Mozart’s Quartet K. 464: Introduction
Mozart meets Haydn
In 1781, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart moved to Vienna, then the epicentre of Western music. Around this time, Mozart and Joseph Haydn met and became intimate friends. They would even meet to play string quartets together, Haydn on first violin and Mozart on the viola. The two became such close friends and admirer’s of each other’s work that Mozart referred to Haydn as “Papa” and used the informal “du” form with him, unusual given their considerable age difference.
Also in 1781, Haydn finished his set of six String Quartets, Op. 33, a collection that includes some of the composer’s best known quartets, such as “The Joke” and “The Bird”. These quartets were revolutionary and made quite the impression on the younger Mozart. After hearing a performance of them that same year, Mozart set about writing his own set of six quartets, inspired by Haydn’s œuvre.
Dedication to Haydn
Mozart was well-known to compose works quickly and with ease, but these six new quartets took him an unusual four years to complete. After a self-described “long and laborious endeavour”, Mozart finished the quartets in 1785. Instead of dedicating them to a wealthy patron or nobleman as was the usual, he dedicated them to his “best friend” Haydn, writing: “A father who had decided to send his sons out into the great world thought it his duty to entrust them to the protection and guidance of a man who was very celebrated at the time, and who happened moreover to be his best friend. In the same way I send my six sons to you…Please, then, receive them kindly and be to them a father, guide, and friend! … I entreat you, however, to be indulgent to those faults which may have escaped a father’s partial eye, and in spite of them, to continue your generous friendship towards one who so highly appreciates it.”
After hearing Mozart’s creations, Haydn famously exclaimed to Mozart’s father: “I tell you before God, and as an honest man, your son is the greatest composer known to me by person and repute; he has taste and what is more the greatest skill in composition.”
K. 464: A Masterpiece of the Genre
The Quartet K. 464 is one of his finest in the genre. It shows a perfect command of form, displays a brilliant penchant for counterpoint, and is effortlessly elegant. Beethoven was enthralled by this quartet, exclaiming “This is what I call a work! Here Mozart is telling the world: ‘Look what I could do, only if you were ready for it.’” He even copied the final movement by hand to better understand Mozart’s craftsmanship. More than a decade later, Beethoven wrote his own Quartet Op. 18, No. 5 modelled on Mozart’s masterpiece.