Orchestre de chambre de Paris
Dinis Sousa direction
Anastasia Kobekina cello
Mendelssohn’s Shakespearian overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream prefaces Schumann’s extremely demanding Cello Concerto.
Dates
Mendelssohn A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Overture Op. 21
Schumann Concerto for cello Op. 129
Mozart Symphony No. 36 K. 425 « Linz »
About
Schumann described Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream Overture as “a cascade of youth”. And with good reason: the prodigy composed it at the age of seventeen. His music captures the essence of Shakespeare’s comedy, rendering the whispering of the fairies, the ardour of the lovers and the braying of a donkey. In its day, Schumann’s Cello Concerto was regarded as an unusual work. At the time, few musicians took an interest in the cello and its expressive potential. Yet this unconventional choice heralded the success of this concerto, performed here under the vibrant bow of Anastasia Kobekina. Conductor Dinis Sousa and the Orchestre de chambre de Paris round off this programme with Mozart’s Symphony No. 36, also known as the “Linz”. Composed in just four days during a visit by Mozart and Constanze to Linz for a concert commissioned by the city’s theatre, it captures the urgency of a composer “forced to write a symphony at breakneck speed”.
Production Orchestre de chambre de Paris