By Sebastian Spreng, Visual Artist and Classical Music Writer

Here’s a riddle. What’s new but came of age a long time ago, bears the name of a composer but includes the work of others, is always held on Sunday but sometimes on Saturday, marks the end of the classical music season but stretches into summer?

You’re right! It’s the renovated Mainly Mozart Festival, which has moved to the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, the festival’s host city. Now produced by the Miami Chamber Music Society, a new organization that sponsored last year’s extremely successful season finale, the festival’s 11 scheduled concerts offer a varied, powerful menu.

With distinguished pianist Marina Radiushina as artistic director, the festival that George Volsky founded in 1993, guided by the indefatigable Frank Cooper and underpinned by conductor James Judd these past two years, now moves on sure footing toward its goals. One is keeping South Floridians interested in music when our torrid summer hits with full force. Another is bringing many of Miami’s top musical entities together under the powerful wing of good music and making their “products” available at affordable prices.

The festival kicks off on April 27 with Mozart’s Ave Verum and Bach’s Ich habe genug cantata, performed by Graham Fandrei, the Collegium Musicum, directed by Donald Oglesby, and a chamber ensemble led by Radiushina. The following Sunday, five members of the Florida Grand Opera Young Artist Program perform songs and arias accompanied by Marina Radiushina on the piano. On May 11, t the Sona String Quartet, plays Mozart, Egilsson, Tchaikovsky and Brahms, followed on May 18 by the Delray String Quartet playing Mozart, Salieri and Richard Danielpour, with the participation of oboeist Joseph Peters. On May 25, Canadian virtuoso Dmitri Levkovich performs, and the first Sunday in May, it’s the Amernet Quartet, performing Dvořak, Weber and Mozart’s Divertimento K. 563. On June 8, a special trio takes on a variety of violin, guitar and piano pieces, and on June 15, the Bergonzi String Quartet with Richard Todd tackle Mozart’s paradigmatic Quintet for Horn and Strings and Schubert’s Death and the Maiden.

The festival ends with a chamber feast at the Adrienne Arsht Center’s magnificent Knight Concert Hall on Sunday, June 22, with the Miami City Ballet and a dream trio composed of Marina Radiushina, Yi-Jia Susanne Hou on violin and outstanding Israeli cellist Amit Peled, back among us for a most promising concert.

255 Alhambra Circle, Coral Gables, Fl, 33134 (786) 556-1715 [email protected]

The festival’s beginnings, related by founders George Volsky and Frank Cooper.