About a year and a half ago I posted my Top 100 favorite pieces of classical music. The list (not ranked in any way) is HERE, and all four of Wolfgang Mozart’s French horn concertos are on it (I lumped all four together as one entry).
This week I thought I’d listen to another horn concerto by Mozart, but not one by Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart – otherwise known as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. No, this concerto is by his father, Leopold – Johann Georg Leopold Mozart, to be exact. I know a little bit about Leopold Mozart – and not just because I’ve seen both the live stage production and the movie “Amadeus” (many years ago I saw Ian McKellan as Salieri and Tim Curry as Wolfgang Mozart on Broadway). Shortly after seeing Peter Shaffer’s play, I also read a biography on Mozart so I learned a bit about Mozart's father Leopold. However, I can’t say that I’ve ever heard anything by Leopold Mozart, so I decided to pick something of his to listen to this week. I selected his horn concerto since all four of the other Mozart’s horn concertos landed on my Top 100 list. I found very little information about this concerto on the internets, as they say. I did see one horn concerto listed on an inventory of works by Leopold Mozart, HERE. However, that concerto is shown as having four movements: Allegro moderato; Menuet; Andante; and Allegro (HERE). The concerto I listened to on YouTube, linked HERE, seems only to have three movements: Allegro moderato; Andante; and Allegro. The YouTube video runs just over thirteen minutes (13:05), and the concerto listed on the log at AllMusic.com comes in at 13:27 – but with four movements – so I’m not so sure they’re the same piece. The concerto by Leopold Mozart was certainly pleasant enough to listen to. However, it was in no way as memorable, spirited or as lyrical as those by his son Wolfgang. To be honest, the opening strains of the work from the orchestra and the horn sound more like a practice exercise and that sets the tone for most of the work. It comes across more as a recital piece for a horn student rather than a refined and sophisticated piece in the horn repertoire. Still, as I said earlier, the work is pleasant enough so it is definitely worth a listen! : )
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A New Hope:As the header above says, each week I will listen to a piece of classical music that I've never heard before, and then I will report out what I thought about it. Archives
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