Written for Leipzig Gewandhaus concertmaster Ferdinand David, Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto was groundbreakingly original when it premiered in 1845, its innovations including dispensing with the orchestral introduction to have the violin enter almost immediately, and no breaks between its three movements but instead transition sections. Stylistically meanwhile, its beauty comes from its blend of Romantic expression with Classical elements such as the Mozartian detail of the orchestration, not least its woodwind writing. Perhaps the greatest surprise of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7—penned in 1811 off the back of a restorative spa retreat—is its sombre, magisterial second movement funeral march, because as whole this work is so very vigorously, joyously alive that Wagner described it as “the apotheosis of the dance”.