Mozart III and IV: Chamber Music and Concerti

Readings:
Robert Levin, “Mozart’s Keyboard Concertos,” in Eighteenth-Century Piano Music, pp. 350-393 (Basic information about the individual works).
If time: Read Charles Rosen's discussion of Mozart's Concertos in The Classical Style, pp. 185-263
Listening:
Mozart: Piano Concertos K. 271 (1777), K. 453 (1784), K. 503 (1786).
Piano Trio in E major, K. 542
Quintet for Piano and Winds in E-flat major, K. 452
Piano Quartet in G minor, K. 478

Questions to consider:
How does Mozart’s Concerto form expand on the models of J. C. Bach? (Remember earlier discussion.)
What role does virtuosity play in the concerti?  How does that role develop or change over the course of these works?
How does the dramatic conflict between soloist and orchestra inform the development of these works?
What was the social context in which these works were developed? (That is: how were they first performed, when, and why.)

What similarities of structure and writing do you discern between the concerti and chamber works on the list?
How is Mozart's approach to writing chamber music with piano different from that of his contemporaries?