Piano Concerto No. 20 (Mozart)

Piano Concerto in D minor
No. 20
by W. A. Mozart
First page of the autograph
KeyD minor
CatalogueK. 466
GenrePiano concerto
StyleClassical period
Composed1785 (1785)
PerformedFebruary 11, 1785 (1785-02-11)
Mehlgrube Concert Hall, Vienna
Movements3
Scoring
  • Piano
  • orchestra

The Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466, was composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1785. The first performance took place at the Mehlgrube Concert Hall in Vienna on 11 February 1785, with the composer as soloist.[1]

Background

A few days after the first performance, the composer's father, Leopold, visiting Vienna, wrote to his daughter Nannerl about her brother's recent success: "[I heard] an excellent new piano concerto by Wolfgang, on which the copyist was still at work when we got here, and your brother didn't even have time to play through the rondo because he had to oversee the copying operation."[2]

The concerto is written in the key of D minor. Other works by Mozart in that key include the Fantasia K. 397 for piano, the Requiem, a Kyrie, a mass, the aria "Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen" from the opera The Magic Flute, and parts of the opera Don Giovanni. It is the first of two Mozart piano concertos in a minor key (No. 24 in C minor is the other).[3]

The young Ludwig van Beethoven admired this concerto and kept it in his repertoire.[2] Composers who wrote cadenzas for it include Beethoven (WoO 58), Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart, Charles-Valentin Alkan, Johannes Brahms (WoO 14), Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Ferruccio Busoni, and Clara Schumann.[4] Beethoven's is the most commonly performed.[2]

One of Mozart's favorite pianos that he played while living in Vienna had a pedal-board operated with the feet, like that of an organ. This piano is on display at the Mozart House in Salzburg, but no longer has a pedal-board. That Mozart had a piano with a pedal-board is reported in a letter by his father, who visited his son in Vienna. Among Mozart's piano works, none are explicitly written with a part for a pedal-board, but according to Leopold's report, at the first performance of the Piano Concerto No. 20, Mozart, who was the soloist and conductor, used his own piano equipped with a pedal-board.[5] Presumably the pedal-board was used to reinforce the left-hand part or add lower notes than the standard keyboard could play. Because Mozart was also an expert on the organ, operating a pedal-board with his feet was no harder than using only his hands.[6]

Movements

The concerto is scored for solo piano, flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings.[1]

As is typical of concertos, it is in three movements:

  1. Allegro (in D minor),
  2. Romance (in B♭ major),
  3. Allegro assai (in D minor, with coda in D major),

I. Allegro

The first movement, in D minor, starts with the strings restlessly but quietly building up to a full forte. Music critic Michael Steinberg calls this opening "all atmosphere and gesture—no theme".[2] It is followed by the second theme, played by the woodwinds before being overtaken by the tutti orchestra.[7]

The solo piano then introduces a new theme,[2] whose construction Robert Levin has called "a masterful balance of expressive and narrative detail".[8] The second theme in F major (the relative major) has a slightly brighter mood but never becomes jubilant. The timpani further heighten the tension in the coda before the cadenza starts. The movement ends on a quiet note.[7]

II. Romance

The second movement, in B♭ major, is a five-part rondo (ABACA)[9] with a coda. The trumpets and timpani are not used. The beginning features the solo piano playing the main B♭ major melody without accompaniment. This lyrical, tender, romantic melody inspired the movement's title, "Romance".

Halfway through, the piece moves on to the second episode (part C), where a storm sets in. A turbulent, agitated. ominous theme in the relative key of G minor greatly contrasts with the peaceful mood at the movement's start. After a transition back to B♭ major, the opening melody returns. The movement ends with a light and delicate ascending arpeggio.

III. Allegro assai

The final movement, a rondo, begins with the piano rippling upward in the home key before the orchestra replies with a furious section. (This piano "rippling" is known as the Mannheim Rocket and is a string of eighth notes (D–F–A–D–F) followed by a quarter note (A)).[10] The piano introduces a second melody, whose mood is dark and restless. Then a cheerful melody in F major is introduced by the orchestra before the piano rounds it off. A series of biting piano chords snaps the bright melody, and passages in D minor return in the piano, then the orchestra. Modulations of the second theme to A minor and G minor follow. Thereafter follows the same format as above, with a momentary pause to introduce the cadenza.

After the cadenza, the piece becomes fully sunny, modulating to the parallel key of D major, and the bright melody is taken up by the winds. The piano repeats the theme before the orchestra develops the passage, ending the concerto.[11]

References

  1. ^ a b Steinberg 1998, p. 303.
  2. ^ a b c d e Steinberg 1998, p. 304.
  3. ^ Leitmeir 2023, p. 13.
  4. ^ Grayson 1998, p. 1.
  5. ^ Irving 2003, p. 223.
  6. ^ Maunder & Rowland 1995, p. 292.
  7. ^ a b Philip 2018, p. 498.
  8. ^ Levin 2003, p. 373.
  9. ^ Girdlestone 1964, pp. 319–321.
  10. ^ Radcliffe 1986, p. 47.
  11. ^ Philip 2018, p. 499.

Sources

  • Girdlestone, Cuthbert (1964) [1958]. Mozart and His Piano Concertos (2nd ed.). New York: Dover Publications. ISBN 0-486-21271-8. LCCN 64-8198. OCLC 608288 – via Internet Archive.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ignored ISBN errors (link)
  • Grayson, David A. (1998). Mozart, Piano concertos no. 20 in D minor, K. 466, and no. 21 in C major, K. 467. Cambridge music handbooks. Cambridge, United Kingdom; New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-48156-4.
  • Irving, John (2003). Mozart's Piano Concertos. Aldershot: Ashgate. ISBN 978-0-7546-0707-6.
  • Leitmeir, Christian Thomas (2023). "Creativity, Performance and Problems of Authorship: Clara Schumann's Cadenzas for Mozart's D minor Concerto, K466". Nineteenth-Century Music Review. 21 (1): 12–43. doi:10.1017/S1479409823000046. ISSN 1479-4098.
  • Levin, Robert D. (2003). "Mozart's Keyboard Concertos". In Marshall, Robert Lewis (ed.). Eighteenth-Century Keyboard Music. Routledge Studies in Musical Genres (2nd ed.). New York, London: Routledge. pp. 350–393. ISBN 978-0-415-96642-9.
  • Maunder, Richard; Rowland, David (1995). "Mozart's pedal piano". Early Music. 23 (2): 287–297. doi:10.1093/earlyj/XXIII.2.287. ISSN 0306-1078. JSTOR 3137706.
  • Philip, Robert (2018). The Classical Music Lover's Companion to Orchestral Music. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-24272-0.
  • Radcliffe, Philip (1986). Mozart Piano Concertos. BBC music guides (1st, revised ed.). London: Ariel Music. ISBN 978-0-563-20487-9.
  • Steinberg, Michael (1998). The Concerto: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513931-0.

Further reading

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