Quartet in F Major for Oboe and Strings, K.370
WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART
Born January 27, 1756, Salzburg
Died December 5, 1791, Vienna

The 24-year-old Mozart spent the second half of 1780 working on his opera Idomeneo and then went to Munich in January of the following year for rehearsals and the première; it was while he was in Munich in early 1781 that he composed this Oboe Quartet. Mozart wrote beautifully for woodwinds, and his music for winds-which includes numerous serenades, divertimentos, and other works-was much admired by the young Beethoven. Mozart, however, wrote very little for the solo oboe. There are distinguished concertos for flute, for clarinet, and for bassoon, but the one oboe concerto is a disputed work, better known in Mozart's later arrangement of it for flute.

Oboists, however, can take consolation in the Oboe Quartet, a brief but splendid work that gives a first-class oboist the opportunity to shine. Mozart wrote it for Friedrich Ramm, the virtuoso solo oboist of the Electoral Orchestra in Munich. Ramm was admired for the purity of his sound, and he must have been a most distinguished player, for the Quartet demands a fluid technique and the ability to make wide melodic skips gracefully, as well as to draw out a cantabile line to great length.

Many have commented that the Oboe Quartet seems to be half-concerto and half-chamber music. Mozart gives the oboist ample opportunity for virtuoso display while the strings merely accompany it, but there are also many passages of true ensemble playing where the melodic line moves easily between oboist and strings. The Allegro opens with a jaunty theme for oboe that will dominate the movement. The graceful development of this sonata-form movement leads to a quiet close. Strings have the opening idea of the grieving D-minor Adagio, with the oboe making its quiet entrance high above them. Mozart gives the oboe long and sustained melodic lines in this movement and-near the close-even offers the oboist the opportunity for a brief cadenza. The finale is a rondo marked Allegro. The dancing rondo theme is first heard in the oboe, but this is quickly picked up by the violin. Near the end of the movement is a passage remarkable for Mozart's use of polyrhythms: two rhythms occurring simultaneously. The strings are in 6/8 throughout, but for a thirteen-measure stretch Mozart sets the oboe in 4/4 against them. The passage makes a brilliant effect, with the strings proceeding evenly and the oboist scurrying to get all the notes in. The very end brings a wonderful touch: the bustle of the rondo gives way to steady eighth-notes, and the oboe rises gracefully to the concluding high F.

Piano Quartet in E-flat Major, Opus 87
ANTONIN DVORÁK
Born September 8, 1841, Muhlhausen, Bohemia
Died May 1, 1904, Prague

Dvorák was compulsive about dating his compositions. As he began work, he would note the date at the top of the blank page, and as he finished he wrote the date at the end of the manuscript. And so we know that he began the Piano Quartet in E-flat Major on July 10, 1889, and completed it six weeks later on August 19. This was a very rich time in Dvorák's life: surrounded by a large and happy family, he was composing steadily and was conducting and being honored throughout Europe. Earlier in 1889 he had seen his opera The Jacobin premièred in Prague, and a week after completing the Piano Quartet he would begin composing one of his finest works, the Eighth Symphony. The composition of the Piano Quartet went well, and on August 10 Dvorák wrote enthusiastically to his publisher: "I've now already finished three movements of a new piano quartet and the Finale will be ready in a few days. As I expected it came easily and the melodies just surged upon me. Thank God!"

The second of Dvorák's two piano quartets, the Quartet in E-flat Major has been much admired for its variety of moods, the deft fusion of piano and string instruments, and Dvorák's easy modulation between surprising keys. Other critics have been less generous, and some have criticized this music for its quasi-orchestral writing and huge effects, one of them even going so far as to call this quartet "disagreeably melodramatic." But one person's disagreeable melodrama is another's beauty, and for every critic who has complained about this music's grand sweep, countless audiences have loved the quartet just for that excitement.

The opening Allegro con fuoco is aptly named, for there is plenty of fire here: at the very beginning the strings make a fierce declaration, only to be answered by the piano's almost whimsical reply. Both these ideas will figure importantly in the development, and the yoking together of such dissimilar ideas is typical of the quartet. The viola, Dvorák's own instrument, has the haunting second theme, and the movement fluctuates between the quietly lyrical and the dramatic.

In a similar way, the Lento is mercurial in its mood shifts. Sectional in structure and unusually long, it is based on five different themes: the cello's wistful opening quickly gives way to a heated episode introduced by the piano, which in turn is followed by sequences of varied tonality and mood. The third movement is in ABA form, but this is no minuet. The outer sections are based on a waltz rhythm, and some have heard Eastern influences here: the piano's waltz tune sings languorously, and Dvorák soon has it tinkling in high registers in imitation of the Hungarian cimbalon. The trio dashes along agreeably on its omnipresent dotted rhythm.

The Finale is the movement most often criticized for sounding orchestral. A dramatic unison passage launches the movement on its vigorous way, and once again a lovely viola melody lessens tensions-in fact, some of the most attractive music in the quartet comes in this movement's quiet passages. The coda begins quietly but soon gathers force, and the quartet rushes to a knock-out conclusion.

Duo in G Major for Violin and Viola, K.423
WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

There is a wonderful story behind Mozart's two duos for violin and viola-perhaps true, perhaps not, but in any case worth re-telling. In the summer of 1783, Mozart returned to Salzburg for the first time since his rupture with Archbishop Colloredo. It was a nervous visit for the composer. Mozart was bringing his new wife Constanze to meet his father for the first time (the couple left behind in Vienna their first child, a baby boy who died in their absence), and he was worried that the archbishop might have him arrested. While in Salzburg, Mozart renewed his friendship with Joseph Haydn's younger brother Michael, who had been music director for the archbishop since 1762, when Mozart was 6. Mozart found Michael Haydn in bad condition. He was sick, and-having been commissioned by the archbishop to provide six duos for violin and viola-had been able to complete only four. As the story has it, the enraged archbishop ordered Haydn's salary cut off until the remaining two duos were complete. Hearing this, Mozart returned the next day with two duos and gave them to Haydn to pass off as his own.

This story sounds a little too good to be true, and it has the earmarks of a tale created to make the archbishop sound like even more of an ogre than he apparently was. But there is enough truth in the story to make it more than plausible. Haydn never published his set of six sonatas, and that fall-after he had returned to Vienna-Mozart wrote to his father in Salzburg, asking that the manuscripts to his duos be returned to him.

This was a very rich period for Mozart as composer. Just before he left for Salzburg, he had completed two of the great string quartets dedicated to Joseph Haydn and had written most of the Mass in C Minor; on the way home to Vienna, he quickly dashed off the "Linz" Symphony. The two duos, the only ones Mozart ever wrote, are masterly in their handling of the two instruments in what might seem a fairly limited form. Mozart played both violin and viola, but he preferred to play the viola, and he makes the two instruments equal partners in this music rather than relegating the viola to its more familiar role as accompanying voice. In fact, the writing for viola is one of the most remarkable aspects of this music, for Mozart fully exploits its distinctively rich and expressive sound.

The Duo in G Major is in three movements: a sonata-form first movement, a lyric slow movement, and a rondo-finale. The extended opening movement, by turns extroverted and melodic, features a brilliant interchange between the two voices and at one point a graceful little canon. The slow movement is built on an aria-like main idea; here the violin introduces the theme and has most of the interest. The bustling finale makes sharp dynamic contrasts; Mozart nicely varies the rhythmic pulse with extended passages in triplets.

Serenade in D Minor for Winds and Strings, Opus 44
ANTONIN DVORÁK

Some composers-Mozart and Mendelssohn come quickly to mind-achieve success with ease. Born into perfect circumstances, they were prodigies who blossomed early, had astonishing careers, and were dead in their mid-thirties. For certain other composers, though, the path to success was slow and difficult. Dvorák was born into a poor family, apprenticed to a butcher, and only narrowly escaped a life behind a meat counter when friends and relatives heard his loud protests and helped send him to music school. But even then success came slowly. Dvorák supported himself for years by conducting bands, playing the viola, and giving piano lessons, and it was not until his mid-thirties-the age at which Mozart and Mendelssohn died-that Dvorák began to achieve any real success and fame.

Perhaps it is no coincidence that at this same point Dvorák began to embrace his Czech identity fully and to incorporate elements of Czech music into his own compositions. In 1878, when Dvorák turned 37, he composed his Slavonic Dances, which quickly made his reputation around the world, and it was early in that same year-between January 4 and 18-that Dvorák composed his Serenade for Winds, which also shows some Czech elements. Serenades for winds are usually remembered as an eighteenth-century form: Haydn, Mozart, and others had written serenades, divertimenti, and cassations for various ensembles of wind instruments. Usually light in character, this music was often composed specifically as background for social occasions.

In his Serenade for Winds, Dvorák took the general form of the eighteenth-century wind serenade but made some changes, reducing the number of movements to just four and scoring it for an unusual combination of instruments: two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, three horns, and-for added resonance and a sustained bass line-a cello and a doublebass. There is also a degree of thematic unity here unusual in a wind serenade: many of Dvorák's themes begin with the upward leap of a fourth, and some themes reappear in several movements.

The Serenade gets off to a mock-serious start on a sturdy march tune, and Dvorák offers variety with a second theme that rocks easily along its dotted rhythms; both themes return to lead the movement to a quiet close. The minuet is the most "Czech" of the four movements, sounding very much like the series of Slavonic Dances Dvorák would compose later the same year. Its agreeable outer sections are in the form of a Czech sousedska, a folk-dance, while the trio section rips along on furiant cross-accents. Critics single out the Andante for special praise, for there is some imaginative writing here. The serene main melody, full of characteristic turns, unfolds in the solo oboe and clarinet while the three horns accompany with syncopated chords and the strings provide a steady bass line. The movement rises to an animated climax, then subsides to close peacefully. The animated finale returns to the manner of the first movement: its main theme bears some relation to the march tune that opened that movement, and in fact the march itself reappears in the course of the finale before a series of sunny fanfares in D major propel the Serenade to its buoyant close.