Die Kolneri/Willens - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Masonic Works, Cantatas and Funeral Music

Following their 11-disc cycle of Mozart�s piano concertos recorded with Ronald Brautigam, Die K�lnerAkademieand Michael Alexander Willensin 2017 released a disc with two of Mozart�s best-loved serenades: the PosthornSerenadeand EinekleineNachtmusik. The result was warmly received, for instance in the French magazine Classicawhere it was described as �a truly attractive disc to chase away the gloom� and on MusicWeb-International.com: �Die K�lnerAkademie� demonstrate once again that they are amongst the best groups in the world of period performance�. Joined by the tenor John Heuzenroederand the male voices of the K�lnerAkademieChoir, the team has now recorded the music that Mozart wrote for performance at Masonic gatherings. Mozart was himself a Mason during the last seven years of his life, and composed a number of songs and cantatas for various occasions. Best-known is probably the Masonic Funeral Music, K 477, heard here in a version ��Meistermusik� �devised by the Mozart scholar Philippe Autexierin an attempt to reconstruct the original performance of the piece. Also included are the four orchestral interludes to the play Thamos, K�nigin �gypten, fine examples of Mozart�s music in the �Sturm und Drang� tradition. Thamoswas written by the poet and Mason Tobias von Gebler, and parallels have frequently been drawn between it and the more overtly Masonic Magic Flute.