# Symphony 40 vs. Symphony 41: Mozart



## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

Which do you prefer better as a whole?


I must go with 40. It keeps my attention where the 41st can drag on for me. This is one of my favorite works by him.


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## Bruckner Anton (Mar 10, 2016)

I could not vote for the masterpiece 40th simply because I find the last movement of 41st unparalleled in Mozart's entire orchestral output and I would "exchange" 10 of his late symphonies just for the movement.


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## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

Bruckner Anton said:


> I could not vote for the masterpiece 40th simply because I find the last movement of 41st unparalleled in Mozart's entire orchestral output.


I hear you, I really love the first movement of the 41st, but I did say as a whole.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

40 or 41?

I'll go with 40.5 as any other choice is beyond my pay grade.

Where does that get me as a listener? I'm doomed to enjoy both late Mozart symphonies with equal relish, though with contrasting mood appreciation.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Neither is a particular favourite of mine (I prefer romantic and 20th century symphonies), but I'd say I enjoy them equally.


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

I prefer #40 although my favorite Mozart symphony is probably #38. I find #41 slightly overrated, even the finale (I don't think the other 3 movements are extraordinary at all); it's a great piece, but not out of this world great. I personally prefer the more playful combinations of polyphonic elements in a finale in the piano concerto K 459 or the string quartet K 387. Not quite like Bruckner's 5th but the Jupiter finale is almost trying too hard to impress.


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## chipia (Apr 22, 2021)

Kreisler jr said:


> I prefer #40 although my favorite Mozart symphony is probably #38. I find #41 slightly overrated, even the finale (I don't think the other 3 movements are extraordinary at all); it's a great piece, but not out of this world great. I personally prefer the more playful combinations of polyphonic elements in a finale in the piano concerto K 459 or the string quartet K 387. Not quite like Bruckner's 5th but the Jupiter finale is almost trying too hard to impress.


I agree, I honestly think that the fugato at the end of the 4th movement sounds awkward and forced, and its transition to the final cadence seems abrupt and unconvincing.


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

I would not go so far as awkward; it's a still a great movement, just not dwarving everything else as many commentators seem to feel. (I seriously encountered a guy in another forum years ago who claimed that Beethoven never got over the perfection of the Jupiter finale and therefore was driven to hypertrophy like in the choral finale of the 9th without ever matching Mozart... rabid fans are gonna be rabid fans, I guess)
I think it is a bit too long, especially with all repeats (these double bar repeats were usually skipped until a few decades ago), as the material is all "basic bricks" (to make the fugato combinations possible) and does not really bear all these repeats. That's one reason I find a combination of "comic opera"-themes and "counterpoint exercise"-material like in K 459 more entertaining.


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Bruckner Anton said:


> I could not vote for the masterpiece 40th simply because I find the last movement of 41st unparalleled in Mozart's entire orchestral output and I would "exchange" 10 of his late symphonies just for the movement.


Largely this for me, though I'd exempt the "Linz" and no.39 from that final cull.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

I voted equally. if you have them one one disc, almost 80 minutes of pleasure .


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## RobertJTh (Sep 19, 2021)

Equal. I can't decide what's more dear to me: the infinite depths of the slow movement of #40, or the Olympian tour de force that's the finale of #41.


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## Nawdry (Dec 27, 2020)

Captainnumber36 said:


> Symphony 40 vs. Symphony 41: Mozart
> Which do you prefer better as a whole?


Both are beautiful works, but the impact of music is typically very personal. I voted for #41 because it communicates to me a particularly majestic power and glorious sense of beauty.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Kreisler jr said:


> I would not go so far as awkward; it's a still a great movement, just not dwarving everything else as many commentators seem to feel. (I seriously encountered a guy in another forum years ago who claimed that Beethoven never got over the perfection of the Jupiter finale and therefore was driven to hypertrophy like in the choral finale of the 9th without ever matching Mozart... *rabid* fans are gonna be *rabid* fans, I guess)


How's that any more "unreasonable" than views like https://www.talkclassical.com/22451-why-do-people-consider-12.html#post2131235 . That guy you mention probably thinks the Beethoven is overwrought in a similar way some people think Mahler is. Btw, I have no problem with (or objection to) people claiming that Beethoven's 9th is the utmost pinnacle of human achievement.
Different people perceive things differently I guess, outside of this forum I've never seen anyone claiming that stuff like the passion recitatives of the Messiah are actually examples of expressive chromaticism.

"During his studies with Weinlig he had tried to discover the secret of Mozart's fluency and lightness in solving difficult technical problems. In particular he tried to emulate the fugal finale of the great C major Symphony, 'magnificent, never surpassed', as he called it years later, and at eighteen he wrote a fugato as the finale of his C major Concert Overture, 'the very best that I could do, as I thought at the time, in honour of my new exemplar'." [ Wagner: A Biography ; Curt von Westernhagen ; P. 82 ]


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

chipia said:


> I agree, I honestly think that the fugato at the end of the 4th movement sounds awkward and forced, and its transition to the final cadence seems abrupt and unconvincing.


Some people talk as if the 4th movement is all about the fugato coda, but I'm also trigued by expressions like 



which are not part of the language of the other two members of the so-called 'Viennese school'




(Btw, I would just say Mozart was great at writing his kind of music while Beethoven was great at his, and leave it at that.)


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## Doublestring (Sep 3, 2014)

40, because Mozart is at his best in a fluent, melodic, gracious, humoristic style. In 41 he's too serious - trying to be Beethoven.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Doublestring said:


> 40, because Mozart is at his best in a fluent, melodic, gracious, humoristic style.






 the stuff at 31:43 - isn't it so sad?


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

I greatly enjoy both, #40 slightly more than #41. This said, the late Mozart symphony I hear the most these days is #39 - I love it's first movement.



Doublestring said:


> 40, because Mozart is at his best in a fluent, melodic, gracious, humoristic style. *In 41 he's too serious - trying to be Beethoven.*


It's the other way around: it was Beethoven who used Mozart's themes in some of his works, and was heavily influenced by him. When K. 551 was composed, Beethoven was living as an intrumentist and had composed next to nothing yet.


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

hammeredklavier said:


> How's that any more "unreasonable" than views like https://www.talkclassical.com/22451-why-do-people-consider-12.html#post2131235 . That guy you mention probably thinks the Beethoven is overwrought in a similar way some people think Mahler is.


It's totally unreasonable because there is absolutely no evidence that Beethoven (or Schubert or Mendelssohn or any other composer) had as his highest ambition to "beat" the Jupiter finale. That's just a nonsensical ahistorical projection. As such weird projections are your bread and butter, I am not surprised that you find nothing odd about this particular one.


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## RobertJTh (Sep 19, 2021)

Kreisler jr said:


> It's totally unreasonable because there is absolutely no evidence that Beethoven (or Schubert or Mendelssohn or any other composer) had as his highest ambition to "beat" the Jupiter finale. That's just a nonsensical ahistorical projection. As such weird projections are your bread and butter, I am not surprised that you find nothing odd about this particular one.


In the 19th century, the Jupiter's finale was seen as one of the biggest achievements in the "academic" style - and countless composition/theory students were obliged to write imitations of it as part of their counterpoint lessons.
As for Beethoven - When he experimented with fugues and counterpoint in general, later in his life, he was heavily influenced by Handel, not so much by Mozart or Bach.
Schubert only started studying counterpoint with Sechter in the last year of his life. I'm sure the Jupiter-finale must have been part of his lessons, but there's hardly any discernible influence noticeable in his last compositions (except maybe for the scherzo or finale or whatever it was going to be of the projected 10th symphony).


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

I voted 40. Various reasons including the blissful first movement, the nostalgia of it being one of my first Mozart memories, the suave andante, the delicate _nobillisima _of the minuet and the athletic finale ........... but then again I'd be happy on a desert island with any one of the four final symphonies.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

#41 by a very slight margin....both are great, love to perform them....
I esp love the inner movements of #41...magical...


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

"Take a bath, take a bath in a bathtub; take a bath take a bath in a bathtub"...The 40th was ruined forever for me by a stupid book by Sigmund Spaeth who thought the best way to learn what music was what was to put "memorable" words to the themes. In nearly 60 years I still can't get that inane "lyric" out of my head. Every time I listen to or play the 40th those words come to mind.

But the G minor (no. 40) is one of the supreme musical creations by anyone of all time. It's an extraordinary masterpiece. Detailed study of it reveals its stature. It's a son of a gun to conduct and shouldn't be taken lightly. I am not a huge Mozart fan, but the last three symphonies are just extraordinary with the 40th and the outstanding centerpiece.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

mbhaub said:


> "Take a bath, take a bath in a bathtub; take a bath take a bath in a bathtub"...The 40th was ruined forever for me by a stupid book by Sigmund Spaeth who thought the best way to learn what music was what was to put "memorable" words to the themes. In nearly 60 years I still can't get that inane "lyric" out of my head. Every time I listen to or play the 40th those words come to mind.


Didn't Walter Damrosch get into that silliness as well??
Brahms 4/I:
"Hel-lo, Hel-lo, What-Ho, What-Ho"; or

Schubert "Unfinished":
"This is the sym-pho-ny, that Schu-bert wrote and ne-ver fin-ished"

gawd, awful........


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## Michael122 (Sep 16, 2021)

41.
It's more complex and the tonal quality is better/more intricately woven than 40.
When listening to these 2 in sequence and back-to-back, it seems there's an accelerating creativity and a daring that culminates in the Jupiter.
Interestingly, it does not appear Mozart was commissioned for either of these pieces, suggesting he wrote them for his personal enjoyment.
That may be one of the reasons why the choice between these two is somewhat difficult.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

My favorites are the ones for the openings of the Rite of Spring and Tchaikovsky's 6th:

I'm … not an English Horn. This is too high for me!

Happy birthday. Happy birthday.



I won't pick between 40 and 41, although the finale of 40 is annoying and that of 41 is magnificent.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Mozart in g minor just doesn't float my boat. I acknowledge the 40th is masterful, but I find it sounds whiny.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Back when I was an oddball college student, and someone issued a top 40 up-tempo instrumental version of "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring," I found myself Walter Damrosching it:

"Argyle socks are the socks that my grandfather's uncle wore during his very young childhood when he was a toddling boy in Schenectady;
Argyle socks are the socks that my grandfather's uncle wore during his very young childhood when he was a boy wearing knickers in Upstate New York,"

I have an old classmate or two who still can't hear it without thinking of socks.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

MarkW said:


> Back when I was an oddball college student, and someone issued a top 40 up-tempo instrumental version of "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring," I found myself Walter Damrosching it:
> 
> "Argyle socks are the socks that my grandfather's uncle wore during his very young childhood when he was a toddling boy in Schenectady;.........


Now, now let's be nice to Schenectady!! :lol:


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Heck148 said:


> Now, now let's be nice to Schenectady!! :lol:


I had a grandmother who lived there.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

MarkW said:


> I had a grandmother who lived there.


LOL!! I grew up there....


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## FrankinUsa (Aug 3, 2021)

I love all the Mozart symphony 25 and above. Between 40 and 41 I prefer 41 by quite a bit more than 40. Plenty of positive reasons listed here for 41 and I agree with them all I do not dislike 40. But it seems somewhat atypical of a Mozart symphony. It almost seems to be “too” sublime.


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## Nipper (Jun 5, 2020)

My favorite Mozart symphony is definitely #40, followed closely by 41, 25, and 29.


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## BoggyB (May 6, 2016)

Nawdry said:


> I voted for #41 because it communicates to me a particularly majestic power and glorious sense of beauty.


+1

Not for nothing do they call it Jupiter.


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

I voted No 41. Love it from start to finish. I find the 1st movement as good as the last. Really inspiring.
No 40 - love it too - great 3rd movement - nobody ever seems to mention it.


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## ORigel (May 7, 2020)

I chose "equal." My preference varies depending on which pf the two symphonies I am listening to at the moment.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

My preference comes down to interpretation or recording. I love Britten's version of Symphony 40 (except for the overlong version of the slow movement), especially the first movement, that I never get tired of. There isn't a version of #41 that I haven't got tired of. I listen to #39 more than #41, again because one version stands out, Walter's.


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## Olias (Nov 18, 2010)

41 but only by the slimmest margin.


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## RollOvaMozart (Dec 15, 2021)

By Jupiter I vote for ...


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## CopistaSignorGomez (Dec 9, 2021)

I'm just happy listening to the andante of symphony no. 15 ii

These symphonies are far away of the Galant Style, that is my preferred taste; these ones are more close to pre-romantic, especially 40 i, of course

By the way, I rate symphony 41 iv, in the high category, counterpoint mozart climax and mastery, also realized In my view in quintet K593 iv


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## Philidor (11 mo ago)

#40 vs. #41? Sorry ... can't vote ... I would regard Nos. 39 to 41 as a triptych which is as an entity even more valuable than the individual symphonies.

I agree that Mozart added some "final factor" to the finale of #41. 

In real life, it depends on the context. I could imagine # 40 as the first part of a program featuring Mahler #6 in the second half. Or Schumann # 4. Or Beethoven # 5, Tchai #4, Tchai #6.

#41 is difficult to follow up with any music. # 41 should be the end of any program. Could imagine some Haydn symphony ("Maria Theresia"? ) followed by his trumpet concerto, then #41. 

Or # 39, #40 and #41 in that sequence.


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## EvaBaron (Jan 3, 2022)

If I had to choose it would be #40 maybe because it was the first symphony I ever listened to in its entirety, before this symphony I was just listening to first movements of a handful of symphonies on Spotify (I know, I know). regardless, it's one of those symphonies where every movement convinces me entirely, and I absolutely love Mozart in minor (#25 anyone?).


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## 59540 (May 16, 2021)

#41. #40 has reached the " I don't need to hear it again for a long while" territory that Beethoven's fifth is in. For me.


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

dissident said:


> #41. #40 has reached the " I don't need to hear it again for a long while" territory that Beethoven's fifth is in. For me.


2nd mvt of #40 never seems to end eh


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## marlow (11 mo ago)

Frankly this is the choice between two absolute masterworks


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## PlaySalieri (Jun 3, 2012)

Oh just to pick out my fave rec of #41 - the 1953 mono Klemperer recording.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

TBH this is one where I'm somewhat closed-minded; I've never been able to get myself into the mindset of someone who would prefer 41 to 40.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

41, and its no contest. Mozart's probably the only composer who has many symphonies and concertos in which I might like one movement but can do without the rest of the piece. Symphony #41 holds my attention from the first note to the last. After the first movement, #40 becomes yet another Mozart piece that I am sitting through more out of obligation than enthusiasm.


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