There may have been no birthday cake served for Mozart’s party on Thursday night, but patrons at Roy Thomson Hall were treated to fulsome cuisine, complete with one serenade, one piano concerto, one sonata and, for dessert (flambéed, of course), a symphony.

Ever since TSO director Peter Oundjian established the annual Mozart event in 2005, it has become a favourite for symphony regulars, who come out in droves to warm up to the music from the eternally youthful Mozart.

Opening with the Serenade No. 6, K. 239 “Serenata notturna,” violinist Jonathan Crow led the appetizer through a good pace. It’s a curious work, which is at once fragile yet comical. Each member of the embedded string quartet offered interpolated cadenzas to great effect; especially the double bass, which was played so improbably that one can hardy believe the work was written in 1776: a testament to the Salzburg prodigy himself…

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[Originally published in the Toronto Star.]

Michael Vincent