Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Concerto per Clarinetto e Orchestra in La maggiore K. 622

Everyone, whether deeply, superficially, distractedly, or unconsciously, has listened at least once in their life to the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791), who is being commemorated today on the 250th anniversary of his birth. Many will know some famous fragments of his most renowned works like the Requiem in D minor K. 626 (really his?) or the first movement of Symphony No. 40 in G minor K. 550 or even the well-known theme "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik," often abused today by boorish stadium chants or foolish Christmas advertisements. In short, Mozart, like it or not, is in our musical DNA. If this is so, it’s thanks to the crystalline beauty and universality of his music, its lyricism, its color, its harmonies, its melodic taste, its perfection of forms, which represent one of the highest moments in the history of music. Nonetheless, not everyone has the time, curiosity, or desire to know his music more attentively, preferring to remain sheltered within their own comfortable and secure enclosures. And it’s a real pity because approaching the listening of Mozart can offer pleasant surprises, especially for those who consider "classical music" relaxing. Honestly, I always thought this is a cliché if not absolute nonsense. Classical music is infinitely varied in its ability to generate a multitude of different emotions. It can be reassuring, as much as exhilarating or heartbreaking, it cannot be captured by a single adjective; often adjectives are not enough or even unnecessary, a situation quite common when listening to Mozart. An example is this concert, which represents one of the most emotionally varied moments in the corpus of the works of the composer from Salzburg.

Belonging to the composer’s full artistic maturity, it was composed in 1791 based on a draft sketched four years earlier and completed just two months before his death. Like other works involving a solo instrument, this composition was created with a specific recipient in mind, namely the clarinetist Anton Stadler (1753-1812), with whom Mozart had a deep friendship and shared Masonic affiliation. Divided into three parts (Allegro, Adagio, Rondo Allegro), the work opens with the orchestra performing an agile and very delicate theme, which develops into a true womb to welcome the solo clarinet part, which embraces the opening thematic module, intertwining with the orchestra lightened for the occasion by the absence of oboes. This relationship between orchestra and solo clarinet is an excellent example of perfection: a dialogue that could not be different, among joyful counterpoints, extreme virtuosity, and an always intense and vital expressivity of shining mother-of-pearl in a continuous emotional crescendo. A perfect balance. To put it in the words of Antonio Salieri in the famous and debated film Amadeus by Milos Forman: move a note and it all collapses.
In the Adagio, a contrast with the pure light of the first movement is felt. A sweet theme, reminiscent of the twilight of dawn, is delicately introduced by the clarinet, eventually finding support and lyricism from the strings. Intense, poetic, sublime, an enchantment for the soul. During the listening of the final Rondo Allegro, a pure lightness in the theme traced by the soloist is felt. This is supported in its continuation by the overflowing vitality of the strings, which also on this occasion naturally join with the development of the clarinet, which offers chills, patches of light, ethereal brushstrokes of colors. Infinitely beautiful music, a breath of life that gets under your skin to come into full contact with the soul.

Nothing else comes to mind when thinking back to this concert; maybe I just want to emphasize a sort of dismay in thinking that just two months after its composition, Mozart would die, ending up in a common grave, as was required by third-class funerals for people of his rank. Therefore, today it is not even possible to visit his grave to thank him. But you can do so by gifting yourself this music that for over two hundred years sounds as clear and alive as ever, remaining the best possible celebration of his time on this earth.