3rd Symphony Concert

This symphony concert opens cheerfully with Mozart's "Cassation" No. 2, a piece in multiple movements, written in Sazlburg in the 1770s. The work is scored for solo strings, meaning that the violin part almost takes on the form of a mini concerto at times. The Hungarian composer Béla Bartók never published his complete two-movement Violin Concerto during his lifetime. Instead, he used the first movement as the first of the "Two Portraits", Op. 5, representing the violinist Stefi Geyer, with whom he was in love. The full concerto was published posthumously in 1956, 11 years after the composer's death. When Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy jotted down the first musical ideas for his Third Symphony, he was in his early 20s and travelling through Scotland. He himself never referred to the work as "Scottish" – nevertheless, the symphony continues to evoke deep feelings of the Romantic era at the sight of the rugged Scottish landscape and castle ruins.

Born in Pretoria, South Africa, Gérard Korsten began his career as a violinist. He was music director of the London Mozart Players and the Orchestra del Teatro Lirico di Cagliari. For thirteen years he was Chief Conductor of the Vorarlberg Symphony Orchestra, of which he is still Honorary Conductor. Our concerto soloist, Antje Weithaas, is one of the most important violinists of our time. In addition to the core repertoire, she also devotes herself to rarely performed concertos and contemporary literature. She is a highly regarded educator, teaching at the Kronberg Academy and elsewhere.