Mozart, Violin Concerto No.3 in G major, K.216 (Mozartwoche 2001)

Isabelle Faust began taking music lessons at the age of five. The recipient of many international awards, she is today a sought-after guest as soloist and chamber musician in all of Europe, the U.S., Israel and Japan. She plays a "Sleeping Beauty" Stradivarius of 1704. This recording from the Salzburg Mozartwoche documents her debut there. The Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg has been the orchestra of the city and Land of Salzburg since 1958 and regularly concertizes at the Salzburg Festival and the Mozartwoche. The principal conductor is the Dutch-born Hubert Soudant, who led the Nouvel Orchestre Philharmonique de France in Paris from 1981 to 1983 and the Utrecht Symphony Orchestra from 1983 to 1986. In addition to his activities in Salzburg, Soudant is also the principal conductor of the Orchestra and Opéra des Pays de Loire in Nantes and Angers, France. Mozart, who was also an accomplished violinist, wrote all of his five violin concertos in Salzburg in 1775, apparently for his own personal use. Their style can best be described as cosmopolitan and reflects the many musical currents he had been exposed to while on his travels in Italy and elsewhere. Aristocratic, suave, witty, wonderfully melodious, they are dazzling gems that conceal an inner core of challenging material that can be truly mastered only by the very best violinists.