Mozart, Sinfonia Concertante in E flat major, K.364

Playing the ex-Roederer Stradivarius of 1710, Solo violinist David Grimal teams up with his teacher Régis Pasquier on the Mantegazza viola. Mozart composed this work, his last concerto for string instruments, in 1779, shortly before he left Salzburg for Vienna. Its urbane elegance seems to anticipate the style that was to characterize Mozart's first Viennese symphonies. Pasquier, who masters both the violin and viola, is a world-renowned soloist who has been called "le star du violon français" by the Paris daily Le Monde and was appointed an "Officier des Arts et des Lettres" by the President of France. David Grimal, who graduated from Paris' Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique with the First Prize in violin and chamber music, has gone on to win several other prestigious awards as well, including the European Cultural Award. His active international career has taken him to most of the world's great musical venues, where he has concertized with ensembles such as the English Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Lyon and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo. The French music magazine Diapason wrote of Grimal: "A truly inspired musician, a stylist conscious of his artistry, has risen to take his place in the otherwise empty firmament of French violin playing of the nineties."