WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART HIS GREATEST STRING QUARTETS
String Quartet No. 14 in G Major, K. 387 "Spring"
I. Allegro vivace assai 07:48
II. Menuetto. Allegro 08:24
III. Andante cantabile 07:38
IV. Molto allegro 05:40
String Quartet No. 15 in D Minor, K. 421 /417B
I. Allegro Moderato 07:36
II. Andante 06:35
III. Minuet and Trio. Allegretto 03:47
IV. Allegretto ma non troppo 09:17
String Quartet No. 16 in E-Flat Major, K. 428
I. Allegro non Troppo 07:01
II. Andante molto 06:12
III. Menuetto - Allegro 05:48
IV. Allegro vivace 05:16
String Quartet No. 17 in B-Flat Major, K. 458 "Hunt"
I. Allegro vivace assai 06:32
II. Menuetto. Moderato 04:08
III. Adagio 07:10
IV. Allegro assai 04:48
String Quartet No. 18 in A Major, K. 464
I. Allegro 07:15
II. Menuetto 06:08
III. Andante 13:16
IV. Allegro non troppo 05:14
String Quartet No. 19 in C Major, K. 465 "Dissonant"
I. Adagio. Allegro 08:33
II. Andante cantabile 07:28
III. Menuetto. Allegro 05:02
IV. Allegro molto 05:56
String Quartet No. 20 in D Major, K. 499 "Hoffmeister"
I. Allegretto 07:05
II. Menuetto. Allegretto 03:09
III. Adagio 08:44
IV. Molto allegro 04:52
String Quartet No. 21 in D Major, K. 575 "Prussian Quartet No. 1"
I. Allegretto 07:43
II. Andante 04:32
III. Menuetto. Allegro 05:40
IV. Allegretto 06:02
String Quartet No. 22 in B-Flat Major, K. 589 "Prussian Quartet No. 2"
I. Allegro 06:12
II. Larghetto 06:22
III. Menuetto - Moderato 06:18
IV. Allegro assai 03:47
String Quartet No. 23 in F Major, K. 590 "Prussian Quartet No. 3"
I. Allegro moderato 08:47
II. Andante 05:59
III. Menuetto. Allegretto 03:53
IV. Allegro 04:54
No music plays itself -- but the balance of creative and recreative roles varies for each composition, and the means by which a balance is struck must agree with the ideal of the music. Mozart, in that light, is crystalline. With Beethoven, by contrast, one strives and the struggle does not harm but rather enhances a music which is muscle and bone; with Haydn, an everpresent wit and unfailing instrumental sense give freedom; a music of belly and brain But there is no more sensitive litmus for the interpreter than Mozart: between the acid of “notes only” performance practice where the music is presumed to speak for itself, and the base of personality cult--between these is perfect Mozart.
At their 40th anniversary the Amadeus Quartet faced an interviewer whose preamble sketched their inimitable style, their hundreds of tours, thousands of concerts, and worldwide esteem before asking if, after all those accomplishments, any challenge remained for them As one they shouted: “Mozart!”
Why? Because no other repertory demands such balance, clarity, grace, and polish; because it is essentially vocal; because it bruises easily in the dissection and reconstruction by which other music is beneficially rehearsed -- all these beliefs have their adherents, and the gospel for a wild-eared few is that Mozartean perfection is itself an imperfection.
What remains is that while his quartets survive a multiplicity of interpretations, there is for each ensemble only one right way to play each piece each night. That the interpretation will grow in the learning process is a necessity: that it can evolve in the spontaneity of performance is an enhancement -- but the way it ought to sound is something you hear in your head as soon as you look at the page. This mirrors the process as it was for Mozart himself: to hear a new work in the mind’s ear, he needed relative peace and quiet; once the composing was complete he could set it
down as fluently as many wrote words, faster than most could copy music, and do it moreover, in the tumult of his household, while conversating, trading billiards shots, or listening to other music. His prodigious gifts hardly need elaboration here, but the reflection is plain: he heard it in his head and set it on the page: there we see it and thus we hear it in ours. After that our aim is simply to avoid getting our mortal thumbprints all over it
Mozart had a cellist in mind when he composed the quartets K 575, 589 and 590: King Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia -- thus the high relief of the lowest voice in these, the 5 “Prussian” quartets, Yet Mozart transcends mere favor-seeking, showing instead how the personality and interdependence of the quartet could be recast by standing it on its crown.
Where is the royal instrument as the violins and viola begin the work with a three-handed duet? Imperially late -- just enough to come in by the treble entrance, a mere octave away from the violins. And so the movement continues, with effortless (-sounding) lyricism bestowed almost evenly: the second theme is exposed by cello and first violin, but at the recap (otherwise a mirror) it is played by first violin and viola. Thus the question (posed this time by symmetry) reappears: where’s the cello?
Enthroned in the next movement comes the answer In this rare Larghetto a soaring melody and ingenious accompaniment answer for all things, except perhaps the omission of repeats For that, the blame rests with the third movement and its abundant Trio, driven by an engine of eighth- and sixteenth-notes to keys as remote as Db major, and over twice the length of its Menuetto.
“It was from Haydn that I first learned the true way to compose string quartets, ” said Mozart, and his assimilation of Haydn’s discoveries was complete years
before 1790, so it is conscious and light-hearted respect which draws the younger man to paraphrase a theme from the Haydn opus where he learned the most
The finale of Opus 33 No. 2 is a joke that of K, 589 is a gentle observation on the nature of that joke, for Mozart did not compete where he could not win and triumphed where no other could compete.
Adept on several instruments, Mozart was attuned to instrumentalists, We do not champion works merely for the passages that may win us praise, nor do we wrestle with those whose only strength is abstraction The composer's expectations of the recreative act admit us to his thinking; as we keep repeating that Mozart night after night' there is much to learn
The darkness of the Quartet in D or, K. 421 is made universal by its sense of privacy-- the obverse of confiding in a stranger; this music weeps wordlessly to those who wish to know and who would listen again. It is his only mature quartet in a minor key, and from first to last it sustains a hopeless agitation.
That agitation has a single source for the entire work The eighth-notes which urge the opening theme evolve to sextuplets, muttering beneath the material which closes the exposition The first sextuplet is a rising triad whose last note is thrice repeated. The rhythmic unease is deepened by the first violin's answer to the middle voices sixes: the figure is displaced by one-sixth of a beat, and this unchecked stammer brings the recapitulation.
The only movement to begin in major, the Andante manages two bars of seeming indifference to the pathos it follows -- but listen closely to the third: no mere bridge to a repeat of the first two but a rising triad whose last note is thrice repeated -- an early hint of what lurks even in the apparent Arcadia of F major In texture, the movement alternates between imitation and unity: these, punctuated with pauses from the very
first bar, give the sense of a melody looking over its shoulder. Once the ear has found the worrisome
element, it can almost hear no other, tainting the innocence of the movement's last cadence.
Where the slow movement compressed the first movement' s agitation into uncertainty, the Menuetto rages in the open.
Recognizing the numbing risk of unrelieved lament, Mozart offers a Trio built on a graceful tremor, with steps and leaps accompanied as lightly as possible -- a 24-bar postponement of the grim da capo.
Mozart composed K 421 having absorbed the quartets of Haydn's Op. 33. His growing craft and his respect for Papa Haydn are displayed in all six of the quartets dedicated to the elder master, and the finale of K 421 offers the most obvious evidence. (Hear the finale of Haydn's Op. 33 no. 5). But the homage of paraphrase, while sincere, is a formality here, demonstrating not only how far Mozart had taken Haydn's advances but how thoroughly the darkness of the D minor envelops its materials By the time we reach the coda, the element that haunts this work has evolved again: in triplet form it is heard loud and soft and in each voice, emerging at last in awful aspect to swallow the piece
The six quartets dedicated to Haydn begin with the G major K 387, a great leap beyond the K 168-173 set which reflect a fascination with Haydn's Op. 20 quartets. But ten years passed since he tossed them off during four months' prodigal-concertizing in Vienna By contrast, the "Haydn" Mozarts took two years to complete, and the unprecedented number of revisions and corrections in the manuscripts testify to the "lunga, e laboriosa fatica" that the usually facile Mozart admitted to Haydn.
K. 387 engages immediately. The first theme sweeps into development before five bars are heard, and the
illusions commence. The opening phrase endures alternations of forte and piano which are minutely jarring: classical practice allows echoes of whole ideas, but these dynamics don't fit the phrase.
Dynamic markings, usually sparse, now a feature: 45 of them in the 55-bar exposition alone, with bar thirtyseven as a pinnacle: one dynamic per note! Mozart's wit plays on expectation: the interruptive markings must tease the phrases without harming them, and the staggered-entry crescendi, weak-beat emphases, and all the sleight-of-hand should briefly mislead the listeners, not derail them - the difference between tongue-in-cheek and tongue protruding.
The Menuetto turns on a deceptive axis too. The giddy illusion that what must be in 3/4 time is now in 2/4 outHaydns Haydn. The Trio contrasts greatly -- a somber unison in the tonic minor -- yet still with block dynamics, reminding us of something.
A respite from phrases plagued by their dynamics and minuets flying false meters comes in the Andante cantabile. This is the movement one sinks into gratefully, the "ahh" of the open C denoting the pleasure of bathing in resonance at just the right temperature. Mozart knew his instruments but anyone who knows their open strings will understand why the steam continues to rise after this movement has rippled its last. From the sweet fancy of the first violin's embroidery, to the triplet lines threaded singly and by fours, and the absolute inevitability of the rest-step return to the recapitulation -- neither player nor listener needs more to absorb.
Fresh from our bath, we step one by one into the bracing current of a fugue. Or fugue shaped-object, for in taking on a challenge raised by Haydn, Mozart reshapes some theories. He melds fugue with sonata as never before in the Molto Allegro finale, and Haydn was impressed. When he proclaimed that Mozart had "the
greatest knowledge of the science of composition, " this is what he was talking about.
Keys open works. The choice of key signals what we may expect to find expressed in a work, once the composer's predilections are known. Nobility is rare in b minor, introspection uncongenial to Eb. The key must suit the medium too: string quartets in E major are rare for good reasons -- the key is unremiting ly bright, and all those sharps stretch the play ers' hands, making good intonation costlier. Mozart and Beethoven played and knew., and both eschewed E; Schubert sampled it once, early. Haydn pioneered four quartets in E but only one of these was after Op. 17. Yet relax one halfstep and the shoe fits: in Eb ten quartets from Haydn, two from Beethoven, one from Schubert, and from Mozart three string quartets and the final viola quintet. A similar distribution from all four composers in Bb, C, and D major reinforces the idea of right keys.
D major is as close to a home for strings as C is for piano. Besides the hand, it fits the instruments, as tonic, subdominant, and dominant all fall on open strings, and reinforcement rings forth from the low Ds of viola and cello. No wonder that D major ties for second as Mozart' s favorite string chamber music key. The wonder is that the two adult D major quartets are consecutive. K. 499 was completed in August of 1786, and K. 575 in June of 1789.
In the six quartets dedicated to Haydn we find that all the "popular" string quartet keys are represented save D, so the creation of the Quartet in D, K. 499 may have paid two debts: one to publisher Anton Hoffmeister, who commissioned the work, and one to the key in which he had written no string chamber music for 14 years. Hoffmeister loaned Mozart money and was repaid with a quartet which he published immediately, thus K. 499 is the only quartet which did not appear as part of a set. That the next quartet is also in D may be only coincidence, as much music appeared between K.
499 and K 575 great ("Prague" Symphony, the C major and minor Viola Quintets, the Clarinet Quintet, Don Giovanni), but there are resemblances between the two, and we note once more that no D major string chamber works were written in the three years which separate them.
K. 575 was the first of a projected set of six which were to have been dedicated to Friedrich Wilhelm II, King of Prussia Mozart completed only three, from June 1789 to June 1790. There are tantalizing fragments of complementary works in the rare and rarer keys of g minor and e minor (Even Haydn never essayed an e minor quartet; none came until Beethoven's second "Razumovsky, " of 1807.) In the end, Mozart neither finished the set nor succeeded in dedicating them to the King: instead, he sold K. 575, K. 589, and K. 590 to the firm of Artaria for a "wretched sum" of ready cash. And not only was the reward less than kingly, he never actually got it: both publication and payment came after his death.
Beyond the neutral, familiar, string-friendly key they share, differences distinguish K. 499 from K. 575. K 499 unison opening skips around in its triad to settle on the dominant in bar 3, where five A quarter-notes prove irresistible to Mozart: he begins to develop the phrase even before it is complete By contrast, K 575 begins with a triad in root position, and its repeated quarter-notes are the motor of accompaniment. In brief, K 499 begins with familiar textures and novel phrase-shapes, where K. 575 plays on textural expectation, delivered in more regular servings.
The two works also contrast in larger structure: the second movement of K. 499 is the minuet, as in four of the six quartets dedicated to Haydn Whereas the minuet comes third in K. 575, as in its sister works K. 589 and K 590. The sizes of the first movements offer one explanation K 575 has only one repeat, so its first movement is a brief 193 (or 270) bars: K. 499 is that
long even without its two repeats, and if both are taken, the first movement runs to more than 500 bars. After this, dance movement brevity is welcome.
Pursuit of royal favor colors the Andante of K, 575 -but softly. The cello does not draw the ear with melody but rather with its independence from the texture of the upper three voices. The concertante style implies much imitation, thus the second themelet is given to each voice in turn, but equality is dispensed with as the cello returns and closes the subject, Familiar roles continue to be exchanged until first violin and cello trade dolce compliments and evaporative scales to close the movement with calm certainty.
In K 499 textures are similarly varied, but the focus is neither that variety nor the preeminence of any single voice. This Adagio is longer and slower than K. 575’s Andante, and its nature is thoroughly lyric The way of this music is walked by pairs, a third apart, and that richness lends a quiet force to its duo themes, as well as a shared privacy to its solo utterances One may also call it a violin-flavored movement -- not only because viola/cello comes second in the exchanges, but also because of the key All four instruments are most alike on open strings, and in G major the listener can feel home at the bottom of the violins' range. With florid passagework in the first violin Mozart simply reflects tradition; solo cello moments in good registers he wisely alternates with doubled middle voices -- in short, the textures are less self-conscious here, and when any one voice leaves the others it is for the highest musical purpose, as first violin in bars 82-89, the cli max of the movement K 575's Andante is not the result of ear or eye less keen -- it is simply that in K. 499 Mozart aimed higher and, as ever, hit the mark.
The two finales demonstrate that the divergence of musical means is cumulative: similarities due to key and medium are outweighed by the relationship of one movement to the next in both works. To balance its
first movement, K. 499's Molto Allegro is not overlarge at 383 bars, (although with both repeats a length of 716 deters even the most zealous repeater) Whereas the finale of K. 575 serves the work it concludes with modest length (230 bars) and moderate tempo (Allegretto)
The emendation of K. 499's tempo (adding "Molto" to Allegro") is credibly held to be Mozart's own, and it gives the listener even less time to examine this movement's guile. The first bar sounds so much like an upbeat, and the pauses in bars 4 and 8 seem so ripe for extra-musical sound (even presuming audiences in good health), that only very regular phrase-lengths manage to veil the deception and sustain the (very Haydn-like) rests. But when ten bars spent on the dominant seventh chord reach a fermata in bar 38, one wonders whether it was all introduction up to there And what's in an intro? For many, mere prologue, a first stage to be jettisoned when the movement proper begins; for Mozart the Recycler, it is the makings of the movement.
Another level of confoundment lies in the apparent character. Brisk, playful D major brio is not quite that. The motoric trìplets race the curves and the straightaways, but the aim is not virtuosity, nor is the effect lighthearted. It is instead a nervous energy which dares not trip in its search for some repose. Those two long repeats begin to look like a means of expending the nervous energy, and it is only at the coda that three sustained voices halt the drive of triplets. At that, the movement may be said to end in a truce
The final Allegretto of K. 575 relates so closely to the first movement that the ear's focus alters from what is being played to who plays it. Resonant key and a singing cello register are employed to feature rather than assert, while the underpinning of viola-as-cello elevates cello to king for a phrase. Interplay holds the stage as the first violin partners cello and second violin
in phrase sharing very reminiscent of the great c major Quintet K.515. Yet there is an ease and a confidence in the Allegretto which simply need not strive When the final return accentuates the economy of building on theme-parts, simplicity of texture makes Mozart's purpose clear: to assure that the work will close without unwanted novelty. And so it does.
That Mozart’s sense of a key's possibilities is grounded in instrumental knowledge and much experiment can be seen in earlier works. The Bb major Quartet, K. 159 is striking in that regard It is new
The piece is introduced by the second violin, properly accompanied, until the first violin awakes with a start during an extension of the initial 8-bar phrase, jarring his colleagues Somewhat. The quartet is heard as two duos much of the time, joining for the simplest of scales at the ends of exposition, development, and movement. As with much early Mozart, tempo choice critically affects character, and a pulse of two-to-a-bar must be carefully weighed against the Andante marking. The Allegro second movement, however, leaps into the proper pace, its vigor dispelling the fuzzy, questing nature of its predecessor and stamping on its tail. With its Milanese kin, K. 159 has but three temperaments to display, and for the finale Mozart chooses saucy charm. This rondo, almost redundantly marked Allegro grazioso, presents a sampler of cheerful rhythms and textures as its music-box theme twists from peekaboo to youthful flirtation. A silvery encore for a program of dearer metal.
How does it feel to perform Mozart? we are sometimes asked. Our sensations include awe, but vary with the works Even the awe is a bit checkered: Mozart is great, all Mozart’s quartets are Mozart, but not all Mozart's quartets are great.
Do we invest more concern in the thirteen early works than the composer did? We certainly spend more time
rehearsing them than he took writing them, and it can be a subliminal annoyance, while examining and while examining and debating the meanings of countless nuances, to hear Mozart's laughter in the mind's ear.
Not so for the F major K. 590. Its brittle, Jack-in-thebox welcome may tickle the listener, but to the players Mozart cries, "En garde!" Despite textural similarities to its fellow-Prussians K. 575 and K. 589 (in the first movements) and a superficial kinship with K. 421 (in the Andantes), the truth is that there is nothing like K 590. Naturally there are technical hurdles in all the quartets, but speaking relatively, K. 590 is a highmaintenance piece, and that -- combined with the singularity of its expression -- requires a special concentration and colors our approach.
The thirteen early Mozart quartets are not often heard in concert, and can offer freshness (or candid glimpses) Our play is work only to the extent that we must decide whether to disguise or feature what awkwardness is there, while trying not to let our knowledge of his later work color our interpretations But his early works do not daunt in concert.
Not so for the F major K 590 Its brittle, Jack-in-thebox welcome may tickle the listener, but to the players Mozart cries, "En garde!" Despite textural similarities to its fellow-Prussians K 575 and K 589 (in the first movements) and a superficial kinship with K. 421 (in the Andantes), the truth is that there is nothing like K. 590 Naturally there are technical hurdles in all the quartets, but speaking relatively, K. 590 is a highmaintenance piece, and that -- combined with the singularity of its expression -- requires a special concentration and colors our approach.
The need to provide moments in the sun for the cello, (instrument of the intended patron), led Mozart to concertante writing in the "Prussian" quartets, especially in the more learned" outer movements
Themes tossed between two voices (or awarded democratically to each of the four) make the shapes and lengths of some phrases predictable. Some scholars lament this as a regression from the advances of the "Haydn" and "Hoffmeister" quartets, but in fact Mozart's earliest quartets illustrate that he was always able to build with both symmetrical and asymmetrical blocks And in any case, once performers have learned how to breathe in five or seven-measure phrases, our task is the perennial one of shifting nimbly amongst the quartet-players roles: soloist, duet-partner, and accompanist. We change hats while our hands are full.
Given that each part will have its solo, textural variety often becomes a matter of simple contrast, thus Mozart starts us in unison. Rare in his quartets, unison openings focus attention baldly, and this one jolts at the third note with a sudden forte, followed by a tame version all in one dynamic. And as for predictable phrase-lengths, that's a matter of opinion: the first measure may be a downbeat, the fourth measure could be a pick-up to a two-measure phraselet; but the seventh measure is absolutely a pick-up to a classic eight measure phrase! So, as noted above, we adjust our breathing and fence with other problems -- the key of F major, for instance For viola and cello the harmonic fabric of F has an acoustic wrinkle. Where the dominant (C) is our deep and resonant open string, the tonic (which would ideally ring more) is F, home to muddy wolf-tones which we must subdue with respectful firmness.
Thin ice is remarkably clear: K. 590's Andante is very simple. Here two hazards are joined, one specific and one broad The theme has as one much silence as sound, so find a way to make the rests sing. Do that, and you discover that different rests sing differently.
The general problem is that of tempo: in a texture as limpid as this, even small differences change the character markedly
Mozart addressed this, ambiguously. In the manuscript he wrote "Allegretto" , while the first edition prints "Andante" . Scholars are divided. Since publication came after Mozart's death, he can hardly have proofread it. On the other hand, there are so many alterations in the printed edition that we assume Mozart must have made them (even allowing for the creative sort of editor). Faced with the music and no tempo-word, our guide would be instinct. Yet provided with the Allegretto/Andante choice, we can better sense a character, and we are most influenced here by the difference between the fastest acceptable six-beat measure and the slowest two. We opt for a pulse of two.
If the little rhythmic snaps introduced by the viola in the second half of the movement sound familiar, one should compare the Trio of the D Minor K. 421. Though they are theme there and commentary in K. 590, we hear the echo when we play the later work.
The amiable Menuetto extends ideas from the Andante, opening with the intervals of the snaps and proceeding with their rhythm. And their cadential use in the Trio affirms the kinship with K 421.
The Allegro finale exemplifies the subjectivity of ease and difficulty from three viewpoints, those of composer, performer. and listener. Mozart's opinion on the challenge of writing quartets is well-known. At times he sounds almost surprised that he Mozart, must labor so. Yet it is a matter of scale: Beethoven could spend a year on one quartet and then return to it for a complete revision. Brahms discarded perhaps twenty quartets before producing three which met his standards So after sketching several possible finales to K. 575 and K. 589. Mozart was glad to find that the finale of K. 590 bubbled forth unimpeded. In the making, it was easy.
In the playing it is another matter. Stage actors have a rule about fight scenes: however many times the players may have repeated it, combat must he rehearsed for each performance. And so it is with certain quartet movements "Why. one may hear (or say). "it's nothing but a pack of scales" . But these scales double back on themselves as they rise and fall through the ensemble's seventeen digits, and while the patterns fit a keyboard (where likely they first rippled). they can make a springboard of the fingerboard. And once mastered, the movement ought to project jazzy ease.
Any sense of the performers striving is a distraction for listeners -- unless they are also string players or readers of notes, since this white-knuckled few will share in a drama quite at odds with Mozart's aim.
Whereas the great good cheer of the B-flat Major K. 458 ("Hunt") unites the three perspectives. Not to suggest by any mean's that one can sleep through the
"Hunt" , but this work has relatives among Mozart's (and Haydn's) quartets which make acquaintance
"aulder" . Respecting its difficulties we can still say that this quartet is as easy as Mozart gets. Which isn't very, but when we see it chosen for any given concert we may think, "Well, we know how we'll feel going on to play the work that follows it."
The jaunty opening holds the key to the movement's appeal. The horn-call's falling thirds provide all Mozart needs for a witty workout. Perhaps none of it is "learned" , but it is clever and -- most of all -- fun.
The Minuetto is unusual in its usualness. An ample Moderato survives some off-beat accents and a subito piano completely unharmed, and its Trio proceeds in the same key, offering contrast only in texture and dynamic. The scheme is similar to the minuet and trio of K. 590.
A moderate minuet frees Mozart to make the slow movement tempo an Adagio, and this is one beyond praise Just as certain early works spoke of things to come, so this Adagio presages music beyond Mozart's day -- even to Schubert and Beethoven. It has everything, and if it sounds like a joy to play, you're right.
The finale first looks like another attempt to out-Haydn Haydn, seasoned with reminders of what happens if we fail to keep our bowarms supple. But there is more to it, for composer and for player Sketches exist of two false starts, one a Polonaise which Mozart abandoned after 65 measures, and the other a thirteen-measure study which is cousin to the final version Among other changes, Mozart eliminated a rather silly tag from the theme, and he reordered some developmental ideas to better effect, but his reconsideration of the tempo affected our sense of that elusive and powerful variable.
The finale is marked "Allegro assai" , which can mean either "lively enough" or "plenty lively" . Some composers used it in place of (or ahead of) Presto ("fast"), but either way, the next notch has always been Prestissimo ("fastest"), so it is most interesting to find that Mozart had originally sketched this theme in Prestissimo. Quite a few of his second thoughts on tempo markings are downward revisions. None of us objects in this instance, for what we lightly call "purely musical reasons" .
Imagining Mozart's laughter can bring our rehearsals down to earth, but to perform his music well one must aim higher. Michael Tree of the Guarneri Quartet said it for all of us: "You know [with Mozart] that if you come out and sit down wrong, you're sunk!". It is music where everything matters.
When a concert program includes a Mozart quartet, that work speaks for him that evening.
Whatever its specific characteristics, it's "the Mozart" , distinct from the Beethoven, Brahms, or Bartok heard with it On the other hand an all-Mozart evening, a series of such, or a recorded cycle frees us to consider a given piece in the context of all the Mozart quartets. Without being seduced into mere comparison we can then enjoy the reward of perspective.
Throughout the six quartets dedicated to Haydn we find astonishing ingenuity in his tributes to Haydn; and the lyric element which distinguishes Mozart is more or less constant; even his explorations of keys and forms in the twenty-four movements of these quartets are habitual, in a way. But in K. 464 the expression is inward, the art is often concealed, and the concern seems less for the listener than for the composer himself.
An atypical key and a 3/4 meter set it apart right away. More democratic part-writing damps virtuosic display, and then there are the themes: the first meandering down some 8thnotes to rise on quarters; the second rising on quarters to noodle down some triplets, and all with plenty of breathing room (that is, rests) between statements. In the development there are some sudden dynamic changes, but they aren't meant to thrill: Mozart uses them to sidestep cadences when he wishes to extend a line or chew further on an idea. The coda appears a bit abruptly, and the ending is simply where the movement stops The Menuetto almost continues the musings of the opening movement, remaining in A Major and, of course, in 3/4. Even the Trio provides no more variety than its key (the dominant) and some triplets left over from the first movement.
The explanation is in Mozart's strategy: the third movement is large, and it is in D Major - not a startling contrast, but a welcome balance to the preceding movements. Now Mozart chooses different goals. These variations show us his thinking in each of the
four voices, and progress majestically. Yet they stand in place of a slow movement where so often Mozart sings publicly of private things. And when the variations are finished, no-one is left hungry, exactly, but the meal has not been like other meals (whatever dessert is).
The last movement opens with a sigh about the first movement. Though we are back in A Major, it does not pursue the expression of the first. All the finale equipment is in place: the energy, the proven sonata form, fugal elements for all four to juggle, and a length perfectly judged to balance the halves of the work. But in a position most often assigned to thrill, this finale isn't meant to, and the ending is clear evidence. K. 464, at its end, just disappears. No hurrah, no message -- the two motives that make up the movement just stop popping up, one sinking out of sight, the other into thin air.
Perhaps the fact that Mozart freely changes the rules here is what so caught Beethoven's fancy. K. 464 was his favorite Mozart quartet. He studied it, copied it out by hand, and followed it scrupulously (in all but one movement) when he composed his own A Major, Op. 18 No. 5. The full meaning of his much-repeated praise -"That's a work! That's where Mozart said to the world: Behold what I might have done for you if the time were right!" -- is elusive, but it reinforces the specific-ifundefined sense musicians have of this piece. A reported exchange between the members of the
Borodin Quartet comes closer:
Berlinsky: Och, what divine music!
Rabei: Heartbreaking!
Barshai: Simply impossible to play. Dubinsky: Yes, it should be banned, shouldn't it?
Wolfgang Mozart as colleague – imagine the pride we take in saying so! Bringing his twenty-three quartets to life permits us to say we know the man in the most important ways, and it is a delightful challenge to share that knowledge with listeners through sounds and the pride we take in saying so! Bringing his twenty-three quartets to life permits us to say we know the man in the most important ways, and it is a delightful challenge to share that knowledge with listeners through sounds and words. Yet there is another source to be explored: his letters, hundreds of them, and they provide a vivid, human view of the man.
To read his thoughts about touring, inspiration, audiences, his musical gifts (and the abilities of others) is like gossiping with a fellow artist; in the life of working musicians, surprisingly little has changed.
When we consider a piece of music in the context of what Mozart had to say about making music, the years between us evaporate.
When I am completely myself, entirely alone, and of good cheer, my ideas flow best and most abundantly ... Those that please me I retain ... and it soon occurs to me how I might turn this or that morsel to good account, so as to make a good dish of it.
All this fires my soul, and my subject enlarges itself. .. and the whole stands almost complete and finished in my mind so that I can apprehend it, like a beautiful statue, at a glance. In my imagination I hear the parts all at once. What a delight this is I cannot tell! ... This is perhaps the best gift ...
If the C Major Quartet K. 465 began without introduction at the Allegro, we could easily apply Mozart's description of composing: while it is fresh and vivacious, it is made of Mozartisms, those figures which are common to so many of his works -- those very
"morsels" he writes of combining. But enter the grave
and mysterious Adagio, with haunting pulse below the aching, suspended dissonances which give this piece its nickname, and the glimpse he gives of how his music germinates does not show all.
That 22-bar Adagio maps a world where Beethoven and Wagner will later explore and build, and its influence is easy to hear both in the subsequent Allegro and in the Andante cantabile second movement, where cello murmurs return us to the gravity of the opening bars.
That the usually facile Mozart labored over his six "Haydn" quartets is well-known, and the manuscripts give proof. For example, three of the four movements' tempi were revised, and revising was not something Mozart regularly did. Some manuscripts suffered more than others.
... I send you the original score - you will find many passages crossed out [as] I knew it would be copied here right away, and so gave free rein to my ideas, making alterations and cuts here and there before sending it to the copyist. Parts for [several instruments] are lacking, as I could not find scorepaper ruled with so many [extra] lines. They were written as extra pages and the copyist has probably lost them. When I was sending the first part somewhere it unfortunately fell in the mud, which accounts for its condition.
In K. 465, the first movement was unchanged between autograph and first edition; the slow movementoriginally an Adagio -- was published as Andante cantabile; the Menuetto began as Allegro and emerged Allegretto; and the finale was written as Allegro and printed as Allegro molto. The slow movement gains flow and loses none of its adagio elements as an andante; the menuetto revision seems apter here than in the G Major K. 387, but either way the challenge for
performers is still to find a tempo in which all grace resides and the repeated quarter-notes never plod. And the finale has a humor so familiar (compare the quintet K. 515) that a tempo-indication is almost needless. There were other sources of change (besides rethinking, copyists, and mud): simple enlargement, and Mozart's father/manager Leopold.
... [my host] sat beside me and listened with close attention and I forgot the cold room and my headache and the wretched clavier and in spite of all played as I do when I am inspired! Give me the best instrument in Europe with an audience that understands nothing, desires to understand nothing and does not feel with me in what I play, and I would have no joy in it!
As performers today we can only agree. It is reassuring to have one's opinions shared, more so when it is Mozart's views one echos, and vastly more when that awareness lights our way toward realizing his musical intent in performance.
- Notes by Daniel Avshalomov
In the seasons since its founding, the American String Quartet (Peter Winograd and Laurie Carney, violins; Daniel Avshalomov, viola; David Geber, cello) has reached a position of rare esteem in the world of chamber music. Their annual tours have brought them to virtually every important concert hall in ten European countries and across North America. Renowned for fluent and definitive interpretations of a diverse repertory, the Quartet has received critical acclaim for their programming of the complete works of Beethoven, Schubert, Schoenberg and Mozart, as well as for their collaborations with a host of distinguished artists.
Persuasive advocates for their art, the members of the Quartet are credited with broadening public awareness and enjoyment of chamber music across the country through their educational programs, seminars and published articles, in addition to their concert tours.
They have enjoyed a long association with the Aspen Festival, the Taos School of Music, and Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival, to which they return as featured artists. Among the first recipients of the National Endowment for the Arts' grants for their activities on college campuses, the ASQ has also maintained a commitment to contemporary music, resulting in numerous commissions and awards, among them two prize-winners at the J.F. Kennedy Center's Friedheim Awards. In 1984 they accepted the position as Quartet-in-Residence at the Manhattan School of Music and in 1992 were invited to become the resident ensemble for the Van Cliburn Piano Competition.
The ASQ continues to reach a broader audience: through recordings of over a dozen works, numerous radio and television broadcasts, tours to Japan and the Far East, and most recently, performances with The New York City Ballet and The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Quartet embodies the challenges and satisfactions of two decades of music-making.
PRODUCED AND ENGINEERED BY JUDITH SHERMAN
SUNY Purchase, New York; Music Division Recital Hall
Recorded between November 9-11, 1992 and November 1997
Editing and Engineering Assistance: Jonathan Schultz & Jeanne Velonis
