Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791): Violin Sonatas Vol.4
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in Salzburg
in 1756, the son of a court musician who, in the year of his youngest child's
birth, published an influential book on violin-playing. Leopold Mozart rose to
occupy the position of Vice-Kapellmeister to the Archbishop of Salzburg, but
sacrificed his own creative career to that of his son, in whom he detected
signs of precocious genius. With the indulgence of his patron, he was able to
undertake extended concert tours of Europe in which his son and elder daughter
Nannerl were able to astonish audiences. The boy played both the keyboard and
the violin and could improvise and soon write down his own compositions.
The childhood that had brought Mozart signal
success was followed by a less satisfactory period of adolescence, largely in
Salzburg under the patronage of a new and less sympathetic Archbishop. Like his
father, Mozart found opportunities far too limited at home, while chances of
travel were now restricted. In 1777, when leave of absence was not granted, he
gave up employment in Salzburg to seek a future elsewhere, but neither Mannheim
nor Paris, both musical centres of some importance, had anything for him. His
Mannheim connections, however, brought a commission for an opera in Munich in
1781, but after its successful staging he was summoned by his patron to Vienna.
There Mozart's dissatisfaction with his position resulted in a quarrel with the
Archbishop and dismissal from his service.
The last ten years of Mozart's life were spent
in Vienna in precarious independence of both patron and immediate paternal
advice, a situation aggravated by an imprudent marriage. Initial success in the
opera-house and as a performer was followed, as the decade went on, by
increasing financial difficulties. By the time of his death in December 1791,
however, his fortunes seemed about to change for the better, with the success
of the German opera Die Zauberflöte (The
Magic Flute), and the possibility of increased patronage.
Mozart's sonatas for violin and keyboard span
a period of some twenty-1ive years. His earliest attempts at the form were made
during his first extended tour of Europe. Four of these early sonatas were
published in Paris in 1764, two as Opus 1
and two as Opus 2, and a further
set of six, Opus 3, was published
in London the following year. There followed another set of six sonatas, Opus 4, written in The Hague in 1766 and
published there and in Amsterdam in the same year. Mozart only returned to the
form twelve years later. During his stay in Mannheim in 1777 and 1778 he
completed four sonatas, to which he added a further two in Paris in the early
summer of the latter year, publishing the set in Paris as Opus 1. Another group of six sonatas was
published in Vienna in 1781. This included a sonata written in Mannheim and
another perhaps written in Salzburg. The other four of the set, which was
published as Opus 2, were written
in the summer of 1781 in Vienna. The four remaining comp1eted sonatas were
written in Vienna between 1784 and 1788. While the Köchel numbers of these
sonatas provide easy identification, various systems of numbering the sonatas
as a series have been used. There are over forty of these works and the
numbering used in the present series starts with the first of the mature
sonatas written in Mannheim in 1778 and inc1udes only comp1eted sonatas after
that date in its numbering.
The Sonata
in B flat major, K.454 was entered by Mozart in his work-list with
the date 21st April1784. In a letter to his father three days later he reports
the presence in Vienna of the Italian violinist Regina Strinasacchi of Mantua,
praising the taste and feeling she shows in her performance. He adds that he is
writing a sonata for her, to be played at the theatre on the following
Thursday, 29th April. The work was duly performed at the Kärntnertor-Theater in
the presence of the Emperor, apparently without previous rehearsal and with
only the violin part written out, while Mozart played the keyboard from brief notes.
The work was fully written out later and was published in August of the same
year, together with two keyboard sonatas. The set was dedicated to Countess
Terese von Cobenzl, wife of the ambassador to Russia, by the publisher,
Torricella. The sonata, written for a virtuosa
rather than for a pupil, opens with a slow introduction, after which
the violin introduces the first subject in a movement in which violin and
keyboard are in equal partnership. Secondary material is introduced in a
seamless texture, followed by a relatively short development that explores new
keys and rhythms and then a final recapitulation. The E flat major Andante allows the violin a gently lyrical
melody, then entrusted to the piano. The movement takes on a darker hue in the
central section, before tension is relaxed in the return of the opening theme,
delicately ornamented with new rhythmic figuration. The violin leads into the
final Allegretto with a theme
that frames a series of rondo episodes particularly rich in melodic invention.
These are subtly introduced, as are the returns of the main theme, with a final
section of some brilliance, as the triplet quavers of the violin are answered
by the running semiquavers of the piano.
The Sonata
in E flat major, K.481 is listed in Mozart's catalogue with the date
12th December 1785. He included it in a list of his latest compositions sent in
August 1786 to their old Salzburg man-servant Sebastian Winter, who, since
1764, had been in the service of Josef Maria Benedikt, Prince von Fürstenberg.
Now in temporarily straitened circumstances, as we learn from a letter to the
composer and publisher, Franz Hoffmeister, in the previous November, Mozart
suggests that Prince von Fürstenberg might like to pay him a regular annual
salary in return for new compositions for exclusive use at the court in
Donaueschingen. The Prince sent for three piano concertos and three symphonies,
but seemingly had no use for the sonata or, indeed, for a court composer in absentia. In the period in which the
sonata was written Mozart was busy with his new opera Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of
Figaro), given its first performance in Vienna on 1st May 1786. The first
movement of the sonata, marked Molto
allegro, entrusts the first subject principa11y to the piano, a11owing
a fuller share of the second subject to the violin, which generally has a less
demanding r61e than in the preceding sonata. The development, with its shifts
of key, introduces a greater element of drama before the return of the
principal theme in recapitulation. The same dramatic writing returns in the
coda. The A flat major Adagio finds
the violin offering at first an accompanin1ent to the piano melody .In what
follows the violin assumes immediate prominence. The second theme, in D flat
major but moving to C sharp minor, effects a transposition to the key of A,
logically enough, if unexpectedly, for the returning first theme, before the
original key is restored for the recapitulation of the first and second themes,
completing a movement of singular beauty .The last movement is in the form of a
theme and variations. The theme itself is played by the violin and piano, the
former taking the melody an octave below the latter. The piano provides a
semiquaver accompanin1ent to the violin variation of the theme and continues
with similar figuration in the second variation. The third variation brings
left-hand semiquavers and right-hand chordal patterns for the piano, with
violin accompaniment. There are strong dynamic contrasts in the following
version of the material and piano left-hand triplet semiquavers in the fifth
variation, before the appearance of rapid demisemiquavers for the right hand.
The piano introduces the final variation, now transformed into a gigue-like 6/8metre, with both instruments sharing the
material between them.
Takako Nishizaki
Takako Nishizaki is one of Japan's finest
violinists. After studying with her father, Shinji Nishizaki, she became the
first student of Shinichi Suzuki, the creator of the famous Suzuki Method of
violin teaching for children. Subsequently she went to Japan's famous Toho
School of Music and to the Juilliard School in the United States, where she
studied with Joseph Fuchs. Takako Nishizaki is one of the most frequently
recorded violinists in the world today. She has recorded ten volumes of her
complete Fritz Kreisler Edition, many contemporary Chinese violin concertos,
among them the concerto by Du Mingxin, dedicated to her, plus a growing number
of rare, previously unrecorded violin concertos, including works by Spohr,
Bériot, Cui, Respighi, Rubinstein and Joachim. For Naxos she has recorded
Vivaldi's Four Seasons, Mozart's
complete Violin Concertos, sonatas
by Mozart and Beethoven and the concertos of Bach, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky,
Beethoven, Bruch and Brahms.
Jeno Jandó
The Hungarian pianist Jeno Jandó has won a
number of piano competitions in Hungary and abroad, including first prize in
the 1973 Hungarian Piano Concours and a first prize in the chamber music
category at the Sydney International Piano Competition in 1977 .He has recorded
for Naxos all the piano concertos and sonatas of Mozart, the concertos of
Brahms, Schumann and Grieg as well as Rachmaninov's Second Concerto and Rhapsody
on a Theme of Paganini and Beethoven's complete piano sonatas. He is
currently recording cycles of the complete sonatas of Haydn and Schubert for
Naxos.