Salzburg, Day 11, Mozart Matinee

Every Saturday and Sunday morning during the Festival there are concerts in the Mozarteum Großer Saal, which is part of the Stiftung Mozarteum, a different organization than the Salzburg Festival, but working in conjunction with them. The Großer Saal is not in the same location as the halls on Karajan-platz, but across the river in the newer part of town. It is the smallest venue of the five halls, seating about 800 people. Perfect for chamber music and solo recitals. Yesterday's concert made full use of the stage as it was for sacred music by Mozart with vocal soloists, mixed choir and full orchestra.

I saw two unique things at this concert--the first was that the gentleman sitting next to me was wearing one of those traditional Austrian jackets, with a mismatched shirt and tie and lederhosen! I'm pretty sure I have never seen anyone combining a shirt and tie with shorts. The other unique thing was the choir, the Salzburg Bach Choir, sang one piece, the Ave verum corpus KV 618, from memory. I have never seen a choir sing from memory before.

The conductor, Ivor Bolton is one of those hyper-active, hyper-competent Englishmen and he and his performers did a lovely job. No matter what some might say, Mozart is far from easy to perform. It requires precision, elegance, balance and clarity and those take a great deal of skill to manage. The program was all of music associated with Mozart's time in Salzburg and began with the Symphony in C, KV 338. It also included the Mass in C,, KV 258, the Venite populi, K 260 and the Litaniae de venerabili altaris KV 243. I have probably heard all these before, but likely did not pay much attention to the sacred music. I have always loved choral music and, really, it is often not well-recorded, so it is a treat to hear in concert by a really good choir.

So, an excellent concert and it made up for last night's opera.