Eine kleine Nachtmusik
Serenade No. 13 | |
---|---|
by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart | |
Other name | Eine kleine Nachtmusik |
Key | G major |
Catalogue | K. 525 |
Composed | 10 August 1787 |
Published | 1827, Offenbach am Main |
Duration | about 16 minutes |
Movements | Four |
Scoring |
Eine kleine Nachtmusik[a] (Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major), K. 525, is a 1787 composition for a chamber ensemble by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791). The German title means "a little night music".[b] The work is written for an ensemble of two violins, viola, cello and double bass, but is often performed by string orchestras.[3] The serenade is one of Mozart's most famous works.
Composition, publication, and reception
The serenade was completed in Vienna on 10 August 1787,[3] around the time Mozart was working on the second act of his opera Don Giovanni.[4] It is not known why it was composed.[5] Wolfgang Hildesheimer, noting that most of Mozart's serenades were written on commission, suggests that this serenade, too, was a commission, whose origin and first performance were not recorded.[6]
The traditionally used name of the work comes from the entry Mozart made for it in his personal catalog, which begins, "Eine kleine Nacht-Musik".[c] As Zaslaw and Cowdery point out, Mozart almost certainly was not giving the piece a special title, but only entering in his records that he had completed a little serenade.[7]
The work was not published until about 1827, long after Mozart's death, by Johann André in Offenbach am Main.[3] It had been sold to this publisher in 1799 by Mozart's widow Constanze, part of a large bundle of her husband's compositions.
Today, the serenade is widely performed and recorded; indeed, both Jacobson and Hildesheimer opine that the serenade is the most popular of all Mozart's works.[6][8] Of the music, Hildesheimer writes, "even if we hear it on every street corner, its high quality is undisputed, an occasional piece from a light but happy pen."[6]
Movements
The work has four movements:
I. Allegro
This first movement is in
- The first theme
II. Romanze: Andante
The second movement, with the tempo marked
III. Menuetto: Allegretto
The third movement, marked following the trio.
IV. Rondo: Allegro
The fourth and last movement is in lively
Possible extra movement
In the catalog entry mentioned above, Mozart listed the work as having five movements ("Allegro – Minuet and Trio – Romance – Minuet and Trio – Finale.").[7] The second movement in his listing — a minuet and trio — was long thought lost, and no one knows if Mozart or someone else removed it. In his 1984 recording, Christopher Hogwood used a minuet of Thomas Attwood (found in his sketchbooks used while he took lessons from Mozart), and an additional newly composed trio to substitute the missing movement. Musicologist Alfred Einstein suggested, however, that a minuet in the Piano Sonata in B♭ major, K. 498a, is the missing movement.[10] K. 498a, which is credited to the composer August Eberhard Müller, incorporates significant amounts of Mozart's work in the form of reworkings of material from the piano concertos K. 450, K. 456, and K. 595, leading Einstein to suggest that the minuet in Müller's sonata might be an arrangement of the missing movement from Eine kleine Nachtmusik.[citation needed]
In 1971, this movement was incorporated into a recording of the work prepared by the musicologist and performer Thurston Dart.[11] In 1989, the minuet and trio of K. 498a was again recorded as part of an arrangement of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik made by Jonathan Del Mar for Nimbus Records.[12]
See also
Notes and references
Notes
- ^ German pronunciation: [ˈaɪnə ˈklaɪnə ˈnaxtmuˌziːk].
- Grove Music Online.
- ^ The full entry reads (in German) "Eine kleine Nachtmusik, bestehend in einem Allegro.Menuett und Trio.–Romance.Menuett und Trio, und Finale.–2 violini, viola e bassi."; "A little serenade, consisting of an allegro, a minuet and trio, a romance, [another] minuet and trio, and a finale. For two violins, viola, and bass instruments." Mozart's "incipit" (quotation for identification purposes) consists of the first two bars of the first movement. The catalog is posted at the web site Archived 19 October 2012 at the Wayback Machine of the British Library.
References
- ^ Unverricht & Eisen 2001a.
- ^ Unverricht & Eisen 2001b.
- ^ a b c Holoman 1992, p. 397.
- ^ Einstein 1962, p. 206.
- ^ Holoman 1992, p. 398.
- ^ a b c Hildesheimer 1991, p. 215.
- ^ a b Zaslaw & Cowdery 1991, p. 250.
- ^ Jacobson 2003, p. 38.
- ^ Heartz 2009, p. 185.
- ^ Einstein 1962, p. 207.
- ^ Dart 1971.
- ^ Goodman.
Sources
- Dart, Thurston (1971) Chamber Music by Mozart at Discogs (list of releases)
- OCLC 31827291.
- Goodman, Roy. "Mozart, Eine kleine Nachtmusic". Nimbus Records. NI7023. Archived from the original on 26 April 2009.
- Heartz, Daniel (2009). Mozart, Haydn and Early Beethoven, 1781–1802. New York: W. W. Norton.
- ISBN 0-374-52298-7.
- ISBN 0-393-02936-0.
- Jacobson, Julius H. (2003). The Classical Music Experience: Discover the Music of the World's Greatest Composers. Vol. 2. narrated by ISBN 1-57071-950-0.
- .
- Unverricht, Hubert; Eisen, Cliff (2001b). "Notturno (It.: 'nocturnal')". Grove Music Online. .
- ISBN 0-393-02886-0.
External links
- Serenade in G. Eine kleine Nachtmusik KV 525: Score and critical report (in German) in the Neue Mozart-Ausgabe
- Eine kleine Nachtmusik: Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
- Performance of Eine kleine Nachtmusik by A Far Cry from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in MP3 format