Southern Pro Musica celebrates The Genius of Mozart

SussexWorld

Jonathan Willcocks brings his professional chamber orchestra Southern Pro Musica to Chichester for a special concert entitled The Genius of Mozart.

Transcript

00:00 Good morning, my name is Phil Kiewit, Group Arts Editor for Sussex Newspapers. It's always

00:06 a great pleasure to speak to Jonathan Wilcox. Now, Jonathan, you have a fabulous sounding

00:10 concert coming up in Chichester, May the 11th, with Southern Pro Musica, and it's a delightful

00:17 sounding programme, The Genius of Mozart. There's a lot encompassed in those words,

00:22 the genius of Mozart. How do you define genius in that context?

00:27 Yes, well, Mozart was a wonderfully prodigious composer. From a very early age, he showed

00:34 extraordinary talent. His father was Leopold Mozart, who himself was a musician. But I

00:42 think being polite, I think he was a limited compositional stature, really. But we start

00:48 off with a short piece by Leopold Mozart. So just to set the scene, the environment

00:54 in which the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was brought up. And so we play a short little

01:00 symphony by Leopold Mozart, and then follow that by the very first symphony that Wolfgang

01:07 Amadeus Mozart wrote, which he wrote when he was age seven, which is an extraordinary

01:11 achievement. It's already showing great interest and originality. And of course, Wolfgang Amadeus

01:18 Mozart was a prodigious child prodigy as a performer, and his very ambitious father touted

01:23 him around the courts of Europe. He was taken around rather like a performing monkey, really.

01:28 I think his father was highly ambitious for both him and his very talented younger sister

01:33 as well. And both of them were touted as performers. But it was as a composer that Mozart really

01:41 flourished. And so having had his first symphony age nine, age seven rather, then we move on

01:48 to the heart of the concert, which are his two crowning glories, the clarinet concerto,

01:53 which and his final symphony, both of which were written in the last year of his sadly

01:58 short life, he died age 35.

02:01 So with this concert, you really are telling a story. The theme is where did Mozart come

02:05 from?

02:06 We are. We're following through the development of him from a prodigiously talented child,

02:12 right through to one of the greatest composers that has ever lived on this planet. And the

02:17 two works which perhaps are most indicative of this great talent, the clarinet concerto,

02:22 which is much loved by audiences, and his final symphony, which is nicknamed the Jupiter

02:27 Symphony.

02:28 Absolutely. But I suppose at the risk of stating the obvious, we can't really say where genius

02:31 does come from, given that his father was only moderately successful. Where did it come

02:36 from?

02:38 He obviously was brought up in a musical environment. And so he had that influence. But what makes

02:43 someone of that prodigious talent? Is it nature or nurture? You know, are you born, some people

02:49 are born with prodigious talents. And that's true in any form, whether it's as an athlete

02:55 or whether it's as an artist or whatever it is. But the way that Mozart flourished in

03:03 the vibrant musical scenes around Europe, particularly in the area around Vienna, Latvia,

03:11 it was very vibrant. It was the centre of much musical excellence. Of course, Haydn

03:15 and Beethoven, also either side of Mozart there, were thriving there. But it's a celebration

03:24 of the glory that Mozart is as a composer, and really tracks that progress through to

03:31 the great crowning works of the...

03:33 It sounds a fabulous programme. And at the moment, Southern Prime Music could play one

03:37 concert per season in Chichester, and you're hoping to increase that to expand?

03:41 Yes, I think the orchestra is pretty well known in Chichester through its partnerships

03:45 with the Chichester Singers, and also the children's concerts, which it gives every

03:50 year in the festival theatre. But St Paul's is a wonderful venue. It's very, very nice

03:57 for audience. There's plenty of good facilities, interval bar and all sorts of things. And

04:02 it's a lovely acoustic for orchestral music. There's good parking there. It's very accessible

04:06 in all sorts of ways. And so we're really looking forward to performing there again

04:10 on Saturday, May the 11th. And tickets are available via the Southern Pro Musical website,

04:16 and also on the door if they're still available at that particular stage. We had a very good

04:21 audience in our concert last year, and we very much hope that audiences will be drawn

04:25 to this extremely attractive programme.

04:27 Particularly since we've got a fantastic clarinetist coming, Jonathan Leibovitz, who's one of the

04:33 rising stars. He's been the rising star artist on Classic FM and multiple prize winners right

04:38 across not only UK, but Europe and in the USA as well. So it's all going to be very

04:44 special.

04:45 Perfect. It's a fabulous programme then. May the 11th, St Paul's, Chichester. Lovely to

04:50 speak to you, Jonathan. Thank you.

04:51 Thank you, Phil.

04:52 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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