First on the program is Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto, featuring clarinetist Martin Fröst. According to the Times, "If you've never listened to Martin Fröst, you've never really listened to the sound of a clarinet.” The Clarinet Concerto, written just months before Mozart’s death in 1791, was one of a series of masterpieces produced by the composer at the end of his life, contemporary with his opera The Magic Flute and his Requiem. The Concerto also constitutes one of the first works composed for the then-new and fashionable clarinet, which had been developed over the course of the 18th century.

The second half of the program is devoted to Mozart's effervescent String Quintet No. 4 and features a cast of five masters of their instruments: Leonidas Kavakos, Henning Kraggerud, Antoine Tamestit, Nobuko Imai, and Frans Helmerson.

Photo: © Nicolas Brodard