Symphony No.35 in D major, K.385 (“Haffner”)

Looking round for a major work suitable for a series of concerts he was planning for Vienna in 1783, Mozart remembered a symphony he had written the previous summer - in a great hurry and rather against his will - to celebrate the ennoblement of the Mayor of Salzburg, Siegmund Haffner. It wasn’t entirely suitable for the purpose he had in mind since, with its introductory March and its second Minuet, it was not so much a symphony as a serenade (in much the same tradition as the eight-movement Serenade he had written for the same Siegmund Haffner six years earlier). On the other hand, when he got his father to send the score on from Salzburg, he was delighted by what he saw. “It has quite astonished me,” he told his father, “for I had forgotten every single note of it. It must certainly make a good effect.” All he had to do to make a Vienna symphony of it was omit the opening March (now identified separately as K.408/2) and the second Minuet (now lost) and add flutes and clarinets to the oboes, bassoons, horns, trumpets, timpani and strings of the original version.

If he had composed a new symphony for Vienna in 1783, Mozart would almost certainly not have written a first movement on the same lines as the Allegro con spirito he had provided for the Haffner celebrations in Salzburg. He was not as interested in single-theme symphonic constructions as Haydn was and, apart from that, there is something just a little pompous, or even faintly satirical, in the character of the material on which it is based. Even so, the events generated by the opening fanfare-like salute form a breathtaking continuity - to be played, as Mozart told his father, “with great fire” - passing through a variety of harmonic and emotional situations with extraordinary spontaneity and without the intervention of a second main theme. At the same time, while completing a perfect symmetry, it never loses sight of that opening fanfare, which is always to be heard somewhere in the texture in one form or another.

If the two middle movements, both of which revert to the original Salzburg instrumentation, betray the serenade affiliations of the work, they do it in a most engaging way. Certainly - given the translucent outer sections illuminated by their melodious violin line and offset by the comparatively dense texture of the short middle section - the scoring of the Andante is no less attractive for the absence of flutes and clarinets. The Menuetto offers an equally effective contrast between the vigorous outer sections with prominent trumpets and horns and the lyrical Trio section featuring oboes and bassoons.

The breathlessly impulsive opening theme of the final Presto derives from Osmin’s aria “O, wie will ich triumphieren” in Die Entführung aus dem Serail - the opera Mozart was working on when his father put him under pressure to write a symphony for Siegmund Haffner. As the main theme of a brilliantly conceived rondo construction, it recurs no fewer than three times in alternation with a more relaxed idea which, depending on the harmonies applied to it, assumes a different character with every appearance. To be played, Mozart told his father, “as quickly as possible,” this explosive little finale must have proved as effective in Vienna as it surely did in Salzburg.

Mozart’s “Haffner” Symphony originally had six movements, including a march at the beginning and another minuet. Clearly, although he always referred to it in his letters as a “symphony,” the work which Mozart sent to Salzburg in August 1882 was more like a serenade in form; and its function, at a Haffner family celebration, was no different from that of the “Haffner” Serenade (in eight movements) which he had written six years earlier. At a time when he was involved in the production of Die Entführung, making an arrangement of it for wind band before anyone else could profit from it, writing “in a great hurry” the wind Serenade in C minor and getting married as well, Mozart certainly wouldn’t have provided Haffner with more movements than he had to.

In December 1782, in search of new music to performed in his Lenten concert, Mozart wrote to his father asking him to send back the score of the “new symphony which I composed for Haffner.” … My new Haffner Symphony has positively amazed me, for I had forgotten every single note of it.” It must have been at this point that Mozart realised that he did not need both minuets and that by making the work shorter (and by adding parts for flutes and clarinets) he could increase its stature to that of a symphony worthy of performance at an important concert in Vienna. What amazed him, presumably, was the extraordinary quality of the first movement, which made the transformation possible.

If he had been writing a symphony for performance in Vienna, and under less pressure, Mozart would probably have written a different sort of first movement. In the circumstances he wrote one which is both festive and economical, a movement propelled by a breathtaking continuity and to be played (as Mozart said to his father ) “with great fire.” The opening D major fanfare for the whole orchestra in unison is not just a flourish: it holds the whole movement inseparably together. Where unrelated thematic material occupies a prominent position in the texture this first theme, or a derivative, is to be heard somewhere below it. And there is no true second subject. The harmonies in the exposition seem to be approaching the dominant but continually veer away from it, back into the tonic, into E major, into a minor key, but never anywhere long enough to establish a new tonal centre let alone a new theme. So it goes on through the development, moving from A major to F sharp minor, always with the same thematic material. The recapitulation preserves the tension, the avoidance of the dominant in the exposition being reflected here by an avoidance of the tonic between the recall of the opening bars and the coda.

If the other three movement betray the serenade origins of the work they do it in the most engaging way. Besides, after a first movement like that, a slow movement like this - a problem-free ternary construction in G major with particularly delightful scoring for first and second violins - is appropriate recreation. Oboes and bassoons carry the lyrical contrast in the vigorously muscular Menuetto (its companion, written for the Salzburg version of the work has apparently been lost, although the accompanying march in d major has been preserved and is now identified as K.408, No.2).

The final Presto, which Mozart told his father must by played “as quickly as possible,” conceals its art under an irresistibly cheerful surface. It main theme, interestingly derived from Osmin’s “O, wie will ich triumphieren” in Die Entführung, is associated with a brilliantly energetic companion involving the whole orchestra, with a particularly dramatic role for the timpani. Obviously intended as the main theme of a rondo, the Osmin tune duly reappears three times in the tonic - the second time after a surprising episode in B minor, the third time only after a syncopated and chromatic variant has usurped the position at what should have been the climax of the construction.