NM Phil to perform four concerts in Mozart festival series

The New Mexico Philharmonic has gathered a bouquet of concertos, symphonies and operas for a Mozart festival spanning four concerts.

All the concerts are slated for Immanuel Presbyterian Church, located at 114 Carlisle Blvd. SE, scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 7; Sunday, Oct. 8; Saturday, Oct. 21; and Sunday, Oct. 22.

He’s “one of the most beloved composers, not only for the world, but for musicians,” said music director Roberto Minczuk. “Mozart’s music, its classical style, the refinement, the intonation, the transparency — it’s very deep music.”

The series opens with “Immortal Voices,” organized as an aural version of the 1984, Academy Award-winning film “Amadeus.”

“This would be better described as Mozart and Salieri,” Minczuk said. Antonio Salieri was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Vienna court rival.

The program opens with Mozart’s overture to “Don Giovanni,” then his Symphony No. 25, written when he was 17 years old. Next, the orchestra will play “Mozart & Salieri” by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

“The movie ‘Amadeus’ was inspired by the play,” Minczuk said. “The play was created and inspired by Pushkin’s story. The Pushkin story is the libretto for Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera. It’s basically a dialogue between Mozart and Salieri.”

Mozart’s beloved “Queen of the Night” aria from “The Magic Flute” follows, with a Salieri aria followed by Mozart’s “Requiem.”

“Mozart is composing this ‘Requiem’ when he dies,” Minczuk said. “Mozart never finished the ‘Requiem’ and that’s where we end.”

Slated for Sunday, Oct. 8, “Virtuosi Concerti & Symphony No. 40” combines Mozart’s concertos for eight instruments: the flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, harp, violin and viola.

“It’s the kind of concert you can only program in a festival setting,” Minczuk said. “It’s like a tasting menu.”

His Symphony No. 40 is likely his most famous, Minczuk said.

“It’s very dark, almost melancholy,” he said. “It’s toward the end of his life. It’s almost like he had a premonition of it being one of his last works.”

On Saturday, Oct. 21, “Operamania” features soprano Amy Owens and baritone Carlos Archuleta. The program opens with the composer’s famous “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” before diving into excerpts from “The Magic Flute,” “The Marriage of Figaro,” “Cosi fan Tutte” and “Don Giovanni.”

On Sunday, Oct. 22, “Jupiter and Beyond” stars a selection of piano music played by Akilan Sankaran, followed by Symphony No. 41, the “Jupiter.”

“We get to play his first piano concerto, written when he was 8 years old, and his last symphony,” Minczuk said.

The composer penned his 39th, 40th and 41st symphonies in a frenetic nine-week period in 1788. He died in 1791.

Tickets are $28-$72, plus fees, at holdmyticket.com or nmphil.org.