PROGRAM NOTES SPONSORED BY THOMAS WARD

Lovers of the natural horn, as well as devotées of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791), will know that he composed four wonderful horn concertos. The work listed as Horn Concerto No. 1 was actually the last of the four to be written. Moreover, when we list its full description in the standard catalog prepared by Ludwig Köchel, it is clear that something more is going on with this charming little piece. Compare its catalog listing to any of its companions:

Horn Concerto No. 1 in D Major, K.(412+514)/386b
Horn Concerto No. 2 in E-flat Major, K.417
Horn Concerto No. 3 in E-flat Major, K.447
Horn Concerto No. 4 in E-flat Major, K.495

The mention of K.412 + K.514 refers to each of the two movements in this piece, together labeled K.386b in the sixth edition of Köchel’s catalog. I know, I know – more information than you need! I mention these details because they reinforce that sometimes a simple designation can deceive us. The seemingly innocuous title “Horn Concerto No. 1 in D Major, K.412,” hardly fits this curious, hodgepodge, certainly incomplete and possibly inauthentic work by the great Salzburg master.

First, Mozart rarely composed only two movements for any of his 50+ concertos. That is strong evidence for its incompleteness. Start to finish, it lasts less than ten minutes. Second, the two movements seem to have been written at different times, as much as 10-15 years apart. Clearly it did not arise from a single moment of inspiration. Like the other three horn concerti, this D-major work was written for Mozart’s friend, horn virtuoso Joseph Leutgeb. Leutgeb’s superior skill allowed Mozart to include virtuosic features in all four concerti, including passages of rapid running notes, a variety of hand-stopping techniques, and lip trills. (It must be mentioned that the horn in Leutgeb’s day – and used this morning – is a “natural” or valveless horn; without valves, all pitches are produced only by combinations of lip position, pressure, and hand-stopping.)

The opening Allegro unfolds with the utmost grace. This is Mozart’s serene lyric style at its most pure. A string quartet idea fills out the first ritornello, answered in short order by the horn solo. Next, a few bars of tonal transition and we land in the secondary key (A major) for a more animated theme. This, too, is quite short-lived. What sounds like a return to the opening theme masks the beginning of the sonata-form development section. Mozart shows us this same theme again in G major and E minor, but the finest moment – as so often with this composer – is the gentle glide back to the main theme in the original key, our reassuring recapitulation. All that remains is a little reinforcement of D major.

Because this concerto lacks a slow movement, we move immediately to the Rondo finale. Composed in 1791, this lilting movement in 6/8 meter was not finished by Mozart. As happened with his famous Requiem, Mozart’s assistant Franz Süssmayr stepped forward to help complete what his master left in a fragmentary state. Exactly which parts are original and which belong to the pupil is not entirely clear, but scholars are able to hazard some guesses.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this D-major concerto is not literally in the music itself. Mozart’s perverse sense of humor inspired him to edit the score with a litany of jibes at Leutgeb – cajoling him here, encouraging him through a difficult passage there. The indications, written in Italian – are funny and even lewd (redolent of Dadaist Erik Satie’s own irreverent expressive markings). “Come on, quick, get on with it! . . . Done yet? . . . You swine, what a dissonance! . . . Oh God, it’s so fast! . . . Help! . . . Now catch your breath!” And at the end, “Enough, enough!”

The Washington Post has called Zachary Wadsworth a composer of “fresh, deeply felt and strikingly original” music. Wadsworth’s works have been heard around the world. In the 2025-26 season, his Chamber Symphony (after music by Ravel) will be premiered by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in Carnegie Hall, and a new song cycle will be premiered at the Belvedere Series in Richmond. In earlier seasons, he was in residence at the Metropolitan Opera and his music was performed at Westminster Abbey in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II. Other recent honors include two JUNO Award nominations, two National Choral Awards, and awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the American Composers Forum. Wadsworth earned degrees from the Eastman School of Music, Yale School of Music, and Cornell University and is currently an Associate Professor of Music at Williams College.

Staunton Music Festival proudly presents the world premiere of Wadsworth’s Felix/Fanny, about which the composer writes:

Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn were both important figures in European Romanticism – indeed, it is hard to think of a brother and sister with similar brilliance as both composers and pianists. And though their work was quite serious, their prolific correspondence shows a lot of the playfulness, good humor, and competitiveness that one might expect between siblings with shared passions. In my short work for narrator and harp, I add music to some of this correspondence (which often included snippets of notated music), drawing attention to the private words of these two towering public musical figures.

They say that practice makes perfect. And if the String Octet in E-flat Major by Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) can claim to be a “perfect” musical work, it is because the 16-year-old had practiced – a lot. By 1825, the year of the Octet, Mendelssohn had already completed twelve string symphonies. These under-appreciated pieces, written between the ages of 12 and 14, document the boy’s growing confidence and widening sphere of influence, all of which feed into the Octet. Certainly Mendelssohn enjoyed a privileged upbringing in the family’s affluent Berlin household. Felix’s father was a banker; his grandfather was the famous philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, which guaranteed a steady stream of intellectuals, artists, and poets passing through the house. By age 12 Felix had buried himself in Goethe and Shakespeare, two filters through which much of his subsequent compositional efforts would pass. He knew Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven (who still lived) through first-hand contact with their music. Their echoes permeate the Octet, as we will have occasion to point out. But already one hears an individual voice, captured best in the glittering Scherzo: mercurial, virtuosic, and tinged with a sense for theater.

The opening Allegro strikes a leisurely, expansive tone. Added strings liberate the first violin to revel in concerto-style display while still allowing thematic progression in the lower strings. Mendelssohn’s phrases are broad, the punctuation ample, the tonal signals relatively clear. Everything contributes toward the Mozartian feel of classical form and rhetoric. An early tendency to develop the main motives is a feint; the true development section is yet to come. This is less an intimate chamber piece than a full-bodied symphony in all but name. Mendelssohn himself stated as much: “This Octet must be played by all instruments in the manner of a symphony.”

The introverted Andante opens in complete contrast to the previous movement. A touch of Baroque siciliano derives from Mendelssohn’s use of that dance’s characteristic dotted rhythm. Bach’s sicilianos offer some of his most appealing and heartfelt slow movements, and young Mendelssohn clearly embraced a similar affect. Moreover, the final plagal cadence evokes passages from Baroque concertos, suggesting immediate continuation into the following movement. Beyond these resonances, echoes of Beethoven’s late quartets abound. For after the first few phrases, Mendelssohn shelves the siciliano topic and proceeds to write a profoundly lyric movement based on a variety of rhythmic figures.

As mentioned earlier, the Scherzo is where Mendelssohn’s own voice comes through most clearly. The closest parallel to this fleet-footed movement can be found in another of Mendelssohn’s early marvels, the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1826). The Scherzo in the Octet carries a program, referring to the “Walpurgis Night” scene from Goethe’s Faust. Such a context helps make sense of the brilliant array of motives and textures. The last page, peppered with innumerable staccato figures in all eight parts, appeals both visually and aurally.

Mendelssohn’s fondness for “Old Bach” (i.e., Johann Sebastian) inspires the fugal opening of the finale. A torrent of notes dresses up Baroque fugue structure in the opening theme. Periodic interruptions by a weighty, unison idea in all strings delineates the finale’s numerous sections, which range from light comedy to learned to serene. A brilliant touch, lasting not more than a moment amidst the blazing pace, is the effusive burst of hymn-like stasis just bars from the end. Despite touches of Baroque plagal cadence and fugue, nowhere does Mendelssohn’s concern for history dampen the spirit of innovation; nowhere does technique overwhelm youthful exuberance. This is music “in itself,” as the philosophers would say. It is artistically “naïve” in the best sense of the word: unencumbered, fluently merging both medium and message. Perhaps it could only have been written by a youngster, before too much of life had left its heavy imprint.

Jason Stell, © 2026