Lisa Jacobs and her international string ensemble are at home in many environments. The fact that they perform without a conductor certainly does not mean they lack direction. Let yourself be lured into a refined musical journey through Europe, and briefly lose touch with the north. They begin in Austria-Hungary, with Haydn, where the band master brings out the best of a violin concerto. The next stop is with their northern neighbours, in the Czech Republic, with Antonín Dvořák and his son-in-law, Josef Suk. In the second segment, the group continues northward, with stops in Poland and Russia, although, is this really north? Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is known as the most European of Russians, and Henryk Wieniawski taught violin in Brussels. There, he gave a very young Eugène Ysaÿe several decisive lessons. In Ysaÿe’s Rêve d’enfant, perhaps we can hear a trace of those important encounters. The Belgian went on to became an absolute star, conquering all of Europe.