This event is part of a series – please visit main page for full details
.It’s an intriguing idea, pairing Beethoven’s first piano concerto, and Mozart’s last, grandest symphony. We think of the two great composers as belonging to separate musical eras, but these two pieces were written only seven years apart.
Beethoven’s concerto, with its wit, elegance and joie de vivre, calls to mind the age of Mozart and Haydn that he was about to leave behind. As for the ‘Jupiter’ symphony (presented here from memory), it’s a majestic work fizzing with so many ideas that Mozart seems barely able to fit them all in. A twentieth century work for strings drawing on American folk idioms and the spirit of the dance is an energetic opener. Two Saffron Hall favourites – Aurora and Benjamin Grosvenor – form an alluring team.