Miraculous Schubert

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You may wonder why you aren't more familiar with the Swiss composer Rudolf Moser after you hear Dimitri Ashkenazy perform his Clarinet Concerto. The entire work is engaging, but listen particularly for what Debussy referred to as the "heavenly arabesques" to be found in the last movement. A bit later in the evening: the crowning achievement of Schubert's orchestral endeavors, his "Great" Symphony in C, as played by John Eliot Gardiner and the Vienna Philharmonic.

Annibale Padovano wrote his Mass for 24 Voices after he left Venice in 1565 to work for the court of Karl II, Archduke of Austria in Graz. Composed for 3 vocal and 21 instrumental parts, it features Venetian "fragmentation" and displays great structural variety. Paul van Nevel and his Huelgas Ensemble do the honors. Finally, Ned Rorem's "Sky Music" ends the evening with pretty heavenly playing by harpist Yolanda Kondonassis.