Mr. Frost, who will also play works by Bartok and Brahms as well as klezmer selections in a late-night recital on Saturday, has drawn rave reviews for his scintillating technique. The New York Times described a 2013 performance of his at Carnegie Hall as “a paragon of lyricism: breathtaking in its pianissimos, utterly fluid in its legatos, gleaming in its ornamental flourishes.” Last year, The Guardian referred to “his extraordinarily pure tone, sinuous phrasing and seamless breathing technique.” But what Mr. Frost loves best about his own playing is the bit you don’t hear — or, rather, don’t know that you hear — as his breath sets the first vibrations in motion that begin to dislodge the silence that will soon grow into music.

“What makes it special is the moment when silence suddenly starts to vibrate,” he said. “Somewhere in that shadow land between silence and sound is the soul of the clarinet.”

Until Mozart, composers had not thought to probe the lyrical side of the instrument, which was then still far from its current form. It was his encounter with Anton Stadler — an instrument maker and virtuoso on both the clarinet and the deeper, more veiled-sounding basset horn — that inspired Mozart to write groundbreaking clarinet parts. Those included the Clarinet Quintet as well as the concerto, written a few months before his death in December 1791, as well as obbligato solos in operas like “The Abduction From the Seraglio” and “Idomeneo” in which the clarinet entered an equal relationship with the human voice.

“Before Mozart, there was almost nothing that could be compared with it,” Mr. Frost said. “In Haydn symphonies, the clarinets are used like trumpet parts. And suddenly Mozart came along with these mellow, long, singing lines. The way he treated the clarinet had to do with hope: Whenever he added them in his operas, it had something to do with hope.”