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W.A. Mozart

Symphonies & Oboe Concerto with Xenia Löffler

Symphonies “Haffner” and “Pariser”

Listen and order here

Works featured on the CD

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:

  • Oboe Concert in C major, K. 271k/ K. 314

  • Symphonie Nr. 31 in D major, K. 297/300a “Paris” 

  • Symphonie Nr. 35 in D major, K. 385 “Haffner”

  • Harmony music to the Overture “Die Entführung aus dem Serail”,  K. 384 

With the framing Mozart symphonies - the “Paris” and the “Haffner” - additional woodwind instruments are brought into the spotlight. “Ah, if only we had clarinetti as well!” Mozart enthused in a letter to his father Leopold during his stay in Mannheim. In fact, the instrument had not yet secured a permanent place in orchestras everywhere at that time. But when Mozart travelled from Mannheim to Paris, he found ideal conditions there and was able, for the first time, to write a symphony scored with two clarinets.
The “Paris” Symphony became a highlight of his oeuvre, capturing the sophisticated taste of the Parisian audience immediately.

The masterful “Haffner Symphony” was at the same time Mozart’s first symphony completed in Vienna. It was written while he was working on Die Entführung aus dem Serail. Its exhilarating final movement contains allusions to the singspiel, whose overture appears on the CD in Mozart’s brilliant arrangement for Harmoniemusik. In a letter to his father, Mozart remarked: “— you wouldn’t believe how difficult it is to adapt something like that for wind band — so that it remains characteristic of the wind instruments, yet none of its impact is lost.” Despite enormous time pressure, Mozart fully lived up to the high standards he set for himself.

Photograph of a woman holding an instrument, smiling at the camera
Xenia Löffler © Daniel Deuter

The opening of a series of Mozart recordings with Akamus under the direction of concertmaster Bernhard Forck!

Experience Xenia Löffler — the ensemble’s internationally sought-after oboist — as the soloist on the first CD of the series, performing Mozart’s Oboe Concerto, one of the most beautiful solo concertos of the Viennese Classical period. Already in 1778, during Mozart’s stay in Mannheim, his Oboe Concerto elicited great admiration. The joy‑filled rondo theme of the concerto was especially dear to Mozart’s heart, so much so that he reused it a few years later: in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Blonde sings to it the fitting words, “What delight, what joy now reigns within my breast!”

Artists
Xenia Löffler, Oboe
Bernhard Forck, Concertmaster
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin

Released on
Pentatone, 2023
The CD production was made possible with the kind support of the Freunde und Förderer der Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin e.V. and the Kulturstiftung Schloss Britz.