Budapest Festival Orchestra

A smallish concerto – this sounds a proper equivalent of the Italian word concertino. As part of BFO’s series, this evening focuses on pieces that were performed without a conductor, by ensembles smaller than today’s symphony orchestras. The chamber orchestra is once again led by the violinist János Pilz as concertmaster. The program covers a time-span from the early 18th century to the end of the 19th, beginning with a piece fitting the Advent season, Corelli’s Christmas Concerto, his best-known composition. This is followed by the Haydn’s Violin Concerto, drawing on Baroque patterns. The soloist is a founding member of the Festival Orchestra, Tímea Iván. After Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s String Symphony, with a wide range of emotions, an unusually cheerful Serenade by the young Josef Suk, a pupil of Dvořák’s, wraps up the concert.