THE Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Anvil Arts’ Orchestra in Association, returns to Basingstoke twice in February.

On Friday, February 6 at 7.45pm, hear Mozart Serenade for 13 wind instruments (Gran Partita), Mysliveček’s Wind Octet no. 2 (1777) and a Mozart selection from Don Giovanni.

The Serenade for 13 wind instruments is the grandest and most sumptuous of all Mozart’s wind serenades, but we have no idea for what occasion the OAE winds piece that opens this concert was written. You don’t need to remember its use in a crucial scene in the film Amadeus to realise that it is one of the composer’s most inspired works in any form.

Mysliveček, the greatest Czech composer of the eighteenth century, was a friend of the young Mozart, who described his music as full of “fire, spirit and life”. He made a huge reputation as an opera composer in Italy, but his wind music, drawing on the traditions of his native Bohemia, is also noteworthy.

The Viennese aristocracy of Mozart’s time loved to have wind band arrangements played at all sorts of social occasions, and this selection of music from Don Giovanni is a delight.

Then on Thursday, February 26 at 7.45pm, the OAE be joined by violinist Viktoria Mullova and conductor Adam Fischer for the Smetana Overture: The Bartered Bride, Brahms’ Violin Concerto and Dvořák’s Symphony no. 9 (From the New World).

The effervescent overture to Smetana’s most well-known opera opens this concert in style. Brahms’ violin concerto is built on a symphonic scale, to the point where the original version had the four movements traditional for that form.

Brahms replaced the middle two with one of his most beautiful adagios, and the finale is a vigorous Hungarian dance. Dvořák’s most famous symphony, written in America while filled with longing for his Czech homeland, has an apparently inexhaustible flow of melodies, with a justly famous slow movement at its heart.

We have a pair of tickets to the concert on February 6 to give away to a Gazette reader.

To be in with a chance, simply answer the following question: The OAE are also bringing two fun family concerts, OAE Tots, to The Anvil this season. On what date will this pair of concerts take place?

Email your answer, plus your name, address and contact telephone number to joanne.mace@basingstokegazette.co.uk or send the same details by post to OAE competition, Joanne Mace, Gazette House, Pelton Road, Basingstoke, RG21 6XD.

The winner will be picked at random from the correct entries received by 10am on January 29 and contacted shortly afterwards. Normal Newsquest rules apply. Good luck!