Works
for string quartet, and voice and piano, performed by the Borromeo String
Quartet, soprano Jeanine De Bique, and pianist Warren Jones. Mozart:
String Quartet in B-flat Major, K. 458Mozart: Misera,
dove son, K. 369

A prolific opera composer, Mozart was an expert dramatist, and his knack
for keeping an audience’s attention and tugging at their emotions extended to
his works for the concert hall. At the end of our program today, we’ll hear one
of the composer’s concert arias, a sort of opera in miniature. In this aria, the
character Fluvia is racked by grief over her father’s treachery, driven so far
as to wish for death, begging heaven to send down a thunderbolt to end her
suffering. But first we begin with a less narrative but no less captivating
instrumental piece. The quartet’s nickname, “The Hunt,” seems irresistibly apt,
given the galloping rhythm and hornlike motives in the opening movement. A
rollicking finale follows two less rustic inner movements, a lilting minuet and
a beautiful adagio.