61 / 84
symphonies), but also his great operas, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Le
Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte. The musicians were the
same (those of the court orchestra, without the strings and without the
singers), and they obviously did their utmost to surpass themselves in what
is in fact a vast, autonomous symphony for wind instruments, or a sort of
imaginary opera for Harmonie.
The Gran Partita is closer to Mozart’s great symphonies and operas than
to the serenade. This is obvious in its aesthetic qualities, synthesising the
most diverse musical styles. In a work that is very long and written for a
single group of instruments, the composer holds the listener’s interest
without difficulty by overstepping the stylistic limits of the serenade and
bringing into play all the compositional resources he had at his disposal. He
integrates elements that are a priori of an extremely heterogeneous nature,
in a composition presenting strong contrasts and sudden changes, and very
close to the operas in its dramatic qualities. We find the same alternation or
combination of seriousness and lightness that characterises the Mozartian
dramma giocoso.
The slow movements, for example, unexpectedly serious in character for a
serenade, are strengthened by the fact of being followed by minuets, whose
lightness – superficiality, even – might seem surprising if it did not serve to
underline their almost tragic emotion. The arrangement of the different
movements follows the principle of variety and contrast that also governs the
instrumentation: Mozart makes a point of alternating thirteen-instrument
tutti with passages for eleven or nine instruments, in different combinations,
and even a quartet (Minuet I Trio I).
GRAN PARTITA KV361 61