The first major concert of the anniversary festival sheds light on the golden age of music in Mannheim and Schwetzingen. Others took their measure from the orchestra of Elector Carl Theodor, which moved to Schwetzingen in the summer with his employer, from its vitality and perfection. Excellent virtuosos who performed as soloists in Europe’s musical capitals belonged to it. Leading figures such as the long-time concertmaster Christian Cannabich and the cellist Anton Fils, who died young, excelled as composers and brought out in their works the advantages of the orchestra, which seemed to others, such as Johann Christian, the youngest of the Bach sons, like a sound arcadia. Anton Schweitzer’s successful opera Alceste saw its best performances here. Niccolò Jomelli, a celebrity during his lifetime, refurbished his Arcadia conservata for Schwetzingen. A visit so inspired Francesco di Majo that he wrote the opera Alessandro for Mannheim. Das Neue Mannheimer Orchester, which Anders Muskens founded at the end of 2016 with the aim of reviving the spirit of that era with period instruments, recalls this golden age.