Symphony No. 41 (Mozart)

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote the Symphony No. 41 in C major (K. 551), along with the immediately preceding symphony, No. 40 in G minor (K. 550), in the space of a few weeks in 1788. It was, as far as can be determined, never performed in Mozart's lifetime. Its movements display the typical classical symphonic form:

Though the title "Jupiter" is not Mozart's—it may have been added by the impresario Johann Peter Salomon in an early arrangement of the work for piano—the symphony carries an Olympian weight to it, marked out immediately by the boldness of the first subject of the first movement. A remarkable characteristic of this symphony is the five-voice fugato (representing the five major themes) at the end of the fourth movement. But there are fugal sections throughout the movement, especially during the interplay between the woodwinds when one of the five themes is first introduced and the G major theme that starts off the 2nd half of the exposition. One can say that the finale represents one of the greatest examples of development in music. The main theme consists of four notes that are developed with astounding complexity throughout the movement:

Image:MozartJupiterFinaleTheme.PNG

Four additional themes are heard in the "Jupiter's" finale, which is in sonata form, and all five motifs are splendidly combined in the fugal coda. In a 1906 article about the Jupiter Symphony, Sir George Grove wrote that "it is for the finale that Mozart has reserved all the resources of his science, and all the power, which no one seems to have possessed to the same degree with himself, of concealing that science, and making it the vehicle for music as pleasing as it is learned. Nowhere has he achieved more." Of the piece as a whole, he wrote that "It is the greatest orchestral work of the world which preceded the French Revolution."

It is interesting to note that the four notes that comprise the main theme of the finale movement of the Jupiter Symphony coincide exactly with the keys of Brahms' four symphonies (c minor, D Major, F Major, e minor) - perhaps a subtle indication of the composer's deep admiration for Mozart's music.