Concerto Budapest

A perfect concerto from Mozart’s final year and a Beethoven symphony that in fact enjoys even greater reverence than the composer himself. This is the programme in the concert that parades massive talent: conductor János Kovács, holder of the Kossuth and Liszt Prizes, multifaceted Slovenian clarinettist Darko Brlek as instrumental guest soloist, and the National Choir. As suggested by the Köchel catalogue number that is well over the 600 mark, the clarinet concerto in A major was written in 1791, around the time of The Magic Flute and Requiem, for the musician Anton Stadler who was a great favourite of and highly respected by Mozart. Following on from the bright and optimistic concerto, Symphony No. 9 is performed just a few days before the 250th anniversary of the birth of Beethoven. Claude Debussy, writing about the work, said this at the beginning of the 20th century: “The Ninth Symphony has been shrouded in a fog of noble words and decorative statements. It's the masterpiece about which more nonsense has been spread than any other. One can be amazed that it hasn't long since been buried under the mountain of writings issued forth by it.” In the 120 years since then the quantity of words, statements and writings has only continued to increase, indeed multiplied, yet nothing can bury the Ninth.