Towards Mozart: About the Program
By Thomas Gerber
Franz Xaver Richter, b.1709 (one year before Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, Bach's eldest son) and d.1789 (the onset of the French Revolution), is perfectly representative of the transition from the Baroque to the Classical eras. Although he spent the last 20 years of his life as maitre de chapelle at the cathedral in Strasbourg, it is the city of Mannheim with which history most associates him. A bass, he was appointed there in 1746 to the Hofkapelle at the court of the Elector Palatine, Carl Theodor. Already 37, Richter arrived around the same time that the violinist Johann Stamitz, then 29, was appointed Konzertmeister, although Stamitz had already been a violinist at the Mannheim court since c. 1741. Today, Stamitz is, rightfully, celebrated as the innovator of what would become the modern orchestra and of the genre of composition for which it is most famous, the symphony; Richter, although he composed dozens of symphonies, does not today enjoy the lionization accorded Stamitz. Richter's Op. 4, of which today's Sinfonia III, in C, is a part, was published in Amsterdam in 1764. In format, its three movements (fast-slow-fast) are typical of the earliest "sinfonias" coming out of Italy in the 1730s, and even some of Haydn's early symphonies from the late 1750s and early 1760s. The bass line is figured, indicating that the Baroque use of a harpsichord continuo is still expected, but, especially in the first movement, the harmonic rhythm (the rate at which chords change) is slower, a Classical era signifier.
Known today as "Dittersdorf," the Viennese-born Carl Ditters was ennobled with a "von Dittersdorf" by Empress Maria Theresa in 1773. He was well known and admired and certainly deserving of ennoblement, but the title was actually just an administrative requirement for one of the many positions he held during his career. A noted virtuoso violinist, Dittersdorf was a highly prolific composer of both instrumental and vocal music. He was especially popular in the genre of singspiel, i.e., German comic opera. His "Der Apotheker und der Doktor" (1786) was especially beloved in Vienna and other European cities. His published symphonies with opus numbers are numerous, but these are dwarfed in number by the many others without opus number. Dittersdorf was particularly productive in the realm of chamber music, while there are thought to be 43 extant authentic concertos, the majority (18) for violin, but others for the flute, the oboe, and the harpsichord (not piano). The Concerto in E minor, c. 1760, heard in today's concert, is one of two for solo flute; the other, in G, is documented but, sadly, lost. This three movement work, in the fast-slow-fast progression standard since the days of Vivaldi, is performed this afternoon in an edition by our soloist, Barthold Kuijken. On a side note: Dittersdorf's output is bedeviled by the same problem experienced by Haydn's and others': many works are considered to be doubtful, owing to the confusion engendered by unscrupulous publishing practices in the 18th century.
It can be said with absolute authority that the next work on today's program is a first for the IBO: a work by an eight-year-old. The Symphony in E-flat, KV 16, dates from 1764-65, the same decade as the Richter and Dittersdorf above. Some writers suggest that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's very earliest works are not entirely his own, possibly "corrected" by his tiger father, Leopold, a violinist and composer himself. Certainly, young Mozart was absorbing and synthesizing the music of established composers whom the father and son (and, early on, the mother and sister) encountered on their travels to the music capitals of mid-18th-century Europe. One such composer was Johann Christian Bach, J.S. Bach's youngest son and the only one to leave Germany for a foreign clime: London. The refreshingly "un-Baroque" balanced phrasing, slower harmonic rhythm, and lighter textures of the "London Bach" had a significant influence on Mozart, as did the melodies and forms of the operas he heard in various Italian cities. The fast-slow-fast movement plan conforms to that of earlier 18th-century symphonies, but Mozart, like Haydn, would later abandon that for the four-movement plan we know from Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, et al.
The concert concludes with another work by Mozart: the Flute Concerto in D, K 314. A bit of mystery surrounds its origins, as it turns out that it was not intended for flute at all, but rather for oboe, and in C major. The original oboe composition was written for a Salzburg oboist named Giuseppe Ferlendis, sometime in the spring-summer of 1777, but Mozart later adapted it for flute to fulfill a commission, for three flute concertos, from Ferdinand Dejean, a Dutch East India Company surgeon. The composer, still in his early 20s, was hoping to get out of a sticky situation, and in fact never managed to complete the commission in its entirety. Despite a remark by Mozart that he despised the flute, the many beautiful flute parts in his works, and the beautifully idiomatic reworking of the oboe part for flute in K. 314, make one wonder about the judiciousness of that remark. Mozart is revered for his many concertos for piano, as well as his violin concertos, but he also contributed beloved concertos to the repertoires of the French horn, the clarinet, the bassoon, and the combinations of flute and harp, and violin and viola. K. 314's soloist this afternoon is the IBO's artistic director, Barthold Kuijken.
