‘Brussels Choral Society - Mozart – Requiem (R. Levin edition)’

Artists:
Brussels Choral Society
Ensemble Orchestral de Bruxelles
Agnieszka Sławińska – Soprano
Inez Carsauw – Alto
Teun Michiels – Tenor 
Jan van der Crabben – Baritone
Natasha Binder – Piano

Conductor: Eric Delson

Programme: Mozart – Requiem – Vesperae Solennes de Confessore – Piano Concerto No. 23

In this all-Mozart concert, the Brussels Choral Society, the Ensemble Orchestral de Bruxelles, soprano Agnieszka Sławińska, alto Inez Carsauw, tenor Teun Michiels, baritone Jan van der Crabben and piano soloist Natasha Binder, conducted by the BCS’s Musical Director Eric Delson, will perform some of the composer’s most melodic and engaging works.
The Vesperae Solennes de Confessore, written at the age of 24, is a high point in Mozart’s small number of religious compositions. The work is characterised by bright, shining allegros, a melodic and spiritual Laudate Dominum and a dazzling Magnificat as a finale.
The Piano Concerto No. 23 was completed at the same time as Le Nozze di Figaro and despite its rather introverted beginning, bursts into an exuberant final movement full of comedy and high spirits. Our soloist, Natasha Binder, still in her teens, played Ravel’s Concerto in G at our concert in December 2013, delighting the audience with her virtuosity and effervescent musicality.
The concert concludes with Mozart’s Requiem, his final and unfinished work, which is performed in a completion by the American musicologist and renowned Mozart scholar Robert D. Levin. The familiar version, completed by Süssmayr, has long been the object of controversy. Levin’s completion respects the historical and performance traditions of the Requiem, making subtle alterations to the orchestration, the better to reflect Mozart’s compositional style, but retaining much of the traditional version and losing none of its drama.