Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie . Augustin Dumay

The leading French violinist Augustin Dumay is no longer an unfamiliar figure to our loyal concert-goers. For some years now, he has been the artistic leader of the Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie. He has also given a platform to the young and talented soprano Helen Kearns, in the undeniably strikingly lyrical orchestral songs of Richard Strauss, where the singer engages in a dialogue with the violin soloist. Relatively few people know that Mendelssohn composed thirteen symphonies for strings at a very early age. For the most part they were intended as homework for his teacher Karl Friedrich Zelter, and display the influence of Bach and Mozart. In the same period, more specifically in 1822, he wrote his 'small' violin concerto, a work that was only brought to light in 1952, by Yehudi Menuhin. The symphonies the young Mozart wrote in Salzburg in 1772 are a testament to his artistic coming of age and a distinctly unique personality.