# On Mozart's compositions for different keyboard instruments



## sandraaaaaa (Nov 26, 2020)

I'm doing a school project and need some help. My topic is the evolution of Mozart's music through the development of the keyboard instrument. I have an excerpt for the harpsichord and the fortepiano but I'm struggling with the last one.

So here's the question: 
*Does anyone know if Mozart composed music for any other instruments other than the harpsichord or fortepiano?
*

At first I was looking at the clavichord but I didn't know if he composed any pieces specifically for it? I also looked at the tangent piano but again, same problem.

Now I'm wondering if I should just broaden my scope of composers and make my topic: the evolution of classical music through the development of the keyboard instrument?

Thank you in advance!


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

He did compose some music for organ. Our resident Mozart expert, hammeredklavier, will be along to fill you in. 

In the meantime:


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## sandraaaaaa (Nov 26, 2020)

consuono said:


> He did compose some music for organ. Our resident Mozart expert, hammeredklavier, will be along to fill you in.
> 
> In the meantime:


Ah yes, I did notice his organ works but I was worried about how to describe the techniques used and changes in his music in relation to my other excerpts if that makes sense.

For example, I talked about how Mozart used ornamentation and broken chords due to the lack of a pedal and dynamics in my harpsichord excerpt. And in my fortepiano excerpt, I talked about how the dynamics change and there are longer pauses because pedalling and dynamics were possible.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)




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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)




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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

I'm thinking you should broaden the scope to beyond Mozart. The fortepiano went through more changes after Mozart. Beethoven explored the possibilities of the fortepiano much more than Mozart, and he wrote for the harpsichord in earlier works.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

sandraaaaaa said:


> I'm doing a school project and need some help. My topic is the evolution of Mozart's music through the development of the keyboard instrument. I have an excerpt for the harpsichord and the fortepiano but I'm struggling with the last one.
> 
> So here's the question:
> *Does anyone know if Mozart composed music for any other instruments other than the harpsichord or fortepiano?
> ...


All the Mozart keyboard sonatas have been recorded using clavichord by Giovanno de Cecco. He talks about Mozart's music on clavichord at length in this interview

http://heinrichvontrotta.blogspot.com/2019/04/giovanni-de-cecco-il-profeta-del.html

Another place to explore are Siegbert Rampe's notes for his Mozart series, he used a whole bunch of different instruments and wrote scholarly essays in the booklets.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Phil loves classical said:


> I'm thinking you should broaden the scope to beyond Mozart. The fortepiano went through more changes after Mozart. Beethoven explored the possibilities of the fortepiano much more than Mozart, and he wrote for the harpsichord in earlier works.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano


I think that the impact of clavichord on Mozart's keyboard is sufficiently striking as to merit a thread of its own. The person to explore for fortepiano, IMO more interesting than Beethoven, is Scarlatti. He was right on the cusp of the piano's bid for hegemony over other domestic keyboard instruments. WF Bach too.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

And I forgot to mention this recording which is special from an organological point of view


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## RICK RIEKERT (Oct 9, 2017)

Mozart wrote at least two works for the glass harmonica, the Adagio in C, K.356 (1791) and the Adagio and Rondo in C Minor, K. 617. Mozart wrote K. 617 on 23 May 1791 for the blind virtuoso, Marianne Kirchgassner. Her instrument was a further development of Benjamin Franklin's invention. It appears to have had a keyboard, as Ernst Gerber reports in his Neues Lexicon, an “elastic sounding board”.

According to Willi Apel, "Among various compositions for the glass harmonica, Mozart's Adagio in C major (K. 356) and Adagio and Rondo (K. 617)...both composed in 1791, are the most interesting. They seem to require an instrument equipped with a keyboard mechanism such as that constructed in 1784." E. Power Biggs was of the same opinion.


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