Mozart. What Else?

The concert presents an all-Mozart journey conceived not merely as a tribute to one of the most celebrated figures in the history of Western music, but as an invitation to a renewed listening experience: a Mozart who is mobile, theatrical, and profoundly dramaturgical, moving across opera seria, concerto, love song, instrumental melancholy, and the great Viennese form through an extraordinary variety of gestures, affects, and sonic relationships.

An introductory listening guide, offered at the beginning of both concerts, is curated by Attilio Cantore, Professor of Music History at the Conservatorio, who introduces the audience to the musical itinerary developed by the Marenzio Consort STU.D.I.O.

The programme opens with the Overture to Le nozze di Figaro, K. 492, and the aria Lungi da te, mio ben from Mitridate, re di Ponto, K. 87/74a, an early work in which the experience of separation becomes musical space, vocal tension, and emotional vulnerability. The Keyboard Concerto in D major, K. 107a—performed on the fortepiano and based on Johann Christian Bach’s music—highlights Mozart’s creative process of assimilation: the galant style of the sonata is transformed into a concertante form in which the fortepiano enters into dialogue with the strings, opening new possibilities, responding, and developing the musical discourse.

The second part of the concert includes Ruhe sanft, mein holdes Leben from Zaide, K. 344/336b, suspended between theatrical fragility and intimate expression; the Adagio from the Concerto for Basset Clarinet in A major, K. 622, in which Mozart’s late style entrusts the instrument’s deep and lyrical register with an almost human voice; and the Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat major, K. 482—also performed on the fortepiano—a grand example of Viennese instrumental theatre, built on the dialogue between fortepiano, winds, and strings.

Through the use of historical instruments, this repertoire acquires a renewed presence: less monument and more body, less icon and more gesture, less abstract perfection and more living expression. The title Mozart. What Else? reflects this perspective: not the image of a Mozart already defined and preserved in collective memory, but the possibility of rediscovering in his music theatre, vocality, inquietude, grace, and invention.