Violin Concerto No. 5 in A Major

Wit and genial humour meld with the spirit of empathy in Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5 in A major. Written in Salzburg in December 1775, shortly before the composer’s 20th birthday, it begins with a swaggering orchestral introduction that would ordinarily lead to a modified repeat of the same from the soloist; what follows after a moment’s silence, however, is a slow, long-breathed violin melody based on the notes of a simple A major chord. Having interrupted the opening’s flow, Mozart recalls the music of the introduction and lets the violin take the lead in its development. The central “Adagio” sounds like a love song, ardent yet tender, in which the solo melody grows and flourishes like an exotic plant in ideal conditions. A fashionable dance, the minuet, meets a stylised Western interpretation of so-called Turkish music in the closing “Rondeau”. The “Turkish” element, with its drone bass, leaping melodic intervals, unsettling chromatic shifts and percussive bow strokes, most likely made its way to Salzburg in the repertoire of itinerant Hungarian Romani bands or was introduced there from Hungary by Mozart’s senior colleague Michael Haydn.