W.A. Mozart 20

Rec.:Northern Chamber Orchestra

    And for the 20th blog entry I thought I'd do a 20th symphony, because it won't be that long before I can't celebrate numbers that way here. Apparently written when Mozart (Wolfgang, we'll hit some Leopold Mozart I'm sure) was 16, because Mozart was a jerk and was trying to make the rest of history feel bad. This was interesting for me as well because generally I don't listen to too much of the middle area of Mozart symphonies.

    Probably the most interesting elements to me in the firs movement are some orchestration things and a pretty huge formal thing. Orchestrationally, the trumpets and horns are pretty foreground and have a decent amount of featured content, which isn't super rare or anything, but still noteworthy. The other thing is that this orchestra was using harpsichord to bolster the forte sections of the work, which I was surprised to hear basso continuo in a symphony this late number wise, but I suppose he was still pretty early in his career. It also isn't noted in the score that I looked at though, so maybe it was a historical choice on the part of the ensemble. The big interesting thing in here though is the form. The is virtually no introduction to the sonata-allegro form, which, again, I don't know enough about middle area Mozart symphonies to know if that is uncommon or not. The interesting thing to me though is that on the recapitulation of the form he swaps the order of the themes and presents the second one first. That would make this piece an ideal one to show experimentations on forms, because the change is easy to recognize and it still clearly follows the rules of the form.

    The middle movements are about what you'd expect, a slow binary movement and a minuet and trio. The noteworthy element in the second movement is the prominent featuring of the flute on the melody through most of it, typically in octaves with the violins. In the third movement, the thing that struck me the most is the use of sustained notes obscuring the usual clear cut dance feel of the movement. In particular, the trio has some interesting suspensions upon first listening.

    Another sonata form, this time in very toe-tapping 12/8. The harpsichord is back from the first movement on the loud sections. Otherwise, I'd note the use of old school sonata form, where the development and recapitulation are repeated as well. Overall, the symphony has some interesting elements here and there, but I can see why it isn't one of the top 40 hits of Mozart.