Piano Concerto in G major K.453

Of the six piano concertos Mozart completed in 1784, two of them, including this one, were written for his favourite pupil, Barbara Ployer. A daughter of the agent of the Salzburg court in Vienna, she inspired such confidence in the composer that on the occasion of the first performance of the Concerto in G in Döbling he took his distinguished colleague Giovanni Paisiello in his carriage “as I want him to hear both my pupil and my compositon.”

If the music reflects her personality, she must have been a charmng and capricious sort of girl - like the delightfully feminine march theme introduced by the violins as the first subject. The other main themes are more realistic, but the pianist treats them in a quite different, playful way when they are reintroduced in the solo exposition. Most capricious of all is the development, in which the soloist scarcely touches on the main themes and instead leads the orchestra through a series of wayward modulations.

The C major slow movement is similarly unpredictable. Its first theme has a curious way of stopping in silence - which three times gives the piano the opportunity to depart in unexpected harmonic directions and the orchestra the task of bringing it back in line.

The last movement is a set of variations on a theme which (according to the composer’s notebook) was a favourite of Mozart’s pet starling. So here is another appropriate tune for Babette who, to judge by the first variation, is delighted with it. There are five variations in all, the fourth of which is a salutary study in austerity, introduced in the minor by the orchestra and syncopated by the always inventive piano. The minor-key variation serves, of course, to offset the cheerfulness of the fifth variation

and the racy presto coda, which is capricious to the point of irresponsibility.

The 39th Symphony – written just three years before the Piano Concerto in B flat major – is another fascinating example of late Mozart. While there are no fearful premonitions here, there is endless speculation on how Mozart came to complete three symphonies in just over six weeks in the summer of 1788. Again, he cannot have known they would be his last works of their kind but, if he had known, he could scarcely have produced a more coherent and more conclusive set of scores as the ultimate demonstration of his mastery. The three symphonies are so varied in character and so well ordered as a sequence – with the uneasy No.40 in G minor so effectively placed between the comparatively relaxed No.39 in E flat and the supremely positive “Jupiter” in C major – that they could almost be regarded as consecutive parts of one big idea.

Certainly, the series begins in a manner worthy of such a big idea with the most dramatic introduction to any symphony up to that time. It is a challenging start. But the main Allegro, which begins in tuneful serenity on violins, is not much concerned with the serious issues which have just been raised. The second main theme,on violins again, is just as happy as the first. There are no serious worries at any point except when woodwind instruments seem to lose direction after a one-bar silence just before a last recall of the main themes, now in an even more cheerful mood than when they were first introduced.

From its innocently melodious beginning, it seems that the Andante is not the place to take up the issues left over from the Adagio introduction to the first movement. So when, after the formal presentation of the main theme, wind and strings plunge without warning into emphatically inimical harmonies, the intervention is all the more surprising, just as the nagging bass line, the syncopated rhythms on second violins and violas and the dramatic gestures on first violins are all the more disturbing. Although the second main theme, introduced in by woodwind, is reassuring, the next intrusion of alien harmonies is even more disconcerting.

The stability secured just before the end of the Andante is confirmed by the unaffectedly vigorous Menuetto and the delightful middle section featuring the two clarinets which, in the absence of oboes, have already contributed much to the distinctive colouring of the work. So what Mozart has to do now, having reviewed and settled the concerns raised at the beginning of the symphony, is to devise a last movement to balance the proportions of the first. While the final Allegro might be less impressive than the corresponding movement of the “Jupiter,” as a sustained structure based on just one main theme it is as brilliantly resourceful as any of Haydn’s and just as entertaining in its virtuoso scoring and its recklessly spontaneous harmonies.

Of the six piano concertos Mozart completed in 1784, two of them (in E flat K.449 and G major K.453) were written for his favourite pupil, Barbara Ployer. Not much is known about her, except that she was the daughter of the agent of the Salzburg court in Vienna, that she paid well for the privilege of having the most popular pianist in Vienna as her teacher and that Mozart was rather proud of her. On 12 June 1784, two months after he had written K.453, Mozart told his father, “Tomorrow Herr Ployer the agent is giving a concert in the country at Döbling, where Fräulein Babette is playing her new concerto in G, and I am performing the quintet: we are playing together the grand sonata for two pianos. I am fetching Paisiello in my carriage, as I want him to hear both my pupil and my compositions.”

Paisielle, who was no mean composer himself, must have been impressed. Barring accidents, the performance can scarcely have failed: the concerto was written to suit the pianist, not only her technical ability (which was evidently considerable, though not as great as Mozart’s) but also her personality. Fräulein Babette must have been a charmng and capricious sort of girl, in something like the same way as the delightfully feminine march theme introduced by the violins as the first subject. The other main themes are more realistic, but the pianist treats them in a quite different, playful way when they are reintroduced in the solo exposition. Most capricious of all is the development, in which the soloist scarcely touches on the main themes and instead leads the orchestra through a series of wayward modulations. Later, if she or he chooses the longer of Mozart’s cadenzas, the pianist has the opportunity to develop some of the main themes, or he can continue to avoid them in the shorter one.

The C major slow movement is similarly wayward in character. Its first theme has a curious way of stopping in silend. When the violins first introduce it, and pause after four bars, the woodwind continue with a new phrase as if nothing had happened. When the pianist first has it, and duly pauses after four bars, he then plunges into G minor, from which unhappy key the woodwind attempt to rescue him with their original answering phrase. Then they reintroduce the main them in G major, and paus, and the piano enters in D minor, which is just as bad. However, when the piano takes up the theme for the last time, in C major, he crosses the pause to E flat major, which is better.

The last movement is a set of variations on a theme which (incredibely, but the evidence is in Mozart’s own notebook) the composer learned from his pet starling. So here is another appropriate tune for Babette who, to judge by the first variation, is delighted with it. There are five variations in all, the fourth of which is a salutary study in austerity, introduced in the minor by the orchestra and syncopated by the always inventive piano. The minor-key variation serves, of course, to offset the cheerfulness of the fifth variations and the racy presto coda, which is capricious to the point of irresponsibility.