vienna in early 1786, the two concertos contrast starkly and seem to have been written years apart – or by two distinct yet connected minds of equal genius. Even more astonishing is the fact that they were written in parallel with the first masterpiece of the Da Ponte trilogy, The Marriage of Figaro, while sharing with it very few stylistic similarities.

For the fourth volume in this collection dedicated to Mozart concertos by the younger generation of performers, the Orpheum Foundation and Alpha Classics present the Concertos nos. 23 and 24 (K488 & 491) performed by the British pianist Julian Trevelyan, who was awarded three prizes at the Géza Anda Competition in Zurich in 2021 and, at the age of sixteen, became the youngest-ever prizewinner at the Marguerite Long Competition in Paris in 2015. ‘Mozart’s music is full of life, humour and enjoyment. My life wouldn’t feel fulfilled if I didn’t have his music’, says the young musician, who is accompanied here by one of the most eminent Mozartian maestros, Christian Zacharias, conducting the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Ferras was born at Le Touquet in 1933, he began studying the violin with his father, who was a pupil of Marcel Chailley. He entered the Conservatoire de Nice as a student of Charles Bistesi in 1941, and in 1943 obtained the First Prize. In 1944 he went to the Conservatoire de Paris. In 1946 he won the First Prize in both disciplines (violin and chamber music), and started his performing career with the Pasdeloup Orchestra under Albert Wolff, and later Paul Paray. He worked with Romanian violinist and composer George Enescu, who also acted as an instructor. Ferras premiered the Violin Concerto by Federico Elizalde, under the direction of Gaston Poulet.

DG and the Freiburger Barockorchester, one of the world’s foremost period-instrument orchestras, launch a new creative partnership with an album of works associated with the celebrated Mannheim court orchestra. Mozart’s Mannheim couples little-known gems by Cannabich, Holzbauer, Vogler and others with works written by Mozart during his formative visit to Mannheim in the late 1770s.