Preview: The symphonic Mozart dips into the minor

Leonard Bernstein prepares listeners for listening afresh to Mozart's Symphony No. 40. (Warning: It's pretty technical.)

by Ken

I had a couple of possible post ideas that started to overlap and scrunch into each other. I had in mind a post where we would listen to the iconic first movements of Beethoven's Fifth and Ninth Symphonies, and I was thinking separately about my curious ambivalence about Mozart's symphonies with the notable exception of the G minor, No. 40. And it was hard to escape one thing these three landmark symphonies have in common.

For tonight I thought we'd start by listening to the first movements of the Mozart's Symphony No. 40 and also No. 25, which happens to be in the same key (G minor). Of Mozart's 40-ish symphonies, these are the only ones that have minor-key first movements.

MOZART: Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K. 183:
i. Allegro con brio


Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia, recorded Dec. 10, 1954 (mono)

Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1973

MOZART: Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550:
i. Molto allegro


Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded 1959

Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1972


IN THIS WEEK'S SUNDAY CLASSICS POST

We'll be pursuing this question of minor-key symphonic first movements and hearing both of Beethoven's.

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