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Eine kleine Nachtmusik
By Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1787. The name means "a little night music". Mozart wrote it for strings: two violins, a viola and a cello.
What to listen for in Eine kleine Nachtmusik
Tap Play the map and follow the stops. It lasts about 76 seconds. Tap any stop to start from there.
- Hello, everybody!. Everyone plays together, strong and bold!
- The rocket. Listen, a bouncy tune zooms up!
- Soft and sweet. Now it's soft and gentle.
- Louder and louder. Listen, it's getting louder and louder!
- A new tune. A new tune, light and soft.
- Hello again. The first tune comes back!
For grown-ups: the composition is in the public domain (written 1787). Peabody’s band plays it from notes read out of a published score, simplified to one tune line with chords, and some stops are played by a different band so the change is easy to hear. Read from: https://www.mutopiaproject.org/ftp/MozartWA/KV525/eine-kleine-nachtmusik-mvt1/eine-kleine-nachtmusik-mvt1-lys.zip (Mutopia, first movement: violin1.ly for the tune, cello.ly and viola.ly for the harmony), checked against https://www.mutopiaproject.org/ftp/MozartWA/KV525/eine-kleine-nachtmusik-mvt1/eine-kleine-nachtmusik-mvt1.mid. G major down a fifth to C; first violin only, bars 1 to 35, then bars 1 to 4 again (the music does come back, after the middle); trills and grace notes left out or written as two quick notes; the shivering (tremolo) bars written as repeated eighths; the quick three-note turns written as sixteenths; harmonised here from the cello and viola.