Page 158 - ESSENTIAL LISTENING TO MUSIC

To balance the growth in the string section, and to increase the color in the orchestra, more winds were added. By the 1790s, a typical symphony orchestra in a large European city might include the instrumentalists listed below. Com- pared to the Baroque orchestra, this ensemble of up to forty players was larger, more colorful, and more flexible. Moreover, within the Classical orchestra, each instrumental family had a specific assignment: The strings presented the bulk of the musical material; the woodwinds added richness and colorful counter- point; the French horns sustained a sonorous background; and the trumpets and percussion provided brilliance when a magnificent sound was needed (see Table 9.1).
table 9.1
Mozart: Symphony No. 40 in G minor (1788), K. 550
In his short lifetime, Mozart wrote 41 symphonies and more than 650 composi- tions in all. To help us keep track of this enormous amount of music, a nineteenth- century musicologist, Ludwig von Köchel, published a list of Mozart’s works in approximately chronological order, assigning each a Köchel (K) number. The need for such a numbering system is obvious because Mozart actually wrote two symphonies in G minor: a short, early one (which accompanies the opening of the film Amadeus), K. 183, and a longer, later symphony in G minor, K. 550, to which we now turn.
Mozart’s celebrated Symphony in G minor requires all the full instru- mental sound and disciplined playing that the late-eighteenth-century or- chestra could muster. This is not a festive composition (hence no trum- pets and drums), but rather an intensely brooding work that suggests tragedy and despair. Though we might be tempted to associate the minor key and despondent mood with a specific event in Mozart’s life, appar- ently no such causal relationship exists. This was one of three symphonies that Mozart produced in the short span of six weeks during the summer of 1788, and the other two are sunny, optimistic works. Rather than respond- ing to a particular disappointment, it is more likely that Mozart invoked the tragic muse in this G minor symphony by drawing on a lifetime of disap- pointments and a premonition—as his letters attest—of an early death.
To get the most out of the following discussion, have the diagram of sonata– allegro form (see Figure 8.4) firmly in mind.
First Movement (Molto Allegro)
exposition (download 25 at 0:00)
Mozart begins his G minor symphony (see Listening Cue) with a textbook example of Classical phrase structure (four-bar antecedent, four-bar consequent
136 chapter nine classical genres
Copyright 201 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
Strings 1st violins, 2nd violins, violas, cellos, double basses (about 27 players in all)
Woodwinds 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons
brasses 2 French horns, 2 trumpets (for festive pieces)
Percussion 2 timpani (for festive pieces)
56797_ch09_ptg01.indd 136 29/08/14 3:35 PM