Flute Quartet in C major, K.285b (1781-2)

Mozart and the Flute

Mozart’s attitude to the flute was, at best, ambiguous. His declaration to his father, in a letter home from Mannheim in 1778, that it was “an instrument that I detest” seems to leave little room for doubt. But, as Leopold Mozart immediately realised, Wolfgang was making excuses for failing to fulfil the terms of a commission and for losing more than half his fee in consequence: he didn’t have the time, he wasn’t in the mood, he didn’t like the flute - and, as he did not say, he was distracted by his interest in Aloysia Weber. Having been asked by Ferdinand Dejean, an amateur flautist in Mannhiem, to write three concertos and four quartets, he had written a new Flute Concerto in G, had recycled his Oboe Concerto in C as a Flute Concerto in D and had completed only two or three of the quartets. Had he really enjoyed writing for the flute he would no doubt have got to work on the commission with his usual application, but as for “detesting” the instrument… In Paris only a few months later he had no trouble in writing a Concerto for Flute and Harp in C for the Comte de Guines, whose flute-playing he actually admired, and the fond Count’s harpist daughter. And, after all, Mozart was the composer of Die Zauberflöte, where the writing for Tamino’s flute is nothing short of magical.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

Flute Quartet in C major, K.285b (1781-2)

Allegro

Andantino - adagio - allegro

The Flute Quartet in C major was long thought to have been one of the works that Mozart wrote for Ferdinand Dejean in Mannheim in 1777 and 1778. Now, however, since a fragment of a sketch for it appears on forensic evidence to have been written three or four years later and since the second movement is much the same in content as the sixth movement of the wind Serenade in B flat, K.361, it is believed to have been written in Vienna in 1781.

There is still much that we don’t know about the work. Above all, we are not sure how much of it was written by Mozart. Obviously, since a sketch for part of the recapitulation of the first movement exists in Mozart’s hand, he was responsible for at least the outer sections of the opening Allegro, which are unmistakable on stylistic grounds anyway. But the middle section, which bears little or no thematic relationship to the rest, seems curiously uncharacteristic.

If, as it surely must be, the second movement is an arrangement rather then the original version of the essentially wind-band inspiration represented by the theme and six variations of the Serenade in B flat, who transcribed it for flute and string trio? According to some scholars, it wasn’t Mozart and - since no autograph score exists or is ever known to have existed - it is difficult to argue the opposite case. Whoever did it, however, he was remarkably adept in his scoring, offering virtuoso opportunities to each instrumentalist in turn and creating a particularly seductive texture in the Adagio variation just before the brightly conclusive Allegro.

Mozart

Flute Quartet in A major, K.298 (1786-7)

Theme and variations: andante

Menuetto

Rondeau: allegretto grazioso

There has also been a long-term confusion about the date of the Quartet in A. The source of the confusion is an inscription on the autograph manuscript, added by someone other than the composer, to the effect that it was written in Paris in 1778, adding (more usefully) that the score once belonged to a “Baron de Jacquin.” The Quartet cannot have been written as early as 1778, however, since the last movement is based on a tune from Paisiello’s opera Le gare generose, which was first performed in Naples in 1786. Since Le gare generose was also heard in Vienna in 1786 it seems reasonable to assume that this is where and when the work originated - particularly since Mozart was a frequent guest at the convivial Vienna home of Gottfried von Jacquin at that time.

Actually, all three movements are based on tunes by other composers. The theme of the four Andante variations derives from Franz Anton Hoffmeister’s song An die Natur, which is introduced by the flute in the conventional tema pattern of two eight-bar sections each one repeated. We do not know the identity of the flautist for whom the decorative first variation was intended or the violinist who was to undertake the semi-quaver runs of the second. From the exceptional quality of the viola writing in the third variation, however, it seems that Mozart had himself in mind for that part. The fourth variation recalls the theme in its original melodic form on the flute but with a busy arpeggio accompaniment on the cello.

The theme of the Menuetto has been identified as an arrangement of an old French song “Il a des bottes, des bottes Bastien,” which is entertaining if not profoundly interesting. But the whole point of the work is its conviviality, as is quite clear from the “Rondieaoux” spelling of the heading on the manuscript and the tempo direction which reads in full “Allegretto grazioso, ma non troppo presto, però adagio. Così-così-con molto garbo ed espressione.” Just how, even with Mozart as violist, this essentially sociable rondo could have been performed “with much fire and expression” it is difficult to imagine.

Flute Quartet in G major K.285a (1777-8)

Andante

Tempo di minuetto

It is now generally accepted that the Quartet in G is the second of those written for Dejean in Mannheim in 1777 or 1778. There are doubts about it, arising from the fact that there is no autograph manuscript and from the peculiar circumstance that it first appeared in print (just after the composer’s death) as part of the first movement of the Quartet in D. It clearly does not belong to the Quartet in D, however, and while there is no proof that it really is by Mozart the similarity of the flute-writing with that of the Concerto in G is fairly conclusive.

A slow movement and a minuet scarcely add up to a quartet, Dejean might justifiably have complained. But he would not easily have found another composer who could have provided him with anything as harmonically interesting as the second subject of the Andante, which veers off into the minor on dynamically emphasised rhythmic syncopations, or with a structural tactic as clever as that which delays the recapitulation of the opening theme so as to make an effective coda of it. In the Tempo di minuetto too the ending is quite unexpected in that a discreetly varied reprise of the first section is denied its expected harmonic conclusion to make way for a delightfully irrelevant afterthought.

Mozart

Flute Quartet in D major K.285 (1777)

Allegro

Adagio -

Rondeau

After the confusions and doubts associated with the others, the certainty of the authenticity and of the date of composition of the Flute Quartet in D is reassuring. Although the autograph manuscript disappeared from the Prussian State Library during the Second World War, we know that it is (or was) dated 25 December 1777 in the composer’s hand - which means that it was completed within days of the Dejean commission coming Mozart’s way in Mannheim. The quality of the music itself confirms that it was written before disillusion, or distraction, set in.

The opening Allegro is not only briskly business-like but also melodically abundant, offering twice as many themes as it strictly needs. Its lightly contrapuntal textures are deftly scored and instrumental colouring is imaginatively applied, above all in the sustained flute phrases poised over undulating strings on a decrescendo at the end of the exposition. The harmonically intriguing development section concentrates on the two first -subject themes, one of which is surprisingly recalled after what, by anology with the exposition, seems to be the end of the movement.

It is difficult to believe that the composer who writes so captivatingly for flute to the delicate accompaniment of pizzicato strings in the central Adagio detested the instrument. Though a short slow movement, it is also in its B minor melancholy unique in Mozart’s chamber music. It leads directly without a break (but perhaps by way of a cadenza) into the Rondeau finale which, in spite of its French title, is an early approximation to the Viennese sonata-rondo in form. Based on a vaguely exotic (or, in the terminology of the day, “Turkish”) main theme, it is as as fertile in melody as the first movement and, given the idiomatic prominence of the viola in the second episode, even more resourcefully scored.

Gerald Larner©2002