BSO: Lewis Plays Mozart

Mozart wrote twelve of his piano concertos in a two-year blaze of creativity, a series of masterpieces to delight the mind, charm and seduce the ear, and pierce the heart. Of them all, No.25 is the biggest, grandest and most sonorous. Separating itself from the tragic manner of its immediate predecessor, it represents the C major summit of the 30-year-old composer’s Viennese style. It is a masterpiece not only magisterial but moving – broad and splendid, yet keenly detailed. Tchaikovsky saw himself as the victim of a cold, cruel fate. He felt a strong empathy for other people in the same situation, be they real or fictitious. That’s why he identified so closely with Manfred, the lonely, heartbroken wanderer at the centre of Byron’s epic poem. Deeply programmatic, long and technically challenging, it is often overlooked, yet it has a great deal to offer – bountiful drama, colour and a memorable series of melodies.