Manchester Camerata will play with the French pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet under the baton of its Artistic Director Gábor Takács-Nagy. The artists will perform on stage as part of the Mozart made in Manchester world tour and will present works composed by the Austrian composer.

The evening will begin with the light Divertimento in D major KV 136, composed by Mozart when he was only sixteen. The very name of the work – divertimento (Italian for entertainment) – determines its cheerful, ludic character. In eighteenth-century Europe, these colourful pieces of several movements were usually played outdoors, adding splendour to carefree afternoons or evenings of the local aristocracy.

The consummately beautiful, formally perfect and at the same time representative for their era are the piano concertos by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Throughout his short life, the artist composed as many as twenty-seven of them. Two of them – Piano Concerto No. 12 in A major KV 414 and Piano Concerto No. 13 in C major KV 415 – will be performed during the concert by Jean-Efflam Bavouzet. They were created in 1782, when Mozart moved to Vienna, where he composed his greatest works. Newly married to Constance Weber, he took full advantage of the city’s cultural life, gradually becoming its center. These compositions are characterized by classical virtuosity on the one hand, and charming simplicity on the other. The concert will be crowned with the great Symphony in C major No. 36 KV 425 “Linz”, created by Mozart in just a few days during his stay in Linz at the invitation of a family friend, Count Thun-Hohenstein. “I really can’t tell you what blessings the family showers upon us. On Tuesday, November 4, there will be an academy [concert] at the theatre, and since I don’t have a single symphony with me, I’m writing a new one at an alarming rate,” wrote Wolfgang Amadeus in a letter to his father, Leopold. And although the composer devoted little time to it, this symphony is one of his most popular and most frequently played works penned by him.