# About the fugal writing in Mozart's Jupiter Symphony



## Krisena

Last year, sometime before I finished school, my composition teacher told the class about the fugal writing in the last movement of Mozart's Symphony No. 41. Earlier in class that day, a composition student with an affinity for counterpoint had written a fugue on which he got several comments from the rest of the class, both positive and negative. One comment that stood out to me however, was the teacher's, saying that unlike Mozart, this student dared to go all out crazy in the ending, which Mozart never did in his fugue. When Mozart gets to the point where he could, my teacher said, he chickens out, doesn't dare to and takes a different turn altogether. This always provoked my teacher when he listened to it, he told us.

Now, I'm a bit of a shy person, and didn't dare to ask my teacher where in the movement that point is, something I regret now, later, as I could probably have gained a lot of insight from knowing the answer. School ended before I knew it, and suddenly, I was unable to ask him anymore, as he demands money for any kind of advice when you're not in his class. That's what you get to do when you're good at your subject and try to make a living out of being a composer, I guess.

So, to the point of this thread: Does anybody have the slightest idea of where the turning point my teacher talked about is? It would be greatly appreciated, as I totally love the Jupiter symphony, and would find it interesting to know more about it -- Especially since I have a feeling that my teacher's got a somewhat controversial opinion. Any help on this matter is greatly appreciated. Thanks!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Are you talkin about bars 36 to 52 of the last movement? Starts at 0:28 in this video:


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## Krisena

I have to admit I'm not sure. To me, it seemed like he meant that when Mozart got to a certain point in his fugue when he had the choice to go bananas and release all the energy built up through the movement, he doesn't dare and turns in another direction instead. I'm not very well-versed in counterpoint, so it's a bit hard for me to understand, let alone find out which point of the movement he meant. Could you elaborate on why you think 0:28 is the place?

Thanks for the film btw, that was a good interpretation!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Well the five voice fugue itself starts at bar 36 as I said before, but it isn't a full fugue, just an exposition where the theme (do, re, fa, mi) is repeated in turn in each voice. The whole fourth movement is in sonata form and for Mozart to compose a full fugue in the middle of the exposition would be unorthodox and avoid the whole structure of the exposition of the movement. After the fugato section which is in fact the second half of the first subject of the exposition, Mozart has to move on, modulate and in the dominant key supply a second subject. The whole movement is based on five different motifs and each subject is built on these which adds to the complicated form. A full fugue in this movement would only be possible in the development section and elaborate on all of the motifs while sticking to both fugal and sonata forms. But being traditional, Mozart stuck to sonata form in this movement with a short fugato in the exposition. Mozart makes his point and moves on.


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## Krisena

I sent my teacher a message yesterday, and it seems I misunderstood, because it wasn't the fugue that was his point, it was the harmony. In measure 233-253 there's a very daring harmonic progression that's basically a circle progression with tritonus substitutions in-between and lots of chromatic passing/suspension notes (not unlike a certain other piece we know that was composed about 70 years later). To quote my teacher: "...and that progression could have ended in our time, to put it that way." I never thought of this while listening to it before, because it sounds so natural, but that progression really is awesome. I guess Mozart ended romanticism before it started! :lol:

Completely step-wise:
*
C - C - G - G
G7 - Gm7 - Gdim7 - Gdim7

Dm - Dm - A - A
A7 - Am7 - Adim7 - Adim7

Em - Em - H7 - H7* _(Implied)_ 
*F7 - F7 - E6 - E7

E7(b5) - E7(b5b9) - A6 - A7
A7(b5) - A7(b5b9) - D6 - D7
D7(b5) - D7(b5b9) - G6 - G7
G7(b5) - G7(b5b9) - C6 - C7
C7!!!*

Very jazzy.


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## Dr T

Perhaps your instructor was referring to the _fugato_ ("fugued") section near the end of the fourth movement, after the recap. It's only about 20 seconds long, but unparalleled in music history. In the video already posted, that section goes from 9:51 to about 10:16. Mozart takes all five of the themes he's used up to that point and combines them thusly.

He starts with two themes, his first and fourth (the first from studying Fux as a youth) in the violas and cellos. He then elevates those two themes in the orchestra and adds another at the bottom. He does this until he has all five themes present (1-3-5-2-4, in vertical order, top to bottom) when the basses come in and get theme 4. He then he continues to rotate all the themes, top theme to the bottom, in a complete cycle. The normal subject-answer alternation is honored throughout. Only the last iteration changes the order (1-3-4-5-2). Eight entrances of the first theme; a five-part fugue without the normal episodes that follow in normal a fugue as a separate piece. It's an unmatched piece of counterpoint.

If you ever study music history using the Wright/Simms text, Music in Western Civilization, the movement is covered in Chapter 47, Example 134, and you can do a full analysis of how themes are used in the movement using the Workbook questions as a guide. The full _fugato_ section starts at m. 373 (the full coda at m. 358).

However, Mozart uses several other counterpoint techniques in the development section, specifically retrograde, inversion, and stretto: Strings (mm. 172-5), stretto; Bassoons and flutes (mm. 169-72), inversion; Viola I (mm. 166-9), retrograde, and Violin I and Cellos/Basses (mm. 201-204), both inversion and stretto. He also does a downward circle of fifths move of five keys (a-d-G-C-F), changing modes along the way in mm. 172-189. This section is somewhat similar to the rising circle of fifths move he uses in the Requiem's Kyrie (mm. 33-39, starting pitches of the abbreviated countersubject [Christe eleison] C, G, D, A, E,) before he hits the last (5th) episode, where the subject returns home to d minor.

A master of counterpoint? I think so. What Mozart does after that section does seem a bit abrupt to the ear, but Mozart has set out to do what he wished using the chosen sonata form and not normal fugue writing. That five-part section is the culmination and summation of what has come before, not the start of a fugue. That's why the closing themes that follow may seem a bit abrupt in content. I hardly think Mozart chickened out in any musical challenge. Rest easy.


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## KenOC

In passing, another bit of startling counterpoint is in the finale to Mendelssohn's Octet, written at 16(!) In fact, the whole finale is startling. I've seen it claimed that he uses 8-part counterpoint in some places, but don't know whether to believe that or not. Maybe somebody here knows?


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## PetrB

Idiotic projectionist, thinking to do like Bach would've been better while not at all getting the overwhelming genius of Mozart and the nonpareil brilliance of his ability to plan and execute formal structure.

While getting some real information from these teachers, just about everyone has endured a kind of suffering while learning from one or more of these sort of petty academic twits.


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## jdec

"The awe-inspiring counterpoint in Mozart's final symphony, explained in one video", by musicologist Richard Atkinson:

http://www.classicfm.com/composers/mozart/music/jupiter-symphony-counterpoint-video/

(With the culminating point explained from 11'50" to the end)


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## PlaySalieri

PetrB said:


> Idiotic projectionist, thinking to do like Bach would've been better while not at all getting the overwhelming genius of Mozart and the nonpareil brilliance of his ability to plan and execute formal structure.
> 
> While getting some real information from these teachers, just about everyone has endured a kind of suffering while learning from one or more of these sort of petty academic twits.


I think that is correct. Obviously musical academics can be quite opinionated - especially those who achieved little aside from getting their Bmus, publishing some articles about 14thC polyphony in The Musical Times and landing a job teaching composition/theory.

I would have thought the jupiter is beyond any kind of critique - the finale is constructed to such a high point of mastery it just seems inconceivable it could be anything other than what it is.


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## hpowders

PetrB said:


> Idiotic projectionist, thinking to do like Bach would've been better while not at all getting the overwhelming genius of Mozart and the nonpareil brilliance of his ability to plan and execute formal structure.
> 
> While getting some real information from these teachers, just about everyone has endured a kind of suffering while learning from one or more of these sort of petty academic twits.


Awesome post, PetrB! Right on target. So many teachers injecting their "opinions", doing more damage than good on impressionable young minds!

You are greatly missed. Come back to TC!!!


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## MadMusicist

jdec said:


> "The awe-inspiring counterpoint in Mozart's final symphony, explained in one video", by musicologist Richard Atkinson:
> 
> http://www.classicfm.com/composers/mozart/music/jupiter-symphony-counterpoint-video/
> 
> (With the culminating point explained from 11'50" to the end)


That's the type of thing I'd been looking for for a long time! What quick and visual way to explain this to someone. Much better than my scrambled narration along with the music.


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## Pugg

MadMusicist said:


> That's the type of thing I'd been looking for for a long time! What quick and visual way to explain this to someone. Much better than my scrambled narration along with the music.


That's why this form is so fabulous, one learns something new almost every day.


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## Guest

jdec said:


> "The awe-inspiring counterpoint in Mozart's final symphony, explained in one video", by musicologist Richard Atkinson:
> 
> http://www.classicfm.com/composers/mozart/music/jupiter-symphony-counterpoint-video/
> 
> (With the culminating point explained from 11'50" to the end)


Interesting to watch this, seeing how the various components are put together. Curiously, it has the effect of reducing composition to something akin to building with Lego. If you understand how to build, (as Mozart obviously does) then the Jupiter suddenly becomes much less ineffable and instead wholly explicable. That doesn't necessarily reduce the marvel, but it does reduce the magic.


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## DeepR

It doesn't reduce the magic while listening; I still get goosebumps there.
I also had goosebumps before I learned/was told how brilliant it is. It's the same. And it confirms my idea that understanding technique and theory doesn't enhance the experience of listening. I had already heard it, instictively.


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## jdec

MacLeod said:


> Interesting to watch this, seeing how the various components are put together. Curiously, it has the effect of reducing composition to something akin to building with Lego. *If you understand how to build, (as Mozart obviously does) then the Jupiter suddenly becomes much less ineffable and instead wholly explicable. That doesn't necessarily reduce the marvel, but it does reduce the magic.*


Yet, Wolfie "built" very fast too, he composed all three the "Jupiter", symphony No.39 and symphony No.40 together in just 6-9 weeks, plus some other chamber works in that same time-frame too.

So was he just a very good "builder"?


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## Haydn70

DeepR said:


> *It doesn't reduce the magic while listening; I still get goosebumps there.*
> I also had goosebumps before I learned/was told how brilliant it is. It's the same. And it confirms my idea that understanding technique and theory doesn't enhance the experience of listening. I had already heard it, instictively.


The same here...I have heard that symphony dozens of times and that passage still overwhelms and thrills me.

However, in regard to understanding (or not understanding) technique and theory, I am on the opposite side of the fence. I studied that passage in a composition seminar back in my undergraduate days. We (the professor and class members) broke it down thoroughly, analyzing the heck out of it. And to understand thoroughly what Mozart had accomplished increased my appreciation and enjoyment of the passage tenfold.

WADR to some here who think knowledge reduces the magic, for me it is just the opposite.


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## DavidA

stomanek said:


> I think that is correct. Obviously musical academics can be quite opinionated - especially those who achieved little aside from getting their Bmus, publishing some articles about 14thC polyphony in The Musical Times and landing a job teaching composition/theory.
> 
> I would have thought the jupiter is beyond any kind of critique - the finale is constructed to such a high point of mastery it just seems inconceivable it could be anything other than what it is.


As Beecham said, 'A musicologist is someone who can read music but can't hear it.'

Anyone who criticises the last movement of the Jupiter and its brilliant writing is either highly unmusical or an academic twit or maybe both.


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## Guest

ArsMusica said:


> WADR to *some here *who think knowledge reduces the magic





DavidA said:


> *Anyone *who criticises.


Well, I can't see anyone here who is criticising, so that doesn't apply, and the only one here who thinks "knowledge reduces the magic" is me, so there is no "some".

Of course, what I mean by "magic" might need explanation, lest anyone think I'm criticising.


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## EdwardBast

MacLeod said:


> Interesting to watch this, seeing how the various components are put together. Curiously, it has the effect of reducing composition to something akin to building with Lego. If you understand how to build, (as Mozart obviously does) then the Jupiter suddenly becomes much less ineffable and instead wholly explicable. *That doesn't necessarily reduce the marvel, but it does reduce the magic.*


Depends on where you think the magic is. The passage of invertible counterpoint is impressive but, in and of itself, not all that special. One of the five ideas is only a measure long, three of the others elaborate simple triads, filling in the chord tones with passing tones. One of these three just sequences the same two measure idea at the interval of a fourth. In other words, these are the simplest, most flexible building blocks one could choose. Combining them is therefore no big deal.

The magic, IMO, isn't in the complexity or difficulty of the passage in the coda. The magic is in the overall design and planning of the movement as a whole. Most important, Mozart manages to make each of the simple building blocks (well, four of them anyway) memorable enough that when they are combined, one remembers them as distinct personalities based on how they're introduced and highlighted in earlier passages. The least distinctive of the lot, and thus the most difficult to "characterize," is the one in whole notes, C-D-F-E. It is exceedingly important because it establishes the overall harmonic scaffolding of the coda passage. Mozart solves the problem merely by precedence, by making it the opening motive of the main theme. The rest have a simple tag or hook that makes them distinctive. The purple one has the trill and the sequencing by fourth, the green has the dotted figure, which suggests a fanfare, the orange is the only one beginning with leaps.

The whole movement is like an operatic ensemble scene. It introduces distinct characters separately, and then culminates in them singing their distinct parts together. It is only because they have previously established their individual character, through their hooks and structural functions, that the passage combining them is so thrilling. The movement is perfect, but its perfection is, IMO, due more to Mozart's operatic genius rather than to his raw contrapuntal skill in the Bachian sense - although the skills clearly overlap. Arguably, arriving at the result he did from this unusual angle is what makes it unique, thoroughly inimitable and magical.


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## Guest

EdwardBast said:


> The magic is in the overall design and planning of the movement as a whole.


Thanks for your post.

Save for the word 'magic', I wholly agree.

I had hoped that my progression from "ineffable" and "explicable" would help guide the reader to the meaning to be inferred where I compare "marvel" with "magic". That is, I meant the word in its first sense here:

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/magic

In other words, it's a marvellous composition, but not a mystery.


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## PlaySalieri

EdwardBast said:


> Depends on where you think the magic is. The passage of invertible counterpoint is impressive but, in and of itself, not all that special. One of the five ideas is only a measure long, three of the others elaborate simple triads, filling in the chord tones with passing tones. One of these three just sequences the same two measure idea at the interval of a fourth. In other words, these are the simplest, most flexible building blocks one could choose. Combining them is therefore no big deal.
> 
> The magic, IMO, isn't in the complexity or difficulty of the passage in the coda. The magic is in the overall design and planning of the movement as a whole. Most important, Mozart manages to make each of the simple building blocks (well, four of them anyway) memorable enough that when they are combined, one remembers them as distinct personalities based on how they're introduced and highlighted in earlier passages. The least distinctive of the lot, and thus the most difficult to "characterize," is the one in whole notes, C-D-F-E. It is exceedingly important because it establishes the overall harmonic scaffolding of the coda passage. Mozart solves the problem merely by precedence, by making it the opening motive of the main theme. The rest have a simple tag or hook that makes them distinctive. The purple one has the trill and the sequencing by fourth, the green has the dotted figure, which suggests a fanfare, the orange is the only one beginning with leaps.
> 
> The whole movement is like an operatic ensemble scene. It introduces distinct characters separately, and then culminates in them singing their distinct parts together. It is only because they have previously established their individual character, through their hooks and structural functions, that the passage combining them is so thrilling. The movement is perfect, but its perfection is, IMO, due more to Mozart's operatic genius rather than to his raw contrapuntal skill in the Bachian sense. Arguably, arriving at the result he did from this unusual angle is what makes it unique, thoroughly inimitable and magical.


I often wonder what his process of composition would have been. Do you see him sketching ideas down on paper - then suddenly seeing the whole thing and planning the mvt out on a huge piece of paper? Or do you see him at the piano going from one bar to the next and working it out as he goes on the staves?


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## DavidA

stomanek said:


> I often wonder what his process of composition would have been. Do you see him sketching ideas down on paper - then suddenly seeing the whole thing and planning the mvt out on a huge piece of paper? Or do you see him at the piano going from one bar to the next and working it out as he goes on the staves?


The incredible thing is the speed he wrote it at. The last three symphonies - works of such quality and genius - in so short a time


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## EdwardBast

stomanek said:


> I often wonder what his process of composition would have been. Do you see him sketching ideas down on paper - then suddenly seeing the whole thing and planning the mvt out on a huge piece of paper? Or do you see him at the piano going from one bar to the next and working it out as he goes on the staves?


I imagine Mozart must have had the big finish in mind very early on, if not from the beginning. If so, then it would have been easiest to work back and forth between sketches of the coda and those for the initial statements of the themes and motives, adjusting back and forth or adding motives to the mix as he went along. But without having actual sketches to check it would be impossible to know the details. He might, for example, have created two or three of the ideas while sketching the beginning of the movement, fully intending to combine them later and designing them so they would go together. Then he might have created the others in a sketch of the coda and then worked backward to introduce them earlier. There are any number of ways it could have worked and it is a loss not to know. Alas, those sketches make such good kindling.  Mikhail Bakhtin is alleged to have burned a whole manuscript as cigarette papers one bleak winter in Kazakhstan.


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## PlaySalieri

EdwardBast said:


> I imagine Mozart must have had the big finish in mind very early on, if not from the beginning. If so, then it would have been easiest to work back and forth between sketches of the coda and those for the initial statements of the themes and motives, adjusting back and forth or adding motives to the mix as he went along. But without having actual sketches to check it would be impossible to know the details. He might, for example, have created two or three of the ideas while sketching the beginning of the movement, fully intending to combine them later and designing them so they would go together. Then he might have created the others in a sketch of the coda and then worked backward to introduce them earlier. There are any number of ways it could have worked and it is a loss not to know. Alas, those sketches make such good kindling.  Mikhail Bakhtin is alleged to have burned a whole manuscript as cigarette papers one bleak winter in Kazakhstan.


I understand that after Mozart died Constanze burned a pile of sketches that, by her judgement - were of no value.


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## PlaySalieri

DavidA said:


> The incredible thing is the speed he wrote it at. The last three symphonies - works of such quality and genius - in so short a time


Yes that is quite a wonder. Thank goodness the MS survived. If they had not then the Prague would have been considered Mozart's last symphony and posterity would have been wondering forever what the next sy would have been like.

Imagine then in the mid 20thC the MS is found for the last 3 sy are found - how the musical world would have reacted with awe.


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## Room2201974

"Sketches? Sketches? We don't need no stinking sketches!" ~ W. A.Mozart, 1788


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## Room2201974

Duplicate post!!!!


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