Mozart: Horn Concerto No. 1 in D major, K. 412+514/386b (with Score)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:
Concerto for Horn and Orchestra in D major, K. 412+514/386b (with Score)
Composed: 1791
Horn: Alan Civil
Conductor: Sir Neville Marriner
Orchestra: Academy of St Martin in the Fields
0:00 1. Allegro (K. 412)
4:41 2. Rondo. Allegro (K. 514) completed by Franz Xaver Süssmay
Wikipedia article
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_Co...)
International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
(imslp.org/wiki/Horn_Concerto_...)

[@Mchwarz]

Thanks for that!

[@hjo4104]

funny how bassoons present an almost absolute replacement of horns.. 😂😂

[@TheGymSavant]

This is a well-documented phenomenon. I recall reading that bassoon and horn are the two instruments with the most similar timbres in the orchestra (maybe just of the wind instruments), and for this reason bassoons often function as additional horn parts or provided chromatic lines unachievable by natural horn

[@hjo4104]

@@TheGymSavant thanks a lot, very well said!! but it's hilarious how Mozart even mostly writes for bassoons here (and in K. 447 also) like he writes for horns (same intervals and rhytms) 🤭

[@TheGymSavant]

@@hjo4104 It’s also worth noting that there is speculation this work was not actually written by Mozart. We know that this was actually the last horn concerto written, that it went unfinished before his death, and was finished by one of his students. The material that was finished by him (the first movement in particular) is quite uncharacteristic and unconventional for Mozart (and not in a good way) so it is speculated that the autograph of the first movement and part of the rondo are Mozart “brushing up” someone else’s work, possibly Leutgeb’s?

[@TheGymSavant]

Further reading if anyone is curious, this is quite thorough: www.historicbrass.org/edocman/hbj-2004/HBSJ_2004_JL01_004_Perl.pdf

[@hjo4104]

@@TheGymSavant I did not know that. I know that the second movement was finished by Süssmayr I think, but this is an interesting info. It could be possible that Leutgeb finished it using Mozart's sketches.

[@FelipeFerreira7]

Maybe is an unpopular opinion, but, i can't see sense in playing Mozart's horn concertos on modern horn, the purpose of the piece is heard the stopped notes.