Lost Vivaldi concerto discovered

A flute concerto by Vivaldi not seen for 250 years has been discovered at the National Archives of Scotland.

Andrew Woolley, a research fellow at Southampton University, came across the work when going through the Marquesses of Lothian's family papers.

The concerto, Il Gran Mogol, is one of a quartet of concertos, the rest of which have yet to turn up. Il Gran Mogol is complete except for a second violin part, which Woolley has been able to reconstruct from the manuscript of another flute concerto by Vivaldi, which appears to be a reworking of Il Gran Mogol.

It is thought that Il Gran Mogol ended up in Scotland courtesy of Lord Robert Kerr, son of the 3rd Marquess of Lothian. He was a keen flautist who undertook the Grand Tour of Europe in the early 1700s, like many young gentlemen of the time, visiting cultural sites and collecting souvenirs to take back to England. It seems that Il Gram Mogoli was one of them.

The concerto will be performed at Perth Concert Hall on 26 January next year, by flautist Katy Bircher, La Serenissima and Adrian Chandler. They will then record Andrew Woolley’s new edition of the work.