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The chamber music of the Viennese Classical period contains both occasional works for private music-making as well as sophisticated concert music – and this duality will be evident in this charming concert for winds and strings. Mozart’s Flute Quartet in D major, composed during his stay in Mannheim in 1777, and Haydn’s Divertimento in C major, composed during his second trip to London in 1794, were both commissioned by amateur flutists. On the other hand, Mozart conceived the oboe part of his Quartet in F major, composed in 1781, for one of the best oboists of that time, Friedrich Ramm; it was probably intended as a token of appreciation for Ramm’s excellent performance at the premiere of Idomeneo in Munich. Beethoven had something quite different in mind with the three String Trios op. 9: with their heightened expressivity and expansive dimensions, they embody a type of chamber music that is no longer lightweight but rather has become a serious discourse for connoisseurs. The third Trio in C minor constitutes the pinnacle of the set.
The chamber music of the Viennese Classical period contains both occasional works for private music-making as well as sophisticated concert music – and this duality will be evident in this charming concert for winds and strings. Mozart’s Flute Quartet in D major, composed during his stay in Mannheim in 1777, and Haydn’s Divertimento in C major, composed during his second trip to London in 1794, were both commissioned by amateur flutists. On the other hand, Mozart conceived the oboe part of his Quartet in F major, composed in 1781, for one of the best oboists of that time, Friedrich Ramm; it was probably intended as a token of appreciation for Ramm’s excellent performance at the premiere of Idomeneo in Munich. Beethoven had something quite different in mind with the three String Trios op. 9: with their heightened expressivity and expansive dimensions, they embody a type of chamber music that is no longer lightweight but rather has become a serious discourse for connoisseurs. The third Trio in C minor constitutes the pinnacle of the set.
One instrument crops up with striking frequency in French music: the harp. Magdalena Hoffmann, in Debussy’s Danse sacrée et danse profane, invokes this special Debussyan inflection on her instrument, joined by a string quartet. She also creates a close but delicate exchange with the violin in Camille Saint-Saëns’s Fantaisie. But no less essential to the special French sound is the flute: when it enters an intimate dialogue with the viola in Ibert’s Interludes, the conversation takes place against the undulating ground of a harp. Wave-like arpeggios for the harp are also heard in Quintet for Harp, Flute, Violin, Viola and Cello by the composer and admiral Jean Cras, a work perhaps inspired by his long journeys at sea. The 20th-century music of Cras, Debussy and Ibert receives an exciting contemporary counterpart in Guillaume Connesson’s String Quartet, composed in 2008.
One instrument crops up with striking frequency in French music: the harp. Magdalena Hoffmann, in Debussy’s Danse sacrée et danse profane, invokes this special Debussyan inflection on her instrument, joined by a string quartet. She also creates a close but delicate exchange with the violin in Camille Saint-Saëns’s Fantaisie. But no less essential to the special French sound is the flute: when it enters an intimate dialogue with the viola in Ibert’s Interludes, the conversation takes place against the undulating ground of a harp. Wave-like arpeggios for the harp are also heard in Quintet for Harp, Flute, Violin, Viola and Cello by the composer and admiral Jean Cras, a work perhaps inspired by his long journeys at sea. The 20th-century music of Cras, Debussy and Ibert receives an exciting contemporary counterpart in Guillaume Connesson’s String Quartet, composed in 2008.