Salzburg and its Orchestra
When Mozart wrote an aria, he tailor-made it to exploit the strengths and circumvent the weaknesses of the singer for whom it was destined. He usually refused to compose an aria until he was familiar with the singer who was to perform it, and when there was a change in the cast of an opera, he sometimes inserted or substituted new arias. In this he was a man of his times, a craftsman who sought to please the singers, the audience and himself with wellwrought creations that would make their intended effect. Mozart’s concern - one might even call it an obsession - for providing the right music for each circumstance in which he found himself is well documented in his letters. When he composed symphonies, their style was likewise influenced to some degree by the strengths and weaknesses of a particular ensemble and the tastes of a certain audience.
It is for that reason that this series of recordings has for the first time recreated the types of ensemble for which Mozart composed his symphonies, enabling us to hear differences between these orchestras that Mozart and his contemporaries thought significant, and to learn what influence those differences may have had upon the style of the music. The ensembles range from the tiny orchestras that Mozart heard at private concerts and small courts to the large opera orchestras that performed his symphonies in Italy, from the small but accomplished Prague orchestra that was so devoted to Mozart and his music to the fifty-seven-member orchestra of the Concert spirituel, from string sections whose balance was similar to that of a modern chamber orchestra to string sections in which the double basses reatly outnumbered the cellos and where there were hardly any Violas. Each of these characteristic sounds may be heard among the more-than-sixty symphonies in this collection.

The use of 18th-century instruments with the proper techniques of playing them gives to the Academy of Ancient Music a vibrant, articulate sound. Inner voices are clearly audible without obscuring the principal melodies. Subtle differences in articulation are heard more distinctly than is usually the case with modern instruments. At lively tempos and with this luminous timbre, the observance of all of Mozart’s repeats does not make movements seem too long, and restores them to their just proportions. A special instance concerns the da capos of the minuets, where, the written and oral traditions of the ast century-and-a-half tell us, the repeats should be omitted. But those traditions cannot be traced as far back as Mozart’s time, and clues found in writings contemporaneous with him suggest that repeats were usually observed during da capos.
Missing instruments understood in 18th-century practice to be required have been supplied: these include bassoons playing the bass line with the cellos and double basses whenever obbligato bassoon parts are not provided, kettledrums whenever trumpets are present, and (with the exception of the 'Paris' symphony) harpsichord or fortepiano continuo. No conductor is needed, as the direction of the orchestra is divided in true 18th-century fashion between the concertmaster and the continuo player, who are placed so that they can see each other and are visible to the rest of the orchestra. As there was wide variation in orchestral practice from region to region in western Europe, no all-purpose classical orchestra can be recreated; rather, we have attempted to present the several kinds of ensembles for which Mozart wrote, whose peculiarities he had in mind when composing.
Documentation of the excellence of Viennese orchestral playing in the 1770s and 80s is presented in the notes to volume 7 of these recordings and need not be repeated here. As there was then no single orchestra dominating Viennese musical life, we have for Mozart’s Viennese symphonies recreated a typical orchestra, avoiding the extremely small groups that sometimes performed at private concerts as well as the huge groups occasionally assembled for special occasions. For example, the orchestras of both the Kärntnerthor and Burg Theatres in 1773 had 6 or 7 first and 6 or 7 second violins, 3 or 4 violas, 3 cellos and 3 double basses, with pairs of the necessary wind and brass, kettledrums and a harpsichord. For Mozart’s late symphonies, however, fortepiano continuo has been employed, on the grounds that as Mozart sat at that instument to lead the orchestra and perform the solo part in his piano concertos, he probably did the same for his symphonies at those concerts.

Musical Sources and Editions
Until recently performers of Mozart’s symphonies have relied solely upon editions drawn from the old Complete Works, published in the 19th century by the Leipzig firm of Breitkopf & Härtel. During the past three decades, however, a new complete edition of Mozart’s works (NMA) has been appearing, published by Bärenreiter of Kassel in collaboration with the Mozarteum of Salzburg. The NMA has been used for all the works in this volume, with revisions made to the 'Paris' and 'Prague' symphonies as described above.

The Final Trilogy
In the vast literature about Mozart's life and music, there are several monographs, dozens of articles, hundreds of book chapters, and thousands of programme notes devoted to the last three symphonies (K. 543, 550 and 551), which were completed in 1788 in the space of about three months. What one gleans from reading a generous sample of these writings may be summarized thus: we do not know for what orchestra or what occasion the three works were composed, so they were probably the result of an inner artistic compulsion rather than an external stimulus; the three works were intended as a trilogy; these masterpieces were never performed during his lifetime and this shows how unappreciated he was by his contemporaries. An investigation of these assertions shows two of the three to be misleading.
Anyone who has examined the psychology of Mozart's pace of composing knows that, although he could sometimes compose with lightning speed, he was also given to procrastination, on occasion he was depressed and found it difficult to compose, and he was often painfully busy giving lessons and concerts to support his family. There are plenty of documented instances suggesting that he seldom launched a large-scale work without a clear use for it in mind, and that, when a commission or opportunity for performance or publication dried up, he would sometimes abandon a work in mid-course. That being the case, we should be surprised if Mozart had composed three large symphonies with no practical goals in mind, and in this instance, we can suggest three such possible goals.
Perhaps the most immediate goal in composing some if not all of the three symphonies was that Mozart had scheduled a series of subscription concerts for June and July 1788. It seems that only the first of these concerts actually took place after which, owing to an insufficient number of subscribers, the rest were cancelled. This was to be the last time that Mozart attempted to put on a public concert in Vienna.
Another goal is revealed by the number three itself. Sets of symphonies were customarily sold in manuscript or engraved editions in groups of three (for larger symphonies) or in groups of six (for smaller ones). Mozart and his father had prepared several sets of six symphonies each earlier in his career, and in 1784 Mozart himself had made up a set of three for publication. We cannot doubt that he hoped to publish K. 543, 550 and 551 as an 'opus', although in fact they remained unpublished until after his death.
The final goal was that in 1788 Mozart was trying to arrange (and not for the first time) a trip to London. It was well-known among musicians on the Continent that a talented composer-performer could make more money in London than anywhere else, and - as Haydn was to show by his visits to London in the early 1790s - producing good symphonies was an important element in such a venture.
When the English tour failed to materialize, Mozart's three symphonies provided music for a German tour he made in 1789 to give concerts and to seek patronage and perhaps a permanent post. An examination of what is known of Mozart's orchestral concerts on this tour and of those after his return to Vienna undermines the notion that the last three symphonies remained unperformed during his lifetime.
At the Dresden Court (14 April) Mozart performed a piano concerto, and, although the rest of his programme is unknown, this concert may very well have also included at least one symphony. A reaction to this event survives, for the Russian ambassador attended Mozart's concert and later summarized the objections of some contemporaries to the composer - objections which he himself apparently did not share:
'Mozart is very learned, very difficult, consequently he is very much esteemed by instrumentalists; but he seems never to have had the good fortune to have loved. No modulation ever issued from his heart.'
A copy of the programme of Mozart's concert of 12 May in the Leipzig Gewandhaus survives. It is reproduced below with indications of the probable identity of the pieces.
Symphony
Scena. Mme. Duscheck (K. 505)
Concerto, on the Pianoforte (K. 456)
Symphony
Concerto, on the Pianoforte (K. 503)
Scena. Mme. Duscheck (K. 528)
Fantasy, on the Pianoforte (K. 475)
Symphony

Although it would be tempting to suppose that Mozart's last three symphonies were all performed on this occasion (raising interesting questions about the endurance of the orchestra and the audience), it is more likely that Mozart followed the custom of some of his Viennese concerts, dividing a symphony and using the opening movements at the beginning of the concert and the finale at the end. Thus Leipzig probably heard only one, or perhaps two, of the last symphonies. The Leipzig music critic Johann Friedrich Rochlitz, who met Mozart and attended this concert and the rehearsal for it, later published a reminiscence of the occasion in the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung, of which he was for many years the editor:

'When I went into the rehearsal the next day... I noticed to my astonishment that the first movement being rehearsed - it was the allegro of a symphony of his - he took very, very fast. Hardly twenty bars had been played and - as might easily be foreseen - the orchestra started to slow down and the tempo dragged. Mozart stopped, explained what they were doing wrong, cried out "Ancora", and began again just as fast as before. The result was the same. He did everything to maintain the same tempo; once he beat time so violently with his foot that one of his finely-worked steel shoebuckles broke into pieces: but all to no avail. He laughed at this mishap, left the pieces lying there, cried out "Ancora" again, and started for the third time at the same tempo. The musicians became recalcitrant toward this diminutive, deathly pale little man who hustled them in this way: incensed, they continued working at it, and now it was all right. Everything that followed, he took at a moderate pace. I must admit: I thought then he was rushing it a bit, insisting he was right, not through obstinacy but in order not to compromise his authority with them right at the beginning. But after the rehearsal he said in an aside to a few connoisseurs: "Don’t be surprised at me; it wasn't caprice, but that I saw that the majority of the musicians were already fairly old people. The dragging would never have stopped if I hadn't first driven them to their limit and made them angry. Now they did their best through sheer irritation". As Mozart had never before heard this orchestra play, that shows a fair knowledge of human nature; so he was not after all a child in everything outside of the realm of music - as people so often say and write.'

One would dearly love to believe this amusing anecdote, if only Rochlitz didn't have such a terrible reputation for publishing trumped-up documents.
In 1790 Mozart, still searching pathetically for patronage and a suitable post, travelled to Frankfurt at his own expense to be present at the festivities surrounding the coronation of Leopold II. A concert he gave there on 15 October is documented by the fullest eye-witness account of any such event that we possess, written by Count Ludwig von Bentheim-Steinfurt in his diary:
'At 11 o'clock in the morning there was a grand concert by Mozart in the auditorium of the National Playhouse. It began with the fine (1) Symphony by Mozart which I have long possessed. (2) Then came a superb Italian aria, "Non so di chi”, which Madame Schick sang with infinite expressiveness. (3) Mozart played a Concerto composed by him which was of an extraordinary prettiness and charm; he had a fortepiano by Stein of Augsburg which must be supreme of its kind and costs from 90 to 100 pounds. Mozart's playing is a little like that of the late Klöffler, but infinitely more perfect. Monsieur Mozart is a small man of rather pleasant appearance; he had a coat of brown marine satin nicely embroidered; he is engaged at the Imperial Court. (4) The soprano Cecarelli sang a beautiful scena and rondeau, for bravura airs do not appear to be his forte; he had grace and a perfect method; an excellent singer but his tone is a little on the decline, that and his ugly physiognomy; for the rest his passage work, ornaments and trills are admirable...
In the second act, (5) another concerto by Mozart, which however did not please me like the first. (6) A duet which we possess and I recognized by the passage "Per te, per te", with ascending notes... It was a real pleasure to hear these two people, although La Schick lost by comparison with the soprano in the matter of voice and ornaments, but she scored in the passage work at least. (7) A Fantasy without the music by Mozart, very charming, in which he shone infinitely, exhibiting all the power of his talent. (8) The last symphony was not given for it was almost two o'clock and everybody was sighing for dinner. The music thus lasted three hours, which was owing to the fact that between the pieces there were very long pauses. The orchestra was no more than rather weak with five or six violins, but apart from that very acccurate. There was only one accursed thing that displeased me very much: there were not many people...'
During Mozart's last years in Vienna, his concert activities were much reduced compared to those in the early 1780s, and we are poorly informed about these concerts because, Mozart's father having died, we do not have a series of informative letters. In fact, the only documented occasion on which a symphony was performed took place on 16 and 17 April 1791 at the 'Society of Musicians' annual benefit concert, when a large orchestra under the direction of Antonio Salieri performed a 'grand symphony’ by Mozart. As Mozart's friends the clarinettists Johann and Anton Stadler were in the orchestra, the symphony played may have been either K. 543 or the second version of K. 550. The very existence of versions of K.550 with and without clarinets demonstrates that the work was performed, for Mozart would hardly have gone to the trouble of adding the clarinets and rewriting the flute and oboes to accommodate them, had he not had a specific performance in view. And the version without clarinets must also have been performed, for surely the re-orchestrated version, which exists in Mozart's hand, of two passages in the slow movement can only have resulted from his having heard the work and discovered an aspect needing improvement. Even though the alternative version of the two passages in the Andante must represent Mozart's final thoughts, it is missing from most editions of the symphony and relegated to an appendix in the NMA. But because it gives every sign of being the definitive version, we have used it for this recording of the version of K. 550 without clarinets.
If we add to the concert activities documented above the evidence of surviving contemporaneous sets of manuscript parts of the last three symphonies, we can confidently lay to rest the myth that these works remained unperformed during his lifetime.

Symphony in Eb major, K.543
The autograph manuscript, also in Kraków, bears no inscription at all, but in Mozart's catalogue of his own works it is dated 'Vienna, 26 Iune 1788'. This symphony is the least well known and performed of the last six symphonies. As K. 543 exhibits no lack of fine workmanship or first-rate inspiration, we must speculate on the possible reasons for its relative neglect. Could it be due to the fact that the other late symphonies have nicknames to characterize them in the minds of conductors and audiences, while the Eb major symphony does not? Could it be that the kinds of  ideas
Mozart chose to explore in this work survive the translation from the lean, clear sound of 18th-century instruments to the powerful, opaque sounds of modern instruments less well than do the more muscular, proto-Romantic ideas of the 'Great G-minor’ and ’Jupiter' symphonies? Could it be that the flat key, which yields a relatively muted sound compared to the brilliance of C major (K. 425, 551) and D major (K. 504), makes less of an impression in large modern halls on 20th-century instruments than it did in small 18th-century halls with period instruments? This recording has as one of its goals to provide a living laboratory to seek answers to such questions, and each listener must judge for himself what the results of the experiment may be.
It has been suggested that K. 543 was consciously modelled on Michael Haydn's Eb major symfphony, Perger no. 17, a work which Mozart in act acquired in 1784. If so, Mozart so far surpassed his 'model' as to make comparison virtually meaningless. More likely is the influence of the symphonies of brother Joseph Haydn, noticeable especially in the stately slow introduction to the first movement and the serene Andante con moto. The first allegro is an interesting case of strong ideas presented in a deliberately understated way. The courtly minuet is set off by a trio based on an Austrian ländler, given out by a favourite Alpine village instrument, the clarinet, complete with oom-pah-pah accompaniment. The perpetual motion of the finale exhibits a great deal of the kind of mischievous good humour for which Joseph Haydn's finales are famous.

Symphony in G minor, K.550 ('Great’, First Version)
The autograph manuscripts of both versions of this work (as well as a corrigenda leaf discussed above) are found in the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna, given to that institution by Brahms. K. 550, was probably dubbed ’the Great' to distinguish it from the 'Little G-minor’ symphony, K. 173dB/183, itself an extraordinary work. As the 'Great G-minor' symphony was first published in 1794 and the 'Little G-minor’ in 1798, the pair of nicknames must have arisen in the 19th-century. That the designation 'Great' stuck to K. 550 was probably due to the other meaning of the word -that is, 'magnificent, outstanding, remarkable' and not simply 'large' - for of all of Mozart's symphonies this was the one that most interested the musicians and critics of succeeding generations. The work’s intensity, unconventionality chromaticism, thematic working-out, profusion of ideas - all of these endeared it to the Romantics. Nonetheless, there was no agreement about its meaning, for some found it imbued with tragedy (even with premonitions of Mozart's early death) while others thought it had the classical balance, proportions and repose of a Greek vase.
There were of course those who understood the work immediately; for instance, Joseph Haydn, who quoted from its Eb-major slow movement in his oratorio The Seasons in the Eb-major aria, no. 38, where winter is compared to old age. The quotation occurs following the words '...exhausted is thy summer's strength...' by which Haydn simultaneously offers us an interpretation of Mozart's music, commemorates the loss of his younger colleague, and perhaps also comments upon the approaching end of his own career. Schubert also took note of K. 550, basing the minuet of his Fifth Symphony on its minuet.
It was largely Richard Wagner's towering influence as a conductor of Beethoven’s symphonies that changed the way in which works like K. 550 were performed. In the 19th-century the size of both string and wind sections was gradually increased, to match the increase in the size of concert halls and opera houses. These enlarged string sections tended to be too powerful when the wind were reduced to Mozart's smaller forces. In addition, the playing style and the way in which instruments were being built (or, in the case of string instruments, also rebuilt) had gradually come to favour legato playing rather than detached playing - the performance-practice equivalent of unendliche Melodie. Finally, with the rise of virtuoso orchestral conductors - and here Wagner's example was most influential - the tempo of a movement was understood to be in a state of continual flux. Indeed, this continuous moulding of the tempo during performance came eventually to be one of the principal points by which a conductors interpretation was judged. The present performances do away with these encrustations of Romantic tradition and approach the symphonies from a more objective, 18th-century point of view.

Symphony in C major, K.551 ('Jupiter')
Like so many other precious Mozart autographs, the manuscript of K. 551 is in the material formerly in Berlin and now at Kraków. On the autograph Mozart wrote only 'Sinfonia', while a later hand added '10 Aug. 1788', taken undoubtedly from the entry in Mozart's catalogue, which reads 'Vienna, 10 August 1788'. The work’s nickname, 'Jupiter', seems to have originated in London. Mozart's son W.A. Mozart fils, told Vincent and Mary Novello that the sobriquet was coined by Haydn's London sponsor, the violinist and orchestra leader Johann Peter Salomon. And indeed the earliest edition of the work to employ the subtitle 'Jupiter' was a piano arrangement made and published by Muzio Clementi in London in 1823. During the first half of the 19th-century in the German-speaking world, however, K. 551 was known as 'the symphony with the fuga finale'. The designation 'Jupiter’ was probably inspired by the pomp of the first movement which, with its prominent use of trumpets and kettledrums and stately dotted rhythms, was calculated to evoke images of nobility and godliness in the 18th-century mind.
The Andante cantabile, with its muted violins and subdominant key, turns 180 degrees from the lighter realms of the first movement toward a darker region. The minuet and trio hide beneath their politely galant exteriors a host of contrapuntal and motivic artifices, which impart to the pair an exceptional unity. And the famous fugal finale? Modern theorists, raised on Bach fugues, will tell you that it is not a fugue at all, but their definition of the genre is certainly not that of the late 18th- and early 19th-centuries. The movement is, to be sure, in sonata form with both repeats and a vast coda in which occurs one of the great miracles of Western music: a triumphal fugato in which the main melodic ideas of the movement are brought together in various combinations and permutations in invertible counterpoint, in a way that has everything to do with the summation and conclusion of a dynamic symphonic movement and nothing at all to do with dry lessons in counterpoint. Joseph Haydn, perhaps the only contemporary of Mozart's able fully to comprehend him during his lifetime, paid this work the ultimate compliment of quoting from its slow movement in the slow movement of his Symphony no. 98, and of modelling the finale of his Symphony no. 95 on that of the 'Jupiter'.

A Note Concerning the Numbering of Mozart's Symphonies
The first edition of Ludwig Ritter von Köchel's Chronological-Thematic Catalogue of the Complete Works of Wolfgang Amaadé Mozart was published in 1862 (=K1). It listed all of the completed works of Mozart known to Köchel in what he believed to be their chronological order, from number 1 (infant harpsichord work) to 626 (the Requiem). The second edition by Paul Graf von Waldersee in 1905 involved primarily minor corrections and clarifications. A thoroughgoing revision came first with Alfred Einstein's third edition, published in 1936 (=K3). (A reprint of this edition with a sizeable supplement of further corrections and additions was published in 1946 and is sometimes referred to as K3a.) Einstein changed the position of many works in Köchel's chronology, threw out as spurious some works Köchel had taken to be authentic, and inserted as authentic some works Köchel believed spurious or did not know about. He also inserted into the chronological scheme incomplete works, sketches, and works known to have existed but now lost. These Köchel had
placed in an appendix (=Anhang, abbreviated Anh.) without chronological order. Köchel's original numbers could not be changed, for they formed the basis of cataloguing for thousands of publishers, libraries, and reference works. Therefore, the new numbers were inserted in chronological order between the old ones by adding lower-case letters. The so-called fourth and fifth editions were nothing more than unchanged reprints of the 1936 edition, without the 1946 supplement. The sixth edition, which appeared in 1964 and was edited by Franz Giegling, Alexander Weinmann, and Gerd Sievers (=K6), continued Einstein's innovations by adding numbers with lower-case letters appended, and a few with upper-case letters in instances in which a work had to be inserted into the chronology between two of Einstein's lowercase insertions. (A so-called seventh edition is an unchanged reprint of the sixth). Hence, many of Mozart's works bear two K numbers, and a few have three.
Although it was not Köchel's intention in devising his catalogue, Mozart's age at the time of composition of a work may be calculated with some degree of accuracy from the K number. (This works, however, only for numbers over 100). This is done by dividing the number by 25 and adding 10. Then, if one keeps in mind that Mozart was born in 1756, the year of composition is also readily approximated.
The old Complete Works of Mozart published 41 symphonies in 3 volumes between 1879 and 1882, numbered 1 to 41 according to the chronology of K1. Additional symphonies appeared in supplementary volumes and are sometimes numbered  42 to 50, even though they are early works.

Bibiography

• Anderson, Emily: The Letters of Mozart & His Family (London, 1966)
• Burney, Charles: The Present State of Music in Germany, The Netherlands, and United Provinces (London, 1773)
• Della Croce, Luigi: Le 75 sinfonie de Mozart (Turin, 1977)
• Eibl, Joseph Heinze, et al.: Mozart: Briefe und Aufzeichnungen (Kassel, 1962-75)
• Koch, Heinrich: Musilcalisches Lexikon (Frankfort, 1802)
• Landon, H. C. Robbins: 'La crise romantique dans la musique autrichienne vers 1770: quelques précurseurs inconnus de la Symphonie en sol mineur (KV 183) de Mozart', Les influences étrangères dans l'oeuvre de W. A. Mozart (Paris, 1958)
• Larsen, Jens Peter: 'A Challenge to Musicology: the Viennese Classical School', Current Musicology (1969), ix
• Mahling, Christoph-Hellmut: 'Mozart und die Orchesterpraxis seiner Zeit', Mozart-Jahrbuch (1967)
• Mila, Massimo: Le Sinfonie de Mozart (Turin, 1967)
• Saint-Foix, Georges de: Les Symphonies de Mozart (Paris, 1932)
• Schneider, Otto, and Anton Algatzy: Mozart-Handbuch (Vienna, 1962)
• Schubart, Ludwig: Christ, Fried. Dan. Schubart's Ideen zu einer Asthetik der Tonkunst (Vienna, 1806)
• Schultz, Detlef: Mozarts Jugendsinfonien (Leipzig, 1900)
• Sulzer, Johann Georg: Allgemeine Theorie der schönen Künste (Berlin, 1771-74)
• Zaslaw, Neal: 'The Compleat Orchestral Musician', Early Music (1979), vii/1
• Zaslaw, Neal: 'Toward the Revival of the Classical Orchestra', Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association (1976-77), ciii
  

Symphony in D major, K.300a/297 (’Paris’)
Despite an extensive literature about Mozart’s stay in Paris in 1778, many questions remain concerning his activities there. The twenty-two-year-old composer and his mother arrived in the French capital on 23 March of that year, in search of a position worthier of his talents than that which he had held at Salzburg. His time in Paris was to prove a disaster; not only did Mozart fail to find regular employment, to make much money by his freelance activities or to produce many compositions, but his mother died.
By common report, the best orchestra in Paris in 1778 was not the orchestra of the wellestablished Concert spirituel, but rather that of the newer Concert des amateurs, founded in 1769 by Gossec. The Concert des amateurs flourished until January 1781, when one of its principal patrons withdrew his support, ending the series abruptly, apparently much to the regret of everyone involved. Performances were held at the Hôtel de Soubise two or three times a week in the autumn and the spring. In order best to present his symphonies to the Parisian public, Mozart should have approached the director of the Concert des amateurs (in 1778 the violinist and composer Joseph Boulogne, le chevalier de Saint-Georges). An he probably had some such plan in mind, for in a letter written to his father from Mannheim on 3 December 1777 he reported hearing from musicians there (who would have been in a position to know, as several Mannheim composers had had symphonies published and performed in Paris) that the Concert des amateurs paid five louis d’or for a new symphony. In the event, however, Mozart was introduced to Joseph Le Gros, director of the Concert spirituel, and it was for that organization that he composed a symphony.
The history of this work is documented in Mozart’s letters. It is the well-known Symphony in D major, K.300a/297, the so-called 'Paris' symphony, which Mozart must have completed - at least in his head if not necessarily on paper - by 12 June, on which date he wrote to his father reporting that earlier in the day he had played through it at the keyboard for the singer Anton Raaff and Count Sickingen, minister of the Palatinate, after lunch at the latter’s house. The symphony had its première at the Concert spirituel on Corpus Christi (18 June) after only one rehearsal - the usual 18th-century practice - on the previous day. Mozart reported (3 July):

I was very nervous at the rehearsal, for never in my life have I heard a worse performance; you cannot imagine how they twice bumbled and scraped through it. I was really in a terrible state and would gladly have rehearsed it again, but as there is always so much to rehearse there was no time left. So I had to go to bed with an anxious heart and in a discontented and angry frame of mind. Next day I had decided not to go to the concert at all; but in the evening, the weather being fine, I at last made up my mind to go, determined that if [my symphony] went as badly as it had at the rehearsal I would certainly go up to the orchestra, take the violin from the hands of Lahoussaye, the first violinist, and lead myself! I prayed to God that it might go well, for it is all to His greater honour and glory; and behold, the symphony began... Right in the middle of the first Allegro was a passage that I knew they would like; the whole audience was thrilled by it and there was a tremendous burst of applause; but as I knew, when I wrote it, what kind of an effect it would produce, I repeated it again at the end - when there were shouts of 'Da Capo'. The Andante also found favour, but particularly the last Allegro because, having observed that here all final as well as first Allegros begin with all the instruments playing together and generally unisono, I began mine with the two violin-sections only, piano for the first eight bars - followed instantly by a forte; the audience, as I expected, said "Shh!" at the soft beginning, and as soon as they heard the forte which followed immediately began to clap their hands. I was so happy that as soon as the symphony was over I went off to the Palais Royal where I had a large ice, said the rosary as I had vowed to do - and went home.

There was a single, brief review of the concert, stating of Mozart only that 'This artist, who from the tenderest age had made a name for himself among harpsichordists, can today be placed among the ablest composers’.
Mozart’s description of the orchestra of the Concert spirituel can be supplemented from other sources. In the period between Mozart’s previous visits to Paris (1763-64 and 1766) and the visit which concerns us here, the orchestra of the Concert spirituel went through a series of reforms, undoubtedl occasioned by the fact that the orchestra had been formed in 1725 to perform a repertory of French music in the style of Delalande, whose motets were mainstays of their concerts. Gradually the Concert spirituel came to perform less French and more Italian and German music, less archaic and more modern music, to which new tasks it was at first ill suited. The orchestral reforms were also surely motivated by invidious comparisons with the Concert des amateurs, whose orchestra was from the start designed to perform 'modern' music. In March 1777 there was the latest of many changes of management at the Concert spirituel: following the death of Leduc, Gaviniès and Gossec resigned as directors, Le Gros was appointed to replace them, and the membership of the orchestra was once again reformed. According to the Almanack des spectacles de Paris for 1779, the composition of the orchestra that gave the première of Mozart’s K.300a/297 on 18 ]une 1778 was 11 first and 11 second violinists, 5 violists, 8 cellists, 5 double bass players, 6 men who played flute, oboe and clarinet, 4 bassoonists, 6 men who played horn and trumpet, and 1 timpanist, or a total of fifty-seven musicians. This orchestra has been precisely duplicated for the present recording. We do not know the seating plan used by the orchestra of the Concert spirituel, but as the orchestra had been reformed several times in imitation of that of the Concert des amateurs, we have obeyed the advice recorded by the violinist J.J.O. de Meude-Monpas, based upon his experience with the latter organization:

'The orchestra's disposition counts for much, and one must observe the following rules, namely: put the second violins opposite and not alongside the firsts; place the bass instruments as near as possible to the first violins (for in harmony the bass is the essential part of the chords); finally, bring together the wind instruments, such as the oboes, flutes, horns, etc; and finish it off with the Violas.'

Certain aspects of this orchestra deserve comment: one is the large number of bassoons, a feature of several orchestras of the period, which gives the bass line a characteristic 'etched' sound quite different from that of a modern orchestra's bass line. Because the upper woodwind were double-handed, it was possible to play French motets, ouvertures and dances with three first and three second oboes, or to play works with 'modern' orchestration, like Mozart’s symphony, with pairs of flutes, oboes and clarinets. Another noteworthy feature is the apparent absence of a keyboard continuo player. The roster of the orchestra of the Concert spirituel contained an organist up to and including the 1772-73 season, after which no keyboard player was listed. One notices among the directors in the 1770s and 80s, however, persons qualified to play keyboard continuo. Works containing recitative continued to appear on the programmes of the Concert spirituel, and we must therefore suppose that someone was available to play continuo for such works even if a newer practice may have eliminated the continuo instrument for most or even all other types of music. (The 'Paris' symphony is performed here without continuo.) Finally, all evidence suggests that when German or Italian orchestras of the period had string sections this large, the wind would nearly always have been doubled. The sound of our recreated 'Paris' orchestra (in which only the bassoons and horns are doubled) is the most string-dominated and hence the most like that of a modern orchestra of all those recreated for this series of recordings.
Following the performance of his symphony, Mozart fell out with Le Gros, due to the latter’s failure to arrange for a performance of Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante, K.297B/A9. On 9 July, however, the two men had a chance encounter at which, as Mozart reported to his father on that very day, Le Gros commissioned another symphony and gave Mozart his opinion of K.300a/297:

'...the symphony was highly approved of - and Le Gros is so pleased with it that he says it is his very best symphony. But the Andante has not had the good fortune to satisfy him: he says that it has too many modulations and that it is too long. He derives this opinion, however, from the fact that the audience forgot to clap their hands as loudly and as long as they did at the end of the first and last movements. For indeed the Andante has won the greatest approval from me, from all connoisseurs, music-lovers and the majority of those who have heard it. It is just the reverse of what Le Gros says -for it is quite simple and short. But in order to satisfy him (and, as he maintains, several others) I have composed another Andante. Each is good in its own way - for each has a different character. But the new one pleases me even more... On August 15th, the Feast of the Assumption, my symphony is to be performed for the second time - with the new Andante.'

And, in fact, not only is the performance of a Mozart symphony at the Concert spirituel on 15 August 1778 confirmed by notices in the Parisian newspapers, but there is indeed a second andante for K.300a/297, for the Berlin manuscript contains one slow movement while the Parisian first edition has an entirely different one (see illustrations). There seems to be general agreement today as to which was the original slow movement and which the movement written to replace it. The latest edition of the Köchel Catalogue states the matter as though it were beyond doubt: 'The Andantino is the original version's middle movement; the middle movement (Andante) subsequently performed in Paris is found only in the first edition’. By the 'Andantino’ the editors of K6 meant the movement in 6/8 metre consisting of 98 bars (called ’Andantino’ in a draft but 'Andante' in the final score); the movement found in the first edition is in 3/4 metre and consists of 58 bars. To avoid the possibility of confusion, we shall refer to them by their metres. The view stated in K6 that the 3/4 movement is the later of the two has been held by several reputable Mozart scholars in recent years: for instance, by Hermann Beck, Otto Erich Deutsch, and J.H. Eibl. It is also to be found in Alfred Einstein’s 1947 Supplement to K3, and was perhaps first voiced) by Georges de Saint-Foix in 1936. On the other hand, at the time of K3 Einstein thought that the two movements were the other way round, following the opinion found in the first two editions of that venerable catalogue and also held by E.H. Mueller von Asow and Hans F. Redlich. In fact, recent research by Alan Tyson (see bibliography) strongly supports the notion that the 3/4 movement was the original and the 6/8 movement the substitute.
There are three modern editions of the 'Paris' symphony which contain the 3/4 andante movement. Anyone who takes the trouble to compare these editions will notice that the solo bassoon part differs from edition to edition as well as from the one heard on this recording. These discrepancies exist because the sets of engraved orchestral parts of the first edition (which provide the only source of this movement) surviving in various libraries lack their bassoon parts; the editors of the three editions were forced therefore to supply a conjectural bassoon part based on incomplete cues in the cello part. Fortunately, however, another copy of the first edition, which includes the hitherto missing bassoon part, is in the private library of Alan Tyson, who has generously made it available, thus enabling this graceful movement to be heard, for the first time in the 20th century, as Mozart wrote it.
Although the finales of the 'Paris' symphony are nearly identical in the printed editions and in the autograph manuscript (in which the finale has been provided in the hand of a copyist, unlike the other two movements which are in Mozart’s own hand), the first movements of the manuscript and of the printed editions differ in a number of details of dynamics, phrasing, and voicing of chords, and both versions have therefore been recorded here.
K.300a/297 was the first of Mozart’s symphonies to employ clarinets, an instrument for which he had great affection, but which was found in few orchestras in the 1770s. When in Mannheim he had written to his father (with the Salzburg orchestra in mind), 'Ah, if only we too had clarinets! You cannot imagine the glorious effect of a symphony with flutes, oboes, and clarinets'. In Paris Mozart had his chance, yet the writing for the clarinets is conservative, as if he perhaps did not quite trust the players on whom he had to depend.
Since Le Gros apparently commissioned another symphony and since Mozart in a letter of 3 October 1778 mentioned '2 ouverturen’, there have been several attempts to sort out the identity of this apparently lost second 'Paris' symphony. A number has even been assigned to it in the Köchel Catalogue (K. 311A/A8), and the almost certainly spurious Ouverture in Bb major, K. AC11.05/311a, has been proposed. I am convinced, however, that the socalled 'second Paris symphony' was merely an earlier work that Mozart took with him from Salzburg (see my article on the Paris symphonies listed in the bibliography). That Mozart had symphonies from Salzburg with him on his trip is clearly documented in several letters prior to his arrival in Paris, and on the eve of his departure from the French capital, when he was trying to sell quickly a number of pieces to publishers in order to raise cash for his journey home, he wrote (11 September), 'As for the symphonies, most of them are not to the Parisian taste’, in order to explain to his father why they could not be sold.
And what did Mozart and his father think the Parisian taste in symphonies to be? According to Leopold (29 ]une 1778):

'To judge by the Stamitz symphonies which have been engraved in Paris, the Parisians must be fond of noisy music. For these are nothing but noise. Apart from this they are a hodge-podge, with here and there a good idea, but introduced very awkwardly and in quite the wrong place.'

And Mozart wrote of his 'Paris' symphony K.300a/297:

'I have been careful not to neglect le premier coup d'archet - and that is quite sufficient. What a fuss the oxen here make of this trick! The devil take me if I can see any difference! They all begin together, just as they do in other places.'

If we add to orchestral 'noises' and le premier coup d'archet Mozart’s remark that 'all last as well as first Allegros begin here with 'all instruments playing together and generally unisono,' we have the the Mozarts' impression of Parisian taste in symphonies in 1778. To this we might add a preference for major keys and for three rather than four movements (that is, omitting the minuet). Mozart’s K.300a/297 fits this composite description, with the exception (which he himself noted) of the way in which the finale begins.
Furthermore, it has been plausibly suggested by Robert Münster that Mozart had not only a good general idea of what would please Parisian audiences, but perhaps also a specific model, namely, a D-major symphony (Riemann no. D-11) by the Mannheim composer Carl Joseph Toeschi, which had enjoyed great success in Paris a few years earlier. Mozart arrived in Paris fresh from hearing the brilliant Mannheim orchestra and filled with tales of the successes that Mannheim composers had had in Paris - successes he hoped to reproduce for himself. His use of a model in such circumstances should not be surprising. Asside from sharing the same key and general movement structure, the Paris symphonies of Mozart and Toeschi exhibit another striking similarity: the exceptionally frequent repetition of musical phrases. No other symphony of Mozart’s has this feature to such a degree.

Symphony in D major, K.385 ('Haffner’, Second Version)
The circumstances surrounding the creation of this work are more fully documented than those for any other of Mozart’s symphonies. In mid-July 1782 Mozart’s father wrote to him in Vienna requesting a new symphony for celebrations surrounding the ennoblement of Mozart’s childhood friend Siegmund Haffner the younger. On 20 Iuly Mozart replied:

'Well, I am up to my eyes in work. By Sunday week I have to arrange my opera [The Abduction from the Seraglio, K. 384] for wind instruments, otherwise someone will beat me to it and secure the profits instead of me. And now you ask me to write a new symphony too! How on earth can I do so? You have no idea how difficult it is to arrange a work of this kind for wind instruments, so that it suits them and yet loses none of its effect. Well, I must just spend the night over it, for that is the only way; and to you, dearest father, I sacrifice it. You may rely on having something from me by every post. I shall work as fast as possible and, as far as haste permits, I shall write something good.'

Although Mozart was prone to procrastination and to making excuses to his father, in this instance his complaints may well have been justified, for having just completed the arduous task of launching his new opera (the première was on 16 July), Mozart moved house on 23 July in preparation for his marriage. By 27 July he reported to his father:

'You will be surprised and disappointed to find that this contains only the first Allegro; but it has been quite impossible to do more for you, for I have had to compose in a great hurry a serenade [probably K. 375], but for wind instruments only (otherwise I could have used it for you too). On Wednesday the 31st I shall send the two minuets, the Andante and the last movement. If I can manage to do so, I shall send a march too. If not, you will just have to use the one from the Haffner music [K. 249], which is quite unknown. I have composed my symphony in D major, because you prefer that key.'

On 29 ]uly Siegmund Haffner the younger was ennobled and added to his name 'von Imbachhausen'. On the 31st, however, Mozart could still only write:

'You see that my intentions are good - only what one cannot do, one cannot! I Won't scribble off inferior stuff. So I cannot send you the whole symphony until next postday. I could have let you have the last movement, but I prefer to despatch it all together, for then it will cost only one fee. What I have sent you has already cost me three gulden.'

On 4 August Mozart and Constanze Weber were married in Vienna without having received Leopold’s approval, which arrived grudgingly the following day. In the meanwhile the other movements must have been completed and sent off, for on 7 August Mozart wrote to his father:

'I send you herewith a short march [probably K. 408, no. 2]. I only hope that all will reach you in good time, and be to your taste. The first Allegro must be played with great fire, the last-  as fast as possible.'

Precisely when the party celebrating Haffner’s ennoblement occurred, and whether the new symphony was received in time to be performed on that occasion, is not known, for Leopold's letter reporting the event is lost. The fact that in a later letter Wolfgang was unsure whether or not orchestral parts had been copied (see below) suggests that the symphony had not arrived in time. Be that as it may, at some time prior to 24 August, Leopold must have written his approval of the work, for on that day Wolfgang responded, 'I am delighted that the symphony is to your taste’.
Three months later the symphony again entered Mozart's correspondence. On 4 December he wrote to his father, in a letter that went astray, asking for the score of the symphony to be returned. When it had become clear that his father had not received that letter, he wrote again on the 21st, summarizing the lost letter, including, 'If you find an opportunity, you might have the goodness to send me the new symphony that I composed for Haffner at your request. Please make sure that I have it before Lent, because I would very much like to perform it at my concert’. On 4 January he again urged his father to retum the symphony, stating that either the score or the parts would be equally useful for his purposes. On the 22nd he again reminded his father, and on the 5th of February yet again with new urgency; ’...as soon as possible, for my concert is to take place on the third Sunday in Lent, that is, on March 23rd, and I must have several copies made. I think, therefore, that if it is not copied [into orchestral parts] already, it would be better to send me back the original score just as I sent it to you; and remember to put in the minuets'. The usually punctilious Leopold's delay is mute testimony to the anger and frustration he felt over what he considered to be his son’s foolish choice of a wife. In any case, by 15 February Wolfgang could write, 'Most heartfelt thanks for the music you have sent me... My new Haffner symphony has positively amazed me, for I had forgotten every single note of it. It must surely produce a good effect'.
Mozart then proceeded to rework the score sent from Salzburg by putting aside the march, eliminating one of the minuets, deleting the repeats of the two sections of the first movement, and adding pairs of flutes and clarinets in the first and last movements, primarily to reinforce the tuttis and requiring no change in the existing orchestration of those movements.
The 'academy' (as concerts were then called) duly took place on Sunday, 23 March, in the Burg Theatre. Mozart reported to his father:

'...the theatre could not have been more crowded and... every box was taken. But what pleased me most of all was that His Majesty the Emperor was present and, goodness! - how delighted he was and how he applauded me! It is his custom to send money to the box office before going to the theatre; otherwise I should have been fully justified in counting on a larger sum, for really his delight was beyond all bounds. He sent 25 ducats.’

In its broad outlines, Mozart’s report is confirmed by a review of the concert:

'The Concert was honoured with an exceptionally large crowd, and the two new concertos and other fantasies which Herr Mozart played on the fortepiano were received with the loudest applause. Our Monarch, who, against his habit, attended the whole of the concert, as well as the entire audience, accorded him such unanimous applause as has never been heard of here. The receipts of the concert are estimated to amount to 1,600 gulden in all’.

The programme was typical of Mozart’s 'academies' and demonstrates the role that symphonies were expected to fill as preludes and postludes framing an evening's events:
1. The first 3 movements of the 'Haffner' symphony (K. 385)
2. 'Se il padre perdei’ from Idomeneo (K. 366)
3. A piano concerto in C major (K. 415)
4. The recitative and aria ’Misera, dove son! - Ah! non son’ io che parlo’ (K. 369)
5. A Sinfonia concertante (movements 3 and 4 from the serenade K. 320)
6. A piano concerto in D major (K. 175 with the finale K. 382)
7. ’Parto m’affretto’ from Lucio Silla (K. 135)
8. A short fugue (’because the Emperor was present')
9. Variations on a tune from Paisiello's I filosofi immaginarii (K. 398) and as an encore to that,
10. Variations on a tune from Gluck's La Rencontre imprévue (K. 455)
11. The recitative and rondo 'Mia speranza adorata - Ah, non sai, qual pena' (K. 416)
12. The finale of the 'Haffner' symphony (K. 385)
Which of us wouldn't give a great deal to be temporarily transported in one of science-fiction’s time machines to the Burg Theatre on that Sunday in March 1783 to hear such a concert led by Mozart at the fortepiano?
The ’Haffner’ symphony was among the six symphonies that Mozart planned to have published in 1784 and in the following year the work was indeed brought out in Vienna by Artaria, in the four-movement version but without the additional flutes and clarinets. The fuller orchestration appeared in Paris published by Sieber with a title page bearing the legend ‘Du repertoire du Concert spirituel'. (The work had been given at the Concert spirituel apparently on 17 April 1783.) Despite the symphony's wide availability, Mozart included it among pieces that he sold to Prince von Fürstenberg 'for performance solely at his court' in 1786.
Having dwelt at some length on the history of the 'Haffner’ symphony, we shall be content to let the music speak for itself - which it does so eloquently - without further description or analysis.

Symphony in D major, K.504 (’Prague’)
Mozart's relations with the citizens of Prague form a happy chapter in the otherwise sad story of his last years. At a time when Vienna was growing indifferent to Mozart and his music, Prague couldn’t have enough of either. Mozart's Prague acquaintance Franz Xaver Niemetschek, who after Mozart's death was entrusted with the education of his son Carl, has left us the best account of the première of the 'Prague' symphony and of Mozart's special relationship wit the Prague orchestra. His account, although written after the fact and somewhat idealized, can be shown to be generally accurate:

I was witness to the enthusiasm which [The Seraglio] aroused in Prague equally among those who were connoisseurs and those who were not. It was as if what had hitherto been taken for music was nothing of the kind. Everyone was transported - amazed at the novel hannonies and at the original, unprecedented passages for wind instruments. Now the Bohemians began to seek out his works, and in the same year [1782], Mozart's symphonies and piano music were to be heard at all the better concerts. From now on the Bohemians' predilection for his works was established! The greatest connoisseurs and artists of our capital were also Mozart's greatest admirers, the most ardent ambassadors of his fame. ...[Figaro] was staged in the year 1787 by the Bondini Company and at the first performance received an ovation such as can be compared only to that given to The Magic Flute at a later date. It is the absolute truth when I state that this opera was performed almost without a break throughout the winter and that it greatly alleviated the straitened circumstances of the manager. The enthusiasm shown by the public was without precedent; they could not hear it often enough. A piano version was made by one of our best masters, Mr. Kucharž; it was arranged for wind instruments, as a quintet, and for German dances: in short, Figaro's tunes echoed through the alleys and parks, and even the harpist in the alehouse had to play ‘Non piu andrai’ if he wanted to be listened to at all. This phenomenon was admittedly due mostly to the excellence of the work; but only a public which had so much feeling for the truly beautiful in music and which included so many real connoisseurs could immediately have recognized the value of art like this; in addidon, there was the incomparable orchestra of our opera house, which understood how to execute Mozart's ideas so accurately and diligently. For on these worthy men, who were mostly not soloists, but all the more knowledgeable and capable for that, the new harmony and fiery eloquence of the singing made the most immediate and lasting impression! The well-known orchestra director, Strobach, since deceased, often declared that at each performance he and his colleagues were so excited that they would gladly have started from the beginning again despite the hard work. Admiration for the composer of this music went so far that Count Johann Thun, one of our principal noblemen and a lover of music, who himself retained a first-class orchestra, invited Mozart to come to Prague and offered him board and lodging and every comfort in his own home. Mozart was too overjoyed at the effect that his music was having on the Bohemians, too eager to become acquainted with such a music-loving nation, not to seize the opportunity with delight. [Mozart came to Prague on 4 October 1787. Ten days later] Figaro was performed and Mozart was there. At once the news of his presence spread in the stalls, and as soon as the overture had ended everyone broke into welcoming applause. In answer to a universal request, he played the piano at a large concert in the opera house [on 19th January]. The theatre had never been so full as on this occasion; never had there been a more fervent, unanimous delight than that awakened by his heavenly playing. We did not, in fact, know which to admire more: his extraordinary powers of composition or his extraordinary playing; together they made such an overwhelming impression on us that we felt we had been sweetly bewitched! But when at the end of the concert Mozart improvised alone on the piano for more than half an hour and had transported us to the highest degree of rapture, this enchantment dissolved in a loud torrent of applause. And indeed his improvisations exceeded anything that could be imagined in the way of piano-playing, as the highest degree of the composer’ s art was combined with the most accomplished dexterity in playing. It is certain that, just as this concert was a unique occasion for the people of Prague, Mozart likewise counted this day as one of the happiest of his life. The symphonies [sic] that he wrote for this occasion are true masterpieces of instrumental composition, full of unexpected transitions, and have élan and a fiery momentum, so that they immediatel incline the soul to expect something sublime. This applies particularly to the great Symphony in D major [K. 504], which is still a favourite in Prague, although it has probably been heard a hundred times. ...[Mozart] had leamed how much the Bohemians appreciated his music and how well they executed it. This he often mentioned to his friends in Prague: he enjoyed in any case being in Prague, where a responsive public and real friends lionized him, as it were. He warmly thanked the opera orchestra in a letter to Mr. Strobach, who was director at the time, and attributed the greater part of the ovation which his music had received in Prague to their excellent performances.

The 'Prague' symphony is also known in Germany as 'the symphony without minuet', because it is the only one of Mozart's last six symphonies lacking that movement. The autograph manuscript is among those formerly in Berlin and now at Kraków. As the Kraków autographs were until recently inaccessible, the NMA was forced to rely upon other sources. Now that the Kraków autographs are once again accessible, we have - with the generous assistance of László Somfai,, who edited the 'Prague' symphon for the NMA - revised the score for this pergormance. The upper righthand corners of the first five pages of the autograph have been cut off, removing in the process Mozart's signature and his inscription of place and date. However, in the catalogue of his works that Mozart kept at that time, the 'Prague' symphony is entered as 'Vienna, 6 December 1786'. Mozart probably had his new symphony in mind not only for his forthcoming trip to Prague, but for four Advent concerts in Vienna that he planned but perhaps never gave.
The 'Prague' symphony differs considerably from the sixty-odd symphonies that Mozart had previously written by being much more difficult; that is to say, it is more difficult to perform and more difficult conceptually. In the intervening years since the 'Haffner' and 'Linz' symphonies Mozart had been exposed to the extraordinary wind playing of Vienna and, in his operas and piano Concertos of those crucial years, had forged entirely new methods of orchestration unique to himself. (His brilliant use of the wind was at the time much criticized, but subsequently formed the basis for the orchestration of Haydn's late orchestral works and those of Beethoven, of Schubert and of many lesser lights.) In addition, his style had deepened, becoming generally more contraguntal in conception. The 'Prague' symphony enefited not only from this newly-elaborated orchestration and deepening of style, but also from the more serious role that, increasingly, was being assigned to symphonies, which were now expected to exhibit artistic depth rather than merely serve as happy noises to open and close concerts.
Three decades later, in 1815, a writer in the Allgemeine rnusikalische Zeitung could look back and recall the revolution in orchestral playing that began in the 1780s:

As far as the difficulty of the music is concerned, many of us can still remember a time when few orchestras had clarinets and none had trombones, when pieces that today any little orchestra can play easily almost at sight had to be laboriously studied, and other works that are now played everywhere simply for pleasure were rejected as impossible to perform. Indeed, we know very well, and it is fresh in our memories, that Mozart's music was at first indignantly cast aside by many orchestras, and that those orchestras that prefer Italian music to anything else still distrust it today.

Evidence suggesting that Mozart may have been aware of the 'difficulty' of his 'Prague' symphony survives in the form of sketches related to all three movements. Sketches survive for only a few of Mozart's symphonies, and for no other symphony in such quantity as for the 'Prague'. In addition, there is some indirect evidence that Mozart first thought of re-using the finale of the 'Paris' symphony for the 'Prague' (both are in D major); perhaps it was the conventionality of the former that led him to reject that time-saving measure. Another attempt to begin a finale was likewise rejected before the finale we know was hit upon. This opens in a most remarkable manner which, as any experienced conductor will tell you, is not easy to begin accurately and in the correct tempo.
The famous Prague orchestra was a tiny one, at quite the other extreme from the orchestra of the Concert spirituel. In the 1780s and 90s it apparently had a string section containing 3 or 4 first and 3 or 4 second violins, 2 violas, 1 or 2 cellos and 2 double basses, with the necessary wind one to a part and a harpsichord. Those forces have been recreated for this performance.
While in Prague in 1787, Mozart probably also gave a concert with the private orchestra of Count Thun, who had residences there and in Linz. It was for Count Thun that Mozart had written his so-called 'Linz' symphony, K. 425, in the space of five days in 1783. Thus, when Niemetschek wrote in the plural of 'symphonies' written for Prague, he was probably referring to the 'Linz' and 'Prague' symphonies. His description of the effect that those two symphonies made nearly 200 years ago still rings true today: they seemed to him 'true masterpieces of instrumental composition, full of unexpected transitions, and have élan and a fiery momentum, so that they immediately in cline the soul to expect something sublime’.