A8 Beethoven. Mozart. Weill

The extent to which music by German composers changed over a century can be heard in the penultimate concert of our subscription series. Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture provides us with a fitting opening to the evening. It relates the story of the Roman general Gaius Martius Coriolanus, who may or may not have been a real figure. The military theme also determines the character of the composition: Beethoven’s music is particularly rousing – almost brusque in places. 

We then turn back a few decades earlier to Mozart’s Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 5 in A major “Turkish”. Mozart wrote his violin concertos in relatively quick succession in Salzburg in the 1770s. The character of the concerto is bound in particular to the last movement, where Mozart works mainly with Turkish rhythmical elements. These were very popular at the time, as is demonstrated by Mozart’s notorious Rondo all Turca.

The solo part of the concerto will be performed by the violinist Grace Park, who made her debut at the Carnegie Hall at the end of 2021. We will conclude with music from the 20^th century and Kurt Weill’s rhythmically concise Symphony No. 2. As a result of his background, the composer of the famous Threepenny Opera became a target of Nazi repression. Weill, however, was able to emigrate, and in the USA he tried to put behind him how he had lived and worked in his native Germany.