Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Requiem K. 626, Live Recording Expo 2015
Same artist
Da Vinci Classics
Benjamin Bernstein, Eleonora De Poi, Laura Verrecchia, Natalia Morozova
Physical Release: 16 October 2026
Digital Release: 23 October 2026
Coming soon · Available on the physical release date
Benjamin Bernstein was born in Paris in 1971. He studied viola with Stefan Kamasa, Vladimir Mendelssohn, and Mikhail Kugel, earning a Master’s degree from the Royal Conservatoire of The Hague. Benjamin also attended masterclasses with Yuri Bashmet, Bruno Giuranna, Valentin Feigin, Andrei Korsakov, Yuri Gandelsman, and Hatto Beyerle. He also achieved a Master’s degree in chamber music at the Duino international school under the guidance of the Trio di Trieste. He has enjoyed an extensive orchestral career, performing with the Orchestre National de Lyon, Moscow Soloists, and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. He also served as principal viola with the Orchestra dell’Emilia-Romagna Arturo Toscanini, Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Teatro Carlo Felice di Genova, Arena di Verona Orchestra, the São Paulo State Symphony Orchestra, and the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra. He is currently permanent principal viola of the Orchestra del Teatro Verdi di Trieste.. As a chamber musician, he has performed throughout the world in major festivals and concert seasons (Festival de Montpellier, Musikàmera in La Fenice, Venice, Festival Respighi, Bologna, Amici della musica in Modena, Udine, Targ center in Jerusalem, among others) in ensembles ranging from duo with piano to string sextet, as well as flute, viola, and harp trio, string quartet, and quintet formations, performing repertoire from the Baroque period to contemporary music. He has appeared as a soloist with the Orchestra di Padova e del Veneto, the Orchestra del Teatro Verdi di Trieste, and numerous chamber ensembles. He also performs on the viola d’amore, for which he is considered one of Italy’s leading specialists. Many of his concerts have been broadcast by Radio France, RAI 3, and other international broadcasters. He has recorded for several labels, including Urania Records, Brilliant Classics, and Da Vinci Classics. The albums dedicated to Heitor Villa-Lobos and Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, recorded with the Mark Rothko Ensemble, received unanimous acclaim in specialized magazines. In addition, two recordings of chamber music by Karl Weigl — including the world premieres of the Second Quartet, in which he also plays the viola d’amore, as well as the Fourth and Sixth Quartets and Lieder — were awarded five Diapasons by the renowned French review Diapason. Benjamin Bernstein has taught in numerous masterclasses at conservatories throughout Italy, including in Adria, Padua, Trieste, and Udine. He was viola professor at the Conservatorio Giacomo Puccini in Gallarate and taught chamber music at the Istituto Superiore di Studi Musicali Luigi Boccherini in Lucca.
Eleonora De Poi graduated with highest honours and special mention from the “A. Steffani” Conservatory in Castelfranco Veneto, later completing violin studies at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam and a Master’s Degree in Viola at the “B. Maderna” Conservatory in Cesena. She has studied with distinguished teachers and attended masterclasses with internationally renowned musicians. Winner of several national and international competitions, both as soloist and chamber musician, she has performed in prestigious venues including the Wiener Konzerthaus, Royal Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Shanghai Oriental Art Center, Teatro Dal Verme, and Palazzo Vecchio. She has collaborated with major orchestras as violinist and violist, often in principal roles. Permanent Principal Viola of the Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa, she graduated from the chamber music programme of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and has served as Principal Viola with several ensembles, including the Orchestra del Friuli Venezia Giulia and I Pomeriggi Musicali. Since 2024 she has appeared as Guest Principal Viola with the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana. In 2025 she recorded for Amadeus and became a member of the Quartetto Lino Liviabella.
Laura Verrecchia: Nata a Venafro (IS), nel 2007 inizia lo studio del canto lirico con il M° Antonella Sdoja, nel 2008 frequenta l’A.A. dell’Accademia Internazionale di Canto Lirico del Soprano Katia Ricciarelli. Nel 2010 interpreta il ruolo di Giannetta nell’opera “Elisir d’amore” diretta dal M° G. Pellegrino e regia di G. Guarino e il ruolo di Maddalena nell’opera “ Rigoletto” diretta dal M° R.Corlianò regia G. Guarino. Nel 2012 interpreta il ruolo di Donna Elvira dell’opera “Don Giovanni” diretta dal Maestro F. Zingariello con la regia di Katia Ricciarelli. Nell’agosto, in occasione del Gran Galà finale del “Festival Mario Lanza”, ha partecipato come ospite duettando anche con il Soprano Chiara Taigi. Nel dicembre 2013 ha vinto il premio "Special Award Grazia Cavanna" all' VIII° Concorso Lirico Internazionale "Rinaldo Pelizzoni". A settembre ha vinto il primo premio e il premio Teatro Massimo V. Bellini al'" IV Concorso Internazionale di canto ed. Europa Marcello Giordani" e lo scorso anno si è classificata al primo posto in occasione del "II Concurso internacional de canto Ópera de Tenerife".
Natalia Morozova was born in Moscow, where she began studying piano at the age of six at the Sergei Rachmaninoff Music School. She continued her education at the Central Music School of the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory with Tigran Alikhanov, a distinguished pianist and pupil of Lev Oborin, and later completed her studies at the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory, attending the advanced piano classes of Viktor Mergianov and Aleksander Mdoyants, as well as Alikhanov’s chamber music class. She graduated with highest honours in 2001 and obtained her doctorate with distinction in 2003. From 2003 to 2005, she further refined her artistic development in Italy at the International Chamber Music Academy of the Trio di Trieste in Duino. Throughout her career, Natalia Morozova has received numerous awards at prestigious international competitions, including First Prize at the Nikolai Rubinstein International Competition in Moscow (1997), First Absolute Prize at the X International Competition for Young Pianists “Roma 99”, First Prize with all special awards at the Taneev International Chamber Music Competition (Kaluga, 1999), First Prize in piano duo with Vitaly Younitsky at the Reding-Piette International Competition in Neuchâtel (2001), and First Prize at both the “Isole Borromee” International Competition and the “Camillo Togni” International Competition in Gussago. She maintains an active international career as both soloist and chamber musician, performing throughout Europe with orchestras such as the Basel Sinfonietta, the Ekaterinburg Symphony Orchestra, the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, the Moscow Soloists conducted by Yuri Bashmet, and the Camerata Venia of Geneva. Her performances have taken her to Russia, Switzerland, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, Austria, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, and Latvia, in venues including the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Salle Pleyel in Paris, the Chelsea Art Club in London, Teatro Verdi in Trieste, Teatro Alfieri in Turin, Teatro Puccini in Merano, Teatro Vittorio Emanuele in Messina, and the Sala Apollinea of Teatro La Fenice in Venice. She has also appeared for Radio Tre at the Cappella Paolina of the Quirinale. An accomplished chamber musician, she has collaborated with internationally renowned artists such as Maxim Vengerov, Gautier Capuçon, Renaud Capuçon, Julian Rachlin, and many others. Since 2010, she has been a member of the scientific committee of the European project “Primavera Musicale” at the Accademia d’Arti Discanto in Verona, where she regularly gives masterclasses. Since 2012, she has also served as a jury member of the UmbriaMusicFest International Piano Competition. Her discography includes a 2013 recording for Dinamec dedicated to Sigismund Thalberg, with works for solo piano and piano duo. In 2024, she released, for Aparté, a recording of the three violin and piano sonatas by Johannes Brahms with violinist Sergey Ostrovsky. Her repertoire, constantly evolving, spans from Baroque to contemporary music, combining stylistic rigour with interpretative depth and an ongoing dialogue with the great European pianistic tradition.
Benjamin Britten (b Lowestoft, 22 Nov 1913; d Aldeburgh, 4 Dec 1976). English composer, conductor and pianist. He and his contemporary Michael Tippett are among several pairs of composers who dominated English art music in the 20th century. Of their music, Britten’s early on achieved, and has maintained, wider international circulation. An exceedingly practical and resourceful musician, Britten worked with increasing determination to recreate the role of leading national composer held during much of his own life by Vaughan Williams, from whom he consciously distanced himself. Notable among his musical and professional achievements are the revival of English opera, initiated by the success of Peter Grimes in 1945; the building of institutions to ensure the continuing viability of musical drama; and outreach to a wider audience, particularly children, in an effort to increase national musical literacy and awareness. Equally important in this was his remaining accessible as a composer, rejecting the modernist ideology of evolution towards a ‘necessary’ obscurity and developing a distinctive tonal language that allowed amateurs and professionals alike to love his work and to enjoy performing and listening to it. Above all, he imbued his works with his own personal concerns, some of them hidden, principally those having to do with his love of men and boys, some more public, like his fiercely held pacifist beliefs, in ways that allowed people to sense the passion and conviction behind them even if unaware of their full implication. He also performed a fascinating, as well as problematic, assimilation of (or rapprochement with) the artistic spoils of the East, attempting an unusual integration of various non-Western musical traditions with his own increasingly linear style.
When Frank Bridge and his wife Ethel went to bid farewell to Benjamin Britten on 29 April 1939, shortly before his train departed for Southampton, where he would board a ship for America, Bridge presented him with his treasured Giussani viola. He knew he would probably never see his favorite composition pupil again. From the age of 18, Britten had studied composition privately with Bridge while officially attending the Royal College of Music under John Ireland. Their relationship extended far beyond purely musical matters. The elder composer became both a…
When Frank Bridge and his wife Ethel went to bid farewell to Benjamin Britten on 29 April 1939, shortly before his train departed for Southampton, where he would board a ship for America, Bridge presented him with his treasured Giussani viola. He knew he would probably never see his favorite composition pupil again. From the age of 18, Britten had studied composition privately with Bridge while officially attending the Royal College of Music under John Ireland. Their relationship extended far beyond purely musical matters. The elder composer became both a friend and a father figure, helping Britten cope with his loneliness in London. One of Britten’s first major works was the Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge for string orchestra, a testament to the deep artistic bond he shared with his mentor. The viola was Bridge’s professional instrument. Although he was also a pianist, his greatest achievements as a performer came as a member of a string quartet. Britten, meanwhile, was known throughout his life as an accomplished pianist, performing both as a duo partner and accompanist to his companion, Peter Pears, as well as to many of the leading musicians of his time. Yet from childhood he had been deeply fond of the viola, studying the instrument with Audrey Alston, a friend of his mother and a member of the Norwich Quartet. Alston, who was herself a friend of Bridge, introduced the young Britten to the master. Although Benjamin never performed publicly as a violist, he continued to play the instrument with pleasure throughout his life. Born in Brighton on 26 February 1879, Frank Bridge studied composition at the Royal Academy of Music. He initially earned his living as an orchestral and chamber musician before becoming a full-time composer under the patronage of Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge. An independent-minded artist, Bridge remained somewhat isolated within the Edwardian British musical world, being far more receptive to continental innovations, particularly French music. He composed symphonic works, ballets, and chamber music, including The Sea, Summer, and Lament, as well as two piano trios, four string quartets, a string sextet, and numerous songs.
Paradoxically, his original compositions for viola are relatively few. The three songs for mezzo-soprano, viola, and piano, written at the end of 1906 and the beginning of 1907, follow Brahms’s path through this marvelous tonal combination. The poems all deal with death and exile: Far, Far from Each Other (text by Matthew Arnold), Where Is It That Our Soul Doth Go? (Heinrich Heine, translated by K. F. Kroecker), and Music, When Soft Voices Die (Percy Bysshe Shelley). The last piece had originally been written in 1903 in an earlier version, in a different key, and for cello instead of viola. The songs received their first performance on 9 December 1908 at the Broadwood Concert Rooms, with Bridge at the piano. The contralto was Ivy Sinclair, Bridge’s sister-in-law, and the violist was Audrey Ffoulkes (Alston), who would give the première of the Pensiero and Allegro appassionato a year later. Pensiero and Allegro appassionato for viola and piano were published in 1908 by Stainer & Bell in the Viola Library series, edited by Lionel Tertis. The former was written in 1905 and the latter in 1907. These works reflect the two principal sides of Bridge’s musical personality: on the one hand, the elegiac, fragmented, and harmonically ambiguous style; on the other, the passionate, broad, and energetic writing. The Allegro appassionato bears many similarities to the introduction and exposition of the Phantasie Piano Trio, composed in the same year. The Lament and Caprice for two violas were written in 1911 and first performed at Aeolian Hall by Lionel Tertis and the composer. The great English violist would become one of the first internationally renowned soloists of this long-neglected instrument. He commissioned or inspired many English composers to write for the viola, among them Arnold Bax, Arthur Bliss, and William Walton. Following the première, all the performing material, as well as the original manuscript, was lost, leaving only sketches preserved in the library of the Royal College of Music. The Lament is almost complete and was prepared for publication in 1981, while the Caprice was reconstructed by Simon Rowland-Jones in 2018, with only minor interventions needed to connect the surviving fragments.
Here again we find a striking contrast between the mourning character of the Lament and the almost Mendelssohnian lightness of the Caprice, a characteristic feature of Bridge’s musical language. Unfortunately, Bridge never completed the viola sonata he began in 1935. Only sketches of an unfinished first movement survive. He died in Eastbourne on 10 January 1941, before Britten returned to England. Benjamin Britten was born in Lowestoft on 22 November 1913. His musical talent was evident from early childhood. He would establish himself as one of England’s greatest composers, achieving immense international success, with his opera Peter Grimes becoming a major classic of the twentieth-century repertoire. Above all, Britten was a composer for the voice. As founder of the English Opera Group, he sought to create the conditions for a revival of English opera, which had remained largely insignificant throughout the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth. To this end, he assembled a close circle of singers and instrumentalists. His lifelong partnership with the tenor Peter Pears inspired many vocal works in a wide variety of forms and settings. Other important collaborations also shaped his output: with the harpist Ossian Ellis, the guitarist Julian Bream, and the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. These partnerships gave rise to numerous instrumental masterpieces, including a suite for solo harp, a sonata for cello and piano, three suites for solo cello, the Cello Symphony, and three string quartets. Nonetheless, Britten’s outspoken pacifism and his homosexuality often left him feeling alienated from British society. Although he maintained close relations with members of the Royal Family, he tried to spend as little time as possible in London, never severing his ties with his native Suffolk. There, together with Peter Pears, he founded the Aldeburgh Festival, which would become one of the world’s leading musical festivals. Britten’s arrangement of Bridge’s ballet There Is a Willow Grows Aslant a Brook—inspired by Gertrude’s narration of Ophelia’s death in Hamlet (Act IV, Scene 7)—reveals the deep bond between master and pupil. The music is highly atmospheric and vividly descriptive, closely following Shakespeare’s text. Britten attended a London performance of the ballet by the Camargo Company in December 1932. A few days after receiving the score from Bridge, he embarked on a reduction of the work for their shared instrument, the viola, and piano. Britten’s attachment to the piece is also evident in the Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, where it appears as a quotation in the Fugue. In 1948, with the blessing of Ethel Bridge, the composer’s widow, Britten also prepared a reduced orchestration of the ballet for the Aldeburgh Festival.
Reflexion and Elegy are two early works written in 1930, while Britten was still living in his parents’ home in Lowestoft, Suffolk. In them, the young composer expresses his intimate and troubled thoughts after a difficult experience at college and before beginning a new life in London. His affinity with the viola as a deeply personal medium is already apparent. In Reflexion, the influence of Bridge—especially of his Second Piano Trio—is unmistakable. Yet the mastery of form and harmony displayed by such a young composer is remarkable. Elegy was written the day after Britten left school. In his diary he noted: “I didn’t think I should be sorry to leave.” Both works were published only after his death. Britten’s only official work for viola is Lachrymae, Op. 48, commissioned by the great Scottish virtuoso William Primrose. It was written and first performed at Aldeburgh in 1950, with Britten himself at the piano. Britten often attracted some of the finest performers of his time to his festival by promising them works specially composed for the occasion. Having neglected the piece while occupied with his opera Billy Budd, Britten received a phone call from Primrose asking when he might expect the score. Britten replied that it was already in the mail—then proceeded to write the work overnight. Lachrymae is a tribute to one of Britten’s favorite English composers, John Dowland. Its title echoes several works written for viol consort. The ten variations do not present the theme at the outset; instead, each explores sharply contrasting atmospheres and emotions through a variety of instrumental techniques, including pizzicato, chords, and harmonics. Britten bases the work not on a single theme but on two related ideas, with the original Dowland melody emerging clearly only at the very end, providing a deeply moving conclusion. Britten would pay tribute to Dowland once again in 1963 with the Nocturnal, Op. 70, for guitar, written for Julian Bream. In the final year of his life, he also arranged the piano part of Lachrymae for string orchestra at the request of Cecil Aronowitz. Benjamin Britten died in Aldeburgh on 4 December 1976 leaving an indelebile mark on twentieth century music.
Benjamin Bernstein © 2026
Available from 16 October 2026.
