The virtuosity of this all-Mozart programme makes the perfect dramatic pairing with Lucy Crowe and our inspirational leader Nadja Zwiener.
The English Concert
Harry Bicket director/harpsichord/organ
Lucy Crowe soprano
Nadja Zwiener violin
Mozart Divertimento in D major K 136
Al destin, che la minaccia from Mitridate K 87
Ruhe sanft, mein holdes Leben from Zaide K 344
Ah se il crudel periglio from Lucio Silla K 135
Et incarnatus est from Mass in C minor K 427
Violin Concerto No 5 in A major K 219 ('Turkish')
Exsultate, jubilate K 165
One of the leading lyric sopranos on stage today, Crowe’s speciality for baroque and classical opera is the ideal pairing for the virtuosic writing in this all-Mozart programme. From his first opera seria, Mitridate, to ‘Et incarnatus est’ from the Great Mass in C minor, a sense of the dramatic is never far from Mozart’s mind.
The orchestra’s inspirational leader, Nadja Zwiener, follows in the same spirit with Mozart’s final violin concerto, a work ripe with drama, exchanging reflective and introverted characters at one moment with overwhelming joy the next. None more so than in the finale with its raucous and playful ‘Turkish’ elements that give the concerto its name.