It is almost impossible to resist the stage charm and musical enthusiasm of Jörg Widmann, the artistic partner of Sinfonietta Riga. The Bavarian's soaring clarinet tone always manages to stir some deeply hidden heartfelt emotion, and his readings of scores based on his astonishingly wide knowledge inspire even the most hardened playing partners to artistic feats.
Increasingly at home in Riga, he indulges Latvia's sophisticated audiences with ever more adventurous programmes. This time, balancing between chamber and symphonic scope, he reworks scores by two bright talents who once lived in Vienna. At the time of the Serenade by Erik Wolfgang Korngold, the composer, who had fled war-torn Austria for California, had already made a name for himself as a great Hollywood film music grandmaster.
Jörg Widmann describes this miraculous composition for strings as a declaration of the composer's love for his wife, surrounded by shimmering magic. The Mozart Serenade, which is set alongside it, was written for the Harmoniemusik, or wind ensemble, which was rapidly gaining popularity in Austria at the time, and which will also include Vidmann's clarinet. With the conviction that to play the music of an unsurpassed genius is not only the most difficult challenge for each musician, but also the most satisfying happiness, the programme culminates with Mozart's Symphony No 36, which bears the name of Linz, and which the composer, winged by the happiness of his recent marriage, is said to have created in a record-breaking four days.
Programme
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Serenade in C minor, K.388, Symphony No. 36 in C major, K. 425 (“Linz”)
Erich Wolfgang Korngold Serenade for string orchestra in B-flat Major op.39
Participants
Sinfonietta Rīga
Jörg Widmann, clarinet, conductor
