Mozart: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik / Serenata Notturna

Description

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 - 1791) Eine kleine Nachtmusik, K. 525 Allegro Romance: Andante Menuetto: Allegretto Rondo: AllegroSerenata Notturna, K. 239 Marcia: Maestoso Menuetto Rondeau: Allegretto -Adagio -AllegroDivertimento in F, K. 247 "Lodron NightMusic No.1" Allegro Andante grazioso Menuetto Adagio Menuetto Allegro assaiAs a child Mozart had enjoyed phenomenalsuccess, travelling through Europe and, with his sister Nannerl, performing forkings and queens, the nobility and others able to afford the spectacle. Hisfather Leopold Mozart, Vice-Kapellmeister to the Archbishop of Salzburg, hadtaken good care of his only surviving son's education and musical training, andhad managed his career at the expense of his own.In December 1771 the Mozart's patron, theArchbishop, had died and was succeeded early in the following year by a lesssympathetic churchman, the reformist Count Hieronymus von Colloredo, a son ofthe Imperial Vice-Chancellor. The new Archbishop shared the feelings of theImperial family on the activities of the Mozarts, who seemed to bring no crediton their employers by "travelling around like beggars". The concerttours that had brought some profit and distinction to the family were to becurtailed, and Mozart was for a few years to be more or less confined to thenarrow limits of Salzburg, in a position that he and his father found quiteunworthy of his genius.Nevertheless in Salzburg there was work to bedone, music to be written and played. In 1777 Mozart was to set out,accompanied only by his mother, to seek his fortune in Mannheim and in Paris,an abortive journey, during the course of which his mother died. Mannheim inparticular, with its virtuoso orchestra, provided a stimulus to his work.Before this, however, Salzburg had provided the occasion for a number ofcompositions, including the Serenata Notturna and the two Divertimentisometimes known as the Lodron Nightmusic, occasional pieces to celebrate thename-day in 1776 and 1777 of Countess Antonia Lodron on 13th June. TheCountess, born Arco, a name we meet in the accounts of Mozart's later dismissalfrom the Archbishop's service in 1781, was the wife of the hereditary marshalof the court, and a leading patroness of music in Salzburg. The Mozarts were onvisiting terms, however deferentially, and Leopold Mozart and his son hadjoined the Lodron's party at a fancy dress ball in February, 1776, LeopoldMozart as a porter and his son as a barber's boy.It was during the winter that Mozart had writtenthe Serenata Notturna, K. 239, completed in January, 1776, and clearly designedfor some Salzburg social occasion. The work is scored for a concerti no ofsingle strings, two violins, a viola and a double bass, and a body of ripienostrings and timpani, an arrangement which, bar the drums, must remind us of theform of the Baroque concerto grosso.The first movement of the Serenata is a statelyMarch, in which the smaller and larger groups of instruments are contrasted.There follows a Minuet, and a Tri