Two new Mozart compositions discovered

Offering further evidence of the precocious talent of the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, two pieces of music attributed to the composer have been discovered in the back of a music book used in his musical education.

The International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg, Austria has said both are almost certainly unknown compositions by the young Mozart.

The pieces, an extensive concerto movement and a prelude, were found at the end of the so-called ‘Nannerl’s Music Book’, which Mozart’s father Leopold had begun to compile in 1759 for his daughter Maria Anna (‘Nannerl’) and which was also used for the musical education of Wolfgang.

Although having previously been published in a volume of Mozart’s music books in 1982, the works were not recognised as being by the composer. Surviving in the hand of Mozart’s father Leopold, they had been classified as anonymous compositions.

However, the Director of the Research Department of the International Mozarteum Foundation Ulrich Leisinger has re-evaluated the compositions. He used handwriting analysis and analysis of other stylistic criteria, which support the claim that they were actually composed by the young Mozart, who was not yet versed in musical notation, and transcribed by his father as the boy played the works at the keyboard.

The pieces were performed in Salzburg, Austria for the first time on Sunday, but they will receive their first concert performance, including a new orchestra version by pianist and Harvard musicologist Robert D Levin, during Mozart Week 2010, which will be held in Salzburg from 22– 31 January next year.