Sunday March 7, 2010 at 3:00pm
Prince George Playhouse
| Mozart | The Hunt |
| Schubert | Octet in F Major |
Please join our very talented PGSO musicians for an afternoon of delightful and enchanting chamber music.
Tickets at Studio 2880
Adults: $22.50
Senior: $18.50
Student: $10.50
Program Notes
W.A. Mozart (1756-91), String Quartet No. 17 in B flat Major, "The Hunt" (1784)
This quartet is the fourth and most popular of the six "Haydn Quartets" that Mozart dedicated to the older composer, who is generally credited with being the creator of the form of the string quartet. Mozart studied Haydn's quartets carefully, and the two composers sometimes played this music together in the mid-1780s. It was after Haydn heard these quartets played, in the early months of 1785, that he made his famous remark to Mozart's father: "Before God, and as an honest man, I tell you that your son is the greatest composer known to me either in person or by name. He has taste, and, what is more, the most profound knowledge of composition."
"The Hunt" gets its nickname from the motif that opens the work in a rollicking 6/8 time, somewhat reminiscent of a hunting-call on the horn, though it is not known who gave it this name, for neither Mozart nor his publisher called it that. Like most string quartets, it's in four movements: allegro vivace, menuetto, adagio, with the last allegro movement returning to the cheerful energy of the first one.
Franz Schubert (1797-1828), Octet in F Major (1824)
This unusual work (there aren't a great many octets for mixed winds and strings) was commissioned by Count Ferdinand Troyer (1780-1851), an Austrian aristocrat and skilled amateur clarinetist. Troyer wanted a piece similar to Beethoven's popular E-flat Septet of 1799, but Schubert added a second violin part to make his work an octet instead. The Octet, premiered at the home of Troyer's employer, Archduke Rudolf, featured Troyer in the clarinet part.
It's easy to believe the often-repeated assertion that this work was practice for Schubert as he worked up to his first major symphony, the "Great Symphony" in C Major (his earlier symphonies he considered hardly worth mentioning), for it is a massive work, in six rather than the expected four movements (Beethoven's Septet also has six movements, with the same alternation of fast and slow movements). Schubert's piece is far more serious and symphonic than Beethoven's, though of course, being by Schubert, it also has its jolly moments.
- Bill Morrison
