HK Academy for Performing Arts
British conductor and harpsichordist Trevor Pinnock will direct the orchestra of the Academy for Performing Arts in an all-Mozart concert on Friday.
This is Pinnock's fourth visit to Hong Kong since 2004 specifically to work with the student ensemble on 18th-century repertoire. He recalls the young players' lively response, saying it generated "extremely hard work, a lot of fun and some fine concerts".
Pinnock is recognised as one of the world's most influential performers in the interpretation of early music, usually taken to include music up to the end of the baroque era. So how does Mozart, the definitive classical period composer, fit into that time-frame? Pinnock says the term "early music" is very loose and can encompass practices extant long after the death of J.S. Bach in 1750.
"If we let it refer to the music of Bach and his sons, we should remember that Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach wrote his last symphonies only in the 1770s, just a few years before the Mozart symphonies we are performing," the 65-year-old says. "Stylistically, the worlds are not as far apart as some people might imagine."