Violin Concerto No. 3 (Mozart)

The Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major, K. 216, was composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in Salzburg in 1775 when he was 19 years old. In a letter to his father, Mozart called it the "Strasbourg Concerto". Researchers believe this epithet comes from the motive in the third movement's Allegretto in the central section, a local dance that already had appeared as a musette-imitating tune in a symphony by Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf., EMI CD booklet contribution

Instrumentation The work is scored for solo violin, two flutes (second movement only), two oboes (tacet in the second movement), two horns in G and D, and strings.

Movements

The piece is in three movements:

I. Allegro

The Allegro is in sonata form, opening with a G major theme played by the orchestra. The first theme takes up the orchestral ritornello similar to Aminta's aria "Aer tranquillo e dì sereni" from Mozart's opera Il re pastore. The main theme is a bright and happy discussion between the solo violin and the accompaniment, followed by a modulation to the dominant D major, then to its parallel key D minor. It experiments in other keys, but does not settle and eventually, heads back to the tonic, G major, in the recapitulation.

II. Adagio

The second movement is in ternary form in the dominant key of D major. The orchestra begins with the main theme, which the violin imitates one octave higher. The winds then play a dance-like motif in A major, which the violin concludes. The violin restates the main theme in A major, although the melody features A sharp instead of A natural, creating a brief modulation to B minor. It soon modulates back to A major, then to the home key of D major through the main theme. After the cadenza, the violin plays the main theme again, thus concluding the movement in D.

This is the only movement in any of the five violin concertos by Mozart where a pair of flutes are used instead of oboes.

III. Rondeau

The finale is a rondo in G major and in time. Mozart inserts into the rondo a short G minor Andante section followed by a longer G major Allegretto section, both in cut time. – Richard Tognetti – Australian Chamber Orchestra – Violin Concertos 3 & 5

Recordings

YearViolinConductorOrchestraRecord companyFormat1935Yehudi MenuhinGeorge EnescuOrchestre symphonique de ParisEMI RecordsMultiple1959Joseph FuchsEugene GoossensLondon Symphony OrchestraEverest RecordsVinyl1962Arthur GrumiauxColin DavisLondon Symphony OrchestraPhilips RecordsVinyl1969Henryk SzeryngAlexander GibsonNew Philharmonia OrchestraPhilips RecordsMultiple1971David OistrakhDavid OistrakhBerlin PhilharmonicEMI RecordsMultiple1978, Feb. 13-19Anne-Sophie MutterHerbert von KarajanBerlin PhilharmonicDeutsche GrammophonMultiple1983Itzhak PerlmanJames LevineVienna PhilharmonicDeutsche GrammophonMultiple1987Takako NishizakiStephen GunzenhauserCappella IstropolitanaNaxos RecordsCD1989Bruno GiurannaOrchestra da Camera di Padova e del VenetoClavesCD2007Hilary HahnGustavo DudamelStuttgart Radio Symphony OrchestraDeutsche GrammophonMultiple2016Isabelle FaustGiovanni AntoniniIl Giardino ArmonicoHarmonia MundiCD2021Viktoria MullovaOliver ZeffmanAcademy of St Martin in the FieldsPlatoonDigital

References

External links