Mozart: Violin Concertos Nos. 1, 2 & 4

Completing the cycle of Mozart’s violin concertos, begun on BISSACD1754, Richard Tognetti and his Australian Chamber Orchestra offer us the first, second and fourth concerto, along with two shorter works for violin and orchestra: the Adagio in E major and the Rondo in C major. All Mozart’s works in this genre were written during a few years quite early in his career and demonstrate very clearly Mozart’s tremendous development - the fourth concerto in particular displays the confidence of the composer both in handling his material and in teasing the audience with the narrative he creates. Tognetti writes of his and the orchestra’s decision to use gut strings, period wind instruments and a lower than usual pitch, in aim to create ‘a sound which we know Mozart would have recognised… while simply looking at the notes Mozart wrote down, and start from there, creating a hybrid hopefully carrying an embodiment of truth’.