American Classical Orchestra performs “Enlightenment”
October 23 @ 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm
$15 – $45
Musicians from the American Classical Orchestra are performing “Enlightenment,” a chamber music performance of Mozart’s popular Clarinet
Quintet, featuring eminent historical clarinet specialist Elise Bonhivert, and Haydn’s Quartet “The Joke.”
Enlightenment
Irvington Theater
Friday, October 23, 2026, at 7:30 PM
Elise Bonhivert, basset clarinet
Edson Scheid and Aisslinn Nosky, violins
Jessica Troy, viola
Serafim Smigelskiy, cello
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Clarinet Quintet in A Major, K. 581
Joseph Haydn: Quartet in E-flat Major, Op. 33, No. 2 (“The Joke”)
Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet was dedicated to his friend and virtuoso clarinetist Anton Stadler. It is the composer’s only piece for this instrumentation and one of the first to exploit the clarinet’s agility and range. Premiered in 1789 in Vienna, the Quintet spotlights the clarinet’s then-untapped potential as a solo instrument and remains one of Mozart’s most beloved works. The soloist is Elise Bonhivert, a graduate of the Royal Conservatory of the Hague, who plays, makes, restores, and repairs clarinets, with a diverse collection of
more than 100 instruments of her own. In the early 1770s, Haydn began to experiment with the string quartet, writing witty divertimenti intended for entertainment. Around 1781, his Op. 33 “Russian Quartets” replaced the traditional minuet movement with a scherzo. Following its publication, the work quickly acquired the nickname Gli scherzi (The Jokes), with the second quartet of the Opus becoming known as Lo Scherzo (The Joke).
