# Mozart: Symphony #41 in C, K. 551 "Jupiter"



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Mozart's 41st symphony, eventually nicknamed "Jupiter," is currently on the sixth tier of the Talk Classical community's favorite and most highly recommended works.

As usual for a work of this stature, Wikipedia has a nice article about it, including a little analysis that amounts to a bit of a listening guide. The best source for recording recommendations is probably Trout's blog post on this work:



> Condensed Listing:
> 1.	Szell (cond.), Cleveland Orchestra	(1963)
> 2.	Walter (cond.), Columbia Symphony Orchestra	(1960)
> 3.	Bernstein (cond.), Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra	(1984)
> ...


As usual, the main questions are: *Do you like this work? Do you love it? Why? What do you like about it? Do you have any reservations about it?* Does it deserve its high place on our list--or does it deserve an even higher one?

And of course, what are your favorite recordings?


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

Love it. For me, it's a triumphant finale to the brilliant career of Mozart as a symphonist. Beethoven apart, it's one of my absolute favorite symphonies from the Classical period, and I enjoy particurlarly it's fourth movement. I have no reservations about this work.

I don't own many recordings of it, but I usually listen to it with Levine and the WPO.


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

I guess it is OK, the first movement is too repetitive though
8/10


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

My favourite symphony. I love the positive exuberant energy of the first and last movements, all the melodies - rythm etc - can never get enough of them. The 1st mvt in my view is the equal of the last even though few people recognise this. 

Favourite recordings - I think there are many - its such a well composed piece that few good conductors fail with it. I have a Klemperer mono recording from the 50s with the Philharmonia that is very good.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

It's grown on me somewhat.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Jacck said:


> I guess it is OK, the first movement is too repetitive though
> 8/10


The first movement is a challenge to the performer! I spent a lot of time exploring this music about 10 years ago and one I remember really thinking made a good job in the first movement was by Klemperer, the one here


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

Mandryka said:


> The first movement is a challenge to the performer! I spent a lot of time exploring this music about 10 years ago and one I remember really thinking made a good job in the first movement was by Klemperer, the one here


I believe you. Mozart is probably much more complex than it looks on the surface. This particular symphony is not among my favorites of his works though (this says nothing about its technical brilliance, but rather about me not particularly caring for its melodies). There are easily 30 other works by Mozart that I prefer to it with the sinfonia concertante and the string quintets sitting at the top


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

One of my favorites of his lately. One of the best 4th movements I've ever heard.


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

Mandryka said:


> The first movement is a challenge to the performer! I spent a lot of time exploring this music about 10 years ago and one I remember really thinking made a good job in the first movement was by Klemperer, the one here
> 
> View attachment 112130


ah - thats the performance I have on LP


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

The finale is certainly exuberant and exciting.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

janxharris said:


> The finale is certainly exuberant and exciting.


Yes it is certainly played like that, though I wonder if it needs be or whether it's the best way.

In Neal Zaslaw's book on the Mozart Symphonies, he argues that there's a lot of seriously meaningful stuff going on in the fugue. One of the themes is a bit of gregorian chant apparently, and so when this comes together in the fugue with secular music, equal partners in a fugue, Mozart may have been saying something about his vision of society.

One of the themes is taken from something by Leopold Mozart, but it's excluded from the finale's climax -- an explicit rejection of the past.

But indeed in tension with that, we have the whole concept of using such complicated music in such a highly old fashioned form -- a form associated with the church -- at the end.

I wonder whether a performance should try to capture some of the seriousness of these ideas, rather than play it "exuberant and exciting"

HAving said that, the only one I can remember which does so is by Rosbaud, an old LP with mediocre sound.


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## Brahmsianhorn (Feb 17, 2017)

I have never gotten into this symphony. Maybe I will give it a listen again. My choice conductors have been Beecham, Walter, Klemperer, and Bernstein.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

It's on my short list of works I would miss if Mozart were to disappear. Weirdly, a performance I really like is the one von Karajan recorded (along with the other five "last" symphonies -- Hafner, Linz, Prague, 39,40,41)) for EMI (I don't know why) in the early '70s.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

I love Mozart but haven't listened to the Jupiter symphony in years. I never liked it as much as Nos. 29, 32, 34-36 or 38. When I did listen I enjoyed the Karl Bohm box of the late symphonies.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Although the "Jupiter" was one of the first Mozart works I really enjoyed (back in high school), it has joined his other symphonies as a piece I never seem to want to hear now, unlike some of the chamber music and concertos. This may reflect a slacking off of interest in symphonies in general and a growing preference for more intimate forms of expression. Among the symphonies, I prefer the "Prague" to all the others; its expansive first movement impresses me even more than the finale of the "Jupiter."


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

I still like this symphony and still like to hear it. Not all the time, but that's normal with all the works I listen to. Its contrapuntal final movement is spectacular.

I can't imagine why anyone claiming to like classical music wouldn't like it or think it merely 'okay'; it makes no sense. It's part of the cream of 18th century classical music.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

eugeneonagain said:


> I still like this symphony and still like to hear it. Not all the time, but that's normal with all the works I listen to. Its contrapuntal final movement is spectacular.
> 
> I can't imagine why anyone claiming to like classical music wouldn't like it or think it merely 'okay'; it makes no sense. It's part of the cream of 18th century classical music.


It might be that some prefer music with a greater emphasis on narrative. A lot of classical era symphonies don't seem to have this for me. Perhaps it's not surprising that the Romantic Era followed, allowing literary and historical themes to inform a piece with the potential and freedom for greater development and expression in this respect. Perhaps the Symphonic Poem, which Liszt established, evolved to fill (what some perceived as) such a void.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Great piece, as are all the late Mozart symphonies...fun, and challenging to play.
I esp love the inside movements of this work....the slow mvt is wistful, poignant...there is almost a taste of melancholy....
same with the Minuet, with its unique descending line...it's expressive, beautiful, but almost haunting....
several favorites:
Walter/NYPO
Reiner/CSO
Szell/CO....
Solti did a fine version, too, but I only have it on tape....


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

janxharris said:


> It might be that some prefer music with a greater emphasis on narrative. A lot of classical era symphonies don't seem to have this for me. Perhaps it's not surprising that the Romantic Era followed, allowing literary and historical themes to inform a piece with the potential and freedom for greater development and expression in this respect. Perhaps the Symphonic Poem, which Liszt established, evolved to fill (what some perceived as) such a void.


I'm sorry you can't appreciate both. You're missing out. Bad luck old chap.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

eugeneonagain said:


> I'm sorry you can't appreciate both. You're missing out. Bad luck old chap.


I don't feel that I am missing out or unlucky.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

janxharris said:


> I don't feel that I am missing out or unlucky.


Because it's comfortable in Plato's cave.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

eugeneonagain said:


> Because it's comfortable in Plato's cave.


Music works that incorporate both the transcendent _and_ the flawed actuality are preferable in my experience.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

janxharris said:


> Music works that incorporate both the transcendent _and_ the flawed actuality are preferable in my experience.


Okay. Sounds like something in dire need of a PhD thesis. Not merely transcendent _or_ flawed, but transcendent _and_ flawed. That's heavy.

I find it very strange that folk like to box themselves in as a certain type of listener to a certain sort of music.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

eugeneonagain said:


> Okay. Sounds like something in dire need of a PhD thesis. Not merely transcendent _or_ flawed, but transcendent _and_ flawed. That's heavy.
> 
> I find it very strange that folk like to box themselves in as a certain type of listener to a certain sort of music.


I don't find classical era music completely satisfying. It's no big deal.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

janxharris said:


> It might be that some prefer music with a greater emphasis on narrative. A lot of classical era symphonies don't seem to have this for me. Perhaps it's not surprising that the Romantic Era followed, allowing literary and historical themes to inform a piece with the potential and freedom for greater development and expression in this respect. Perhaps the Symphonic Poem, which Liszt established, evolved to fill (what some perceived as) such a void.


You're describing what some listeners would call "absolute" music, music in and of itself that requires or has no narrative... "beauty, enjoyment, effectiveness of sound for its own sake"... "sound without philosophy". I would consider most Baroque and Classical music to fall into this category... and then later come some of the modernists such as Stravinsky and Schoenberg (sometimes). It's music that doesn't tell a story or is required to tell a story like a great deal of the music during the Romantic era:

"For I consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all, whether a feeling, an attitude of mind, a psychological mood, a phenomenon of nature, etc. Expression has never been an inherent property of music. That is by no means the purpose of its existence. If, as is nearly always the case, music appears to express something, this is only an illusion and not a reality. It is simply an additional attribute which, by tacit and inveterate agreement, we have lent it, thrust upon it, as a label, a convention - in short, an aspect which, unconsciously or by force of habit, we have come to confuse with its essential being." -Stravinsky

In the above sense, Stravinsky would be more closely related to Mozart than to Chopin or most of the other Romantics. It can be a major issue (of conversation) which category each piece of music may fall in. Chopin wrote his music as being "absolute" because all he provided in identifying them are opus numbers, but I'd say that the narrative military quality of some of his polonaise sound as if they have a strong and obvious unspoken narrative. And Stravinsky, the contradictory rascal, did write something called the Firebird (the bird) and Petrushka (the puppet).

Is there such a thing as absolute music that represents nothing but itself? I'd say yes... and it can be a great pleasure not to be saddled with a narrative that seems secondary and which can sometimes clutter the mind. I consider Mozart as one of its masters.


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## RockyIII (Jan 21, 2019)

I like Mozart's Symphony No. 41 in C (Jupiter) a lot. I have the 2008 recording by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra with Charles Mackerras conducting.

Rocky


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

The real test for me is which version I can still listen to from overexposure. Tate's is really the only one I can always listen to. The pacing, and attention to detail.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Of course, the Jupiter (along with other great symphonies of Classical times) has a narrative! Not a story, perhaps, but an argument. I am quite fussy about how Mozart is played in that there are performances from across the performance spectrum that I enjoy but just as may that bore me. I like Beecham, Walter, Krips and Klemperer in this symphony. I also like Pinnock and Norrington. I do actually also enjoy the just mentioned recording by Tate even though it is a little too "spelled out". But Szell, Karajan, Bohm and Gardiner don't do it for me at all. And I am agnostic when it comes to Mackerras (which is better than I usually am with his recordings).


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

I like it, but like all 18th century symphonies, it would be no big deal for me if I never heard it again.


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## Ras (Oct 6, 2017)

*Venus and Mars are alright tonight, but Jupiter is even better!*

Mozart's "Jupiter" is one of my all time favorite symphonies and certainly my favorite symphony by Mozart.

I love *Herreweghe on Phi and Immerseel on Zig-Zag* - both recent period recordings.


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## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

The Jupiter is of course a total masterpiece which belongs somewhere at the very top of all symphonies. And composed in a matter of weeks(??).
I first heard the last movement by watching the video below, which comes with a nice visualization. I've rarely heard a piece of music that I enjoyed so much, so instantly. 
Later, I also heard it in concert, which I enjoyed immensely. Along with his concerto for harp and flute.

Here's a great performance by Muti of the entire symphony.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

The Jupiter is the only Mozart symphony which I find indispensable. A reason may be that while I find one or two parts of other symphonies by him to be memorable, with the Jupiter the whole thing is. Since I first heard it I have felt it has a spirit of adventure and brilliance which makes Mozart's subsequent early demise all the more tragic.

I initially had the recording by Beecham with RPO on Seraphim label, coupled with Schubert's 6th. I also used to have a HIP one with Rene Jacobs. Currently I have Barry Wordsworth with Capella Istropolitana on Naxos, a fine account even if not unique in any particular way.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

For various reasons, I much prefer 40 and I feel a little jealous of 41's popularity. If only 40 had a great nickname! But you guys are selling me on 41. I will give it a listen trying not to feel any resentment....


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

science said:


> For various reasons, I much prefer 40 and I feel a little jealous of 41's popularity. If only 40 had a great nickname! But you guys are selling me on 41. I will give it a listen trying not to feel any resentment....


I used to feel the same way but lately my tastes are changing. That last movement of 41... some of the best of Mozart's writing I've ever heard. I really like the second movement too and Mozart second movements are not usually my favorite part so.


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

science said:


> For various reasons, I much prefer 40 and I feel a little jealous of 41's popularity. If only 40 had a great nickname! But you guys are selling me on 41. I will give it a listen trying not to feel any resentment....


40 seems to be at least as popular

when the chips are down K551 seems to get the nod from great conductors etc. Not without good reason. My only gripe is the fame of the last mvt unjustifiably overshadows the other mvts which are equally as fine.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

the last symphonies of Mozart - 35-41, are amongst the greatest treasures in the symphonic repertoire. they are wonderful and challenging to perform well [you have to make difficult music sound easy and effortless!!]
I love all of these great works, but for my own favorites, I lean towards #s 38 "Prague" and #39.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Both 40 and 41 seems to be cut from the same cloth of symphonic mastery. I prefer 41 over 40 because the opening of the latter sounds to me more pleading and beseeching compared to the opening of 41. But I think Mozart was composing on all 12 cylinders in his final 6 symphonies. I find these works breathtaking in their inspired perfection—perhaps the summit of his works for orchestra. Nevertheless, I think opera was his first and foremost love because it combined everything from the libretto to the voice to the settings to the orchestra—the greatest of challenges and the greatest of rewards. ; )


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Larkenfield said:


> .....I find these works breathtaking in their inspired perfection-perhaps the summit of his works for orchestra. Nevertheless, I think opera was his first and foremost love because it combined everything from the libretto to the voice to the settings to the orchestra-the greatest of challenges and the greatest of rewards.


Yes, I agree - great as the symphonies are, I think the pinnacle of Mozart's genius may be found in the operas...many years ago , I got to perform the great Mozart Eb 5tet for Piano and Winds K.452 with Frank Glazer on piano...He was a terrific pianist, great chamber music performer, and he'd recorded the work brilliantly with members of the NY WW 5tet...it was a great learning experience to play with such an artist - he made an interesting point, with which I've come to agree - he said that the "essence", the genius of Beethoven was found in the symphonies, with Mozart, the operas, with Schubert, the songs....


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