Closing Concert

Thursday 7 August 2025 – 9 PM
Collégiale Saint-Pancrace, Aups

The closing concert of our 1st Festival du Haut-Var will be led by a very special ensemble: the Trio à Cordes. By bringing together a violin, a viola and a cello, this ensemble enables composers to explore a wide range of colours and sonorities typical of string instruments.

Trio Opus 9 No. 3 is an early work by Ludwig van Beethoven. Essential to the development of his style and the string quartets he would later compose, this trio is full of passion and ardour, in a key that Beethoven particularly appreciated and that he would use for his famous 5th symphony: C minor. After the almost anxious ardour of the first movement, we blossom in the passion of the slow movement before being swept away by a passionate and energetic scherzo and finale.

You will then hear Richard Strauss's “Variations on a Bavarian Theme”, inspired by the theme “Das Dirndl is harb auf mi”. This short piece, composed in 1882 when Strauss was just 18, is nonetheless full of maturity and harmonic richness.

By inviting oboist Rebecka Neumann to join them on stage, our String Trio is giving itself the opportunity to explore a work that needs no introduction: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Oboe Quartet. The Austrian composer was particularly inspired in his compositions by the musicians he met, and the oboists are delighted today by his encounter with the virtuoso Friedrich Ramm, musician in the orchestra of the Prince Elector of Bavaria in Munich. In three movements, this quartet allows the oboe to express all its melodic and virtuosic qualities, touching us directly to the heart.

In France, a few years later, François Devienne also had the idea of combining a wind instrument and a string trio: he composed three quartets for bassoon and string trio. This virtuoso composer and musician, who is little known today, was nonetheless highly regarded in his day and was even dubbed ‘the French Mozart’ for his brilliant style and sense of melody.