Mozart piece that was lost for centuries now discovered. Here's where you can listen to it
Here's some music for the ears of fans of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: A piece by the renowned composer that had been lost for centuries has now been discovered in a library in Germany.
According to a statement from the Leipzig Municipal Libraries, the piece—called Serenade in C—was apparently composed by Mozart during his teenage years sometime in the mid to late 1760s.
Library researchers managed to find the composition while they were working on the new edition of the Köchel Catalogue, which is considered a reference work on Mozart’s musical work and is being compiled by the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg.
Leipzig Municipal Libraries noted, however, that the manuscript was only a copy or transcription that was made around 1780 and was not the original one made by Mozart himself.
The previously unnoticed work is also referred to as the "Ganz kleine Nachtmusik" in the new Köchel catalog, which is German for "Little Night Music."
The piece consists of seven miniature movements for a string trio, which together last only about twelve minutes.
Ulrich Leisinger, head of research at the International Mozarteum Foundation, claimed that it was thanks to Mozart's sister Maria Anna that Serenade in C was saved from being lost forever.
"Until now the young Mozart has been familiar to us chiefly as a composer of keyboard music and of arias and sinfonias but we know from a list drawn up by Leopold Mozart that he wrote many other chamber works in his youth, all of them unfortunately lost," Leisinger said.
"It looks as if–thanks to a series of favorable circumstances–a complete string trio has survived in Leipzig. The source was evidently Mozart’s sister, and so it is tempting to think that she preserved the work as a memento of her brother. Perhaps he wrote the Trio specially for her and for her name day," he continued.
Details of Serenade in C have been made available at Köchel digital, a platform that provides all interested parties with easy access to Mozart’s works.
The composition was also performed by three musicians consisting of Vincent Geer, David Geer and Elisabeth Zimmermann outside the Leipzig Opera, which was recorded and published on the YouTube channel of JSO Leipzig.
Mozart was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period, having composed more than 800 works before passing away at the age of 35.
His most famous compositions include the motet Exsultate, Jubilate, K 165, the operas The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni, and the Jupiter Symphony.