Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

"Six Sonates pour le clavecin

avec l'accompagnement d'un Violon" (1766) KV 26-31

Adagio for Glass Harmonica KV 536 (KV 617a)

Francesco Petrini (1740-1820)

Sonata III in C minor, Op. 3

Sonata VI in B flat major, Op. 3

Masumi Nagasawa: Single-action harp

Jean-Mathias Wolters, 1785 Paris

Ryo Terakado: Baroque violin

Giovannni Grancino, 1690 Milano

Recorded in Hervormde Gemeente, Rhoon,

The Netherlands, in May 2009

Etcetera KTC 1404

released in February 2010

front cover "Six Sonates pour le clavecin avec l'accompagnement d'un Violon" (1766)”

The Sonatas were written for harpsichord with violin accompaniment and were dedicated to the Princess of Nassau-Weilburg. They were engraved and published immediately as “Opus IV” by Hummel in The Hague and Amsterdam. These same sonatas were republished by Le Menu et Boyer in Paris the following year (1767), with an additional remark on the front page: Ces Pieces peuvent s’executer sur la Harpe (These pieces can be performed on the harp), demonstrating how popular harp playing was in Paris at that time, not to mention that the publisher would also be able to sell more copies of the sonatas! These annotations were dropped soon afterwards and this charming music remained only as sonatas for the harpsichord accompanied by violin. This is the first recording of these sonatas on the 18th century French harp. The type of harp played in 18th century Paris was called a single-action pedal harp and it had a very different construction from the concert harps played now. The single-action harp was introduced to Paris in 1749 by the German harpist Georg Adam Goepffert (ca 1727-1809). In contrast to the existing Baroque harps, single-action harps could alternate chromatic half-step notes by using seven pedals attached to the foot of the instrument. The harps had slender bodies with a sound-shell that was similar to a lute’s. The frame of the harp was built entirely of wood and the instrument’s sound was light and silvery as a result.

Apéritif d’Amadé, Early Sonatas

The Concerto for Harp and Flute KV 299 is almost the only piece composed for the harp by Wolfgang Amadé Mozart. In the Royal Library in The Hague many years ago, I once held an early French edition of six of Mozart’s keyboard sonatas. Reading the description on the title page astounded me and I wondered if these sonatas were indeed playable on the harp. This marked the beginning of my journey with these Mozart sonatas.

The Mozart family arrived in The Hague at the invitation of one of the Princesses of the Dutch Royal family in September 1765. Princess Caroline of Nassau-Weilburg was pregnant at that time and was extremely eager to hear the young Mozart after his successful concerts in England. Leopold Mozart’s two children Nannerl and Wolfgang had been performing in major European cities and rumours about them had already spread widely throughout musical society. The family was planning to stay for a short time in Holland before returning home via Paris but Nannerl fell ill after two days stay in The Hague and remained in bed for almost two months. Wolfgang then fell ill in his turn, causing the family to remain in Holland for almost seven months despite growing financial difficulties. The Six Sonatas KV 26-31 were written during this period: Wolfgang had just turned nine years old.

Francesco Petrini (1740-1820) was born into a family with Italian roots in Berlin. His father served as a harpist at the court of Frederick the Great of Prussia. Petrini made a successful debut in the Concert Spirituel in Paris In 1770, after which he remained there for the rest of his life. It has been said that the only solo for the harp composed by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was written especially for Petrini, as he knew of Petrini’s virtuosity on the instrument. Petrini’s Six Sonatas Op. 3 were composed in 1786; although the instruments used are the same as Mozart’s, Petrini’s were for harp with violin accompaniment ad libitum and could also be performed as independent solo harp pieces. Even though Petrini’s music feels comfortable on the harp, Mozart’s composition sparkles all on its own. It seems to me that Mozart’s primary concern was not with the instrument used but rather with the music itself — the music that was revolving in his head and that was simply waiting to be transcribed and then to be played with love and expression.

photo: Merlijn Doomernik

Philippe Meyer (1737-1819), another harpist whom Mozart had met, also played an important part in the history of the harp. His harp method was published in 1763 and was the first written for the single-action harp; it provides much interesting information about how the harp was played and practiced at that time. Given that quite a number of harpists were active in Paris during those years, I realised that it was quite probable that Mozart had heard the single-action harp performed during his visit there. Mozart, however, was most impressed by Johann Schobert (ca.1735-1767) out of all the musicians he had met in 1764. Schobert was well-known as a harpsichordist in Paris and also composed sonatas for keyboard with violin accompaniment. It seems evident that it was through him that Mozart was introduced to the sonatas qui peuvent se jouer avec l’accompagnement de violon (that can be played with the accompaniment of the violin). We should note that the violin is not used as an instrument ad libitum but as a true accompaniment. Mozart chose the same combination of instruments for the six sonatas that he composed in Holland. The sonatas are written in six different keys and, except for the first sonata, each has two movements. This style seemed to be Mozart’s preference for his violin sonatas, rather than the three movement form that he used primarily for his keyboard works. The six sonatas each have different characters, these ranging from jolly peasant dances, pantomime-like theatre music, elegant minuets and fancy chatterbox music to timeless tranquil lullabies. It is absolutely remarkable that we can already hear how lyrically the nine-year-old Wolfgang composed. It is my opinion that the range of colour and dynamic dimension of the music expands expressively when these sonatas are performed on the harp rather than on the original harpsichord. The harp also brings a gallant lightness to the pieces, whilst the patterns of broken chord accompaniments sound simply perfect on the harp. It makes my heart race to imagine that he may have given these sonatas to the musicians he had met in France as he returned to Salzburg and that they were appreciated on the harp; it is to my great joy that I can now assist in re-establishing these sonatas into the harp repertoire.

We must not forget that all the compositions written for harp in the 18th century up until the beginning of the 19th century were performed on this type of harp. The harp mostly used in orchestras nowadays, the so-called doubleaction harp, was only invented by Sebastien Erard (1752-1831) in 1810. We should also note that many players of the single-action harp appeared in the Concerts Spirituels in Paris during the 18th century; truly astonishing numbers of single-action harp builders were active in Paris during this time. Leopold Mozart visited Paris in 1764 and mentioned in his letters that Wolfgang and Nannerl had received engraved sonatas from the musicians Schobert, Eckardt and Le Grand as well as Hochbrucker, a German harpist who was living there. Leopold also mentioned Philippe Meyer, another harpist, alongside a list of people whom they had met at that time. Hochbrucker and Meyer were both well-known harp tutors. Christian Hochbrucker (1733-1812) was a Bavarian harpist who played an important role in the history of the harp; the Hochbrucker family as a whole had dedicated itself to the improvement and development of the single-action harp. Six sonatas written by Christian were already engraved in 1762 and were the first sonatas to be published for this instrument; these undoubtedly must have been the sonatas given to Mozart.

The Adagio in C major, KV 617a for glass harmonica was most likely written in Vienna in 1791. Mozart first heard this instrument in 1773 when he was 17; it was then played by Marianne Davies (1740-1792), an English virtuoso on the instrument who had also given lessons to Marie Antoinette. In a letter from Leopold Mozart to his wife, he told her that Wolfgang had also played the instrument at the house of the well-known doctor and hypnotist Franz Anton Mesmer (1734-1814) and that he himself would love to own one as well. This Adagio in C was written in the last year of Mozart’s life for Marianne Kirchgessner (1770-1808), a blind glass harmonica player; the ethereal sound of the instrument clearly enraptured him. I can well imagine that Mozart was hearing celestial sounds. I believe that divine sound was always within him, not only in his later years but even when he was as young as nine. He was also able to see and to feel the nature of human comedy and tragedy at a young age. He was truly one of the gifted ones: Amadé, or ‘loved by God’. Touched by his music, I ponder over the ephemeral beauty of the sakura, the Japanese cherry blossom. People gather around the cherry trees once a year to admire their blossom, the beauty of which lasts only for few days. The tender melancholy of Mozart’s music is like the petals of the cherry blossom that dance in the air: elegant, delicate and free but yet with a shade of sadness, for both express the ephemeral character of human life and of nature.

Masumi Nagasawa