Mozart
Serenade in C minor, K388 25'
R. Strauss
Suite in B flat major for 13 wind instruments 23'
London Winds
Michael Collins clarinet/director
There will be no interval
Richard Strauss was just 20 when he composed his Suite – and steeped in the conservative musical traditions of his horn-player father, who revered Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven above all.
It's a legacy present here in the young Strauss's music, but developed and transformed into something altogether more rich and strange.
Clarinettist Michael Collins and his ensemble London Winds set Strauss and his favourite composer, Mozart, side by side, presenting their very different takes on the 18th-century 'Harmonie' ensemble of wind instruments, and revealing the early seeds of Strauss's signature lyricism that would eventually flower in Der Rosenkavalier.