Mazeppa Auckland Castle, Bishop Auckland

A TWO-VIOLIN concert such as this one given by Mazeppa – Rhys Watkins and David Worswick opening Bishop Auckland Music Society’s summer series – is quite rare.

With David Worswick doing the arranging, they opened with three keyboard sonatas by Scarlatti, K.345 in A, K.502 in C and K.24 in A, all brilliantly virtuoso in performance, but rather too driven and unsubtle in overall effect. This also applies to Wieniawski’s two Etude-Caprices, op.18.

Mazeppa’s version by Liszt fared better in that it had a tale to tell that provided some light and shade to the performance. For me, the second half was more convincing, particularly the Handel/Halvorsen Passacaglia and J S Bach’s group of Four Inventions where sheer technical skills were at the service of musical expression.

This applied particularly to the most recently composed works of the evening, a selection from Luciano Berio’s all too brief 34 Duetti per Due Violini (1974-83). Next in the Auckland Castle concert series is on May 17 when the Busch Trio will play Mozart, Frank Bridge and Schubert. For tickets go to communigate.co.uk/ne/bms.

Dave Robson