More than Mozart's friend, the music of Josef Mysliveček

Josef Mysliveček

The Czech composer Josef Mysliveček remains best known as a friend and influence on Mozart. Nearly twenty years older than Mozart, Mysliveček was based in Italy for most of his adult life and met the young composer in Bologna in 1770 (when Mozart was 14) and the Mozarts remained close to Mysliveček for the remainder of the decade. As a composer, Mysliveček provided numerous models for Mozart's own composition. But Mysliveček's music only occasionally comes out on its own.This week there is a chance to her flautist Ana de la Vega performing Mysliveček's Flute Concerto,  a work she has recorded with the English Chamber Orchestra [available on-line], further ahead pianist Clare Hammond will be releasing a disc of Mysliveček's keyboard music.


On Tuesday 19 February 2019 at Cadogan Hall, Ana de la Vega will be the soloist in Mysliveček's Flute Concerto with the English Chamber Orchestra, director Stephanie Gonley, in a programme which also includes Mozart's Flute Concerto in D. Mozart famously disliked the flute, but his two flute concertos remain corner-stones of the repertoire and this combination of Mozart and Mysliveček gives us a chance to hear the influence of the older composer on the younger. Full details from the Cadogan Hall website.

Pianist Clare Hammond's disc of Mysliveček's complete keyboard music will be released on BIS, and will encompass not only his works for solo keyboard but his two keyboard concertos with Nicholas McGegan and the Swedish Chamber Orchestera. The recording of the second concerto will be the first time it has been issued on disc. Both concertos dates from the late 1770s, towards the end of the period of Mysliveček's friendship with Mozart. The disc will be released on 10 March 2019.