Mozart - Violin Sonata No. 26, B-flat Major. K 378 [Szeryng/Haebler]

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791) was one of the most influential, popular and prolific composers of the classical period. A child prodigy, from an early age he began composing over 600 works, including some of the most famous pieces of symphonic, chamber, operatic, and choral music.

Sonata for violin & piano No. 26 in B flat major, K. 378 (K. 317d)

1. Allegro moderato (0:00)
2. Andantino sostenuto e cantabile (9:07)
3. Rondeau. Allegro (14:57)

Henryk Szeryng, violin and Ingrid Haebler, piano

Mozart composed his sonatas for violin and piano in spurts. There are the dozen-plus that he wrote during the 1760s when not yet even a teenager, the six Mannheim sonatas of 1778, the six sonatas of 1781, and finally the four glorious late works put to paper during the mid- and late 1780s. The Sonata for violin and piano No. 26 in B flat major, K. 317d (formerly K. 378), comes from the 1781 set, though it seems that the piece might actually have been composed two years earlier (in 1779) than its five companion pieces. Mozart moved to Vienna in March 1781; these six violin sonatas, minus perhaps the present work (which, if it does date from 1779, counts among the Salzburg works), were composed over the course of his first months as a resident of the bustling Austrian metropolis, and they were the first music of his to be published in the city (as Op. 2).