String Quartet No. 15 (Mozart)

1783 composition by W. A. Mozart From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's String Quartet No. 15 in D minor, K. 421/417b is the second of his quartets dedicated to Haydn and the only one of the set in a minor key. Though undated in the autograph,[1] it is believed to have been completed in 1783, while his wife Constanze Mozart was in labour with her first child Raimund.[a] Constanze stated that the rising string figures in the second movement corresponded to her cries from the other room.[3]

Detail of Lange's 1782–83 Mozart portrait

Structure

I. Allegro moderato
II. Andante
III. Menuetto and Trio – Allegretto
IV. Allegretto ma non troppo – Più allegro
Performed by the Strub Quartet
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Performances of the whole string quartet vary in length from 23 to 33 minutes. It is in four movements:

  1. Allegro moderato
  2. Andante (F major)
  3. Menuetto and Trio (the latter in D major) – Allegretto
  4. Allegretto ma non troppo – Più allegro

The first movement is characterized by a sharp contrast between the aperiodicity of the first subject group, characterized by Arnold Schoenberg as "prose-like", and the "wholly periodic" second subject group.[4] In the Andante and the Menuetto, "normal expectations of phraseology are confounded."[5] The main part of the Menuetto is in minuet and trio sonata form,[6] while "the contrasting major-mode Trio ... is ... almost embarrassingly lightweight on its own ... [but] makes a wonderful foil to the darker character of the Minuet."[7] The last movement is a set of variations. The movement ends in a Picardy third.

Arrangements

An arrangement of the Menuetto and Trio for violin and piano is in Suzuki Violin Volume 7.[8]

Notes and references

Further reading

External links

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