Symphony No. 40 in g minor, K. 550

Composer: MOZART, Wolfgang Amadeus
  • Mozart wrote his last three symphonies (K. 543, 550 and 551) in the summer of 1788.1
  • Mozart completed this symphony on July 25, 1788, in Vienna.2 Mozart’s biographer Maynard Solomon suggests that Mozart may have written his last three symphonies for a proposed trip to London (which never occurred).3
  • This is one of only two symphonies Mozart wrote in a minor mode. It’s an example of the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) style which originated in late 18th-C. German literature, and found its way into music and other arts as well.4
  • Johannes Brahms ended up with the manuscript of this piece in the 1860s. He received it as a thank-you gift from Princess Anna of Hesse after he dedicated his Piano Quintet, Op. 34 to her.5

Sources

  1. Cliff Eisen, and Stanley Sadie, “Mozart, (Johann Chrysostom) Wolfgang Amadeus,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed March 24, 2021,  https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-6002278233.
  2. Cliff Eisen, and Stanley Sadie, “Mozart, (Johann Chrysostom) Wolfgang Amadeus,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed March 24, 2021,  https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-6002278233.
  3. Maynard Solomon, Mozart: A Life (New York: Harper Collins, 1995), 426.
  4. Betsy Schwarm, “Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550,” Encyclopaedia Brittanica (Jan. 3, 2017), accessed March 24, 2021, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Symphony-No-40-in-G-Minor.
  5. Jan Swafford, Johannes Brahms: A Biography (New York: Vintage Books, 1997), 287.

Cut IDs

44027 40672 49540 44380 44734 14702 22893