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From about 1788 onwards,Mozart had been beset with financial difficulties, to the
point where he wrote begging letters to his friends, who, although generous in their
support, could not entirely fund the composers life style. Mozart's productivity was
affected by worry, and his major creative output started to decline in quantity, if not
in quality. Constanze's continuing ill-health added to the financial burden, with
doctor's bills and visits to Spas to be paid for. However, he was given 100 Friedrichs
d'Or for the Prussian quartets in Berlin, and with that came an offer of a post, which
Mozart declined, it is said out of loyalty to the Viennese. In spite of all these
difficulties,Mozart continued to innovate and to challenge musical boundaries. The
quartets K589 and K590, whilst still forming part of the three ‘Prussian' quartets, had
a less prominent part for the cello than their predecessor, K575.
Mozart's first String Quintet had been written as early as 1773, after which he left the
form for another thirteen years when he had already left his home town of Salzburg
and settled in Vienna. By this time, he was a fully mature composer with some of his
finest works already behind him and more to come.Why Mozart decided, after such a
long gap, to return to the idea of the String Quintet is unsure, it has even been
suggested that the death of Frederick the Great and the accession of his amateur
cellist successor may have spurred Mozart into writing the Quintets.Mozart would
also have noticed that Boccherini, a major composer of Quintets, had been made the
new Prussian Court Composer.Whatever the real reason may be,Mozart wrote a
further five Quintets for Strings in the period from April 1787 to April 1791. Despite
the quality of the works Mozart was producing in Vienna, he was hounded by
poverty and he offered three of his Quintets on a subscription basis in April 1788,
hoping thereby to raise some money for his family and himself.
The G minor Quintet (KV516) immediately follows its predecessor and makes up
something of a pair for whereas the earlier C major Quintet is a mellow and trouble
free piece, the G minor Quintet is sombre and grave. Originally conceived in A
minor, Mozart was unhappy with his choice of key and reverted to the more usual G
minor. It is this Quintet which was always the most often played of the set, somehow
catching the imagination of the listener with its thread of melancholy.
Like all the Quintets, KV516 is in four movements with two outer fast movements
framing a slow movement and a Minuet. The opening of the first movement already
sets the mood of melancholy and tiredness and the movement remains one in mood,
interrupted only by passages of turmoil. The Minuet which follows is, like the first
movement, in G minor although the mood lightens a little for a G major trio. The
slow movement in E flat has the strings muted throughout whereas the Finale begins
with an Adagio introduction which builds to an unbearable stress before the 6/8
Allegro proper which even with its outward jollity cannot dismiss the mood of
despair of the Quintet entirely.
The sixth and final Quintet is in E flat major and follows the same four movement
plan as the others. This time however, the opening Allegro di molto opens with the
viola solo and as the movement progresses, the other instruments seem to be given
the role of bravura ornamentation. The Andante slow movement is a free set of
variations which seems almost to be a concerto movement in miniature. The Minuet
has a trio based on the Laendler dance and seems to echo closely the music of
Mozart's great friend and mentor, Joseph Haydn. Haydn's spirit is never far away in
the Finale either which is again a mixture of Rondo and Sonata form and which sets
the seal on the Quintet form and indeed the chamber music for strings under
Mozart's pen.
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