Ouverture en hommage à Mozart

Ouverture en hommage à Mozart
Overture in homage to Mozart

Year of composition

1956

Duration

7'

Scored for

orchestra: 3 2 2 2 - 2 2 0 0 - timp. - strings (12 12 8 8 6)
‘Dédiée à Monsieur René Dovaz, Directeur du Studio de Radio-Genève’

Publication information

Universal Edition (UE13005)

Commentary

from A propos de… - commentaires de Frank Martin sur ses œuvres (1984):

The Ouverture en hommage à Mozart was written at the request of Radio-Geneva for a joint international broadcast to conclude the Mozart year in December 1956. It was not the author’s intention in any way to make a sort of pastiche of Mozart, but to try to express, in his own language, his admiration for this master; hence the title: Overture in Homage to Mozart, which could have been, according to tradition, ‘Mozart’s Tomb’, were this expression not a suggestion of something too mournful. There is no doubt something inherently impossible in a task of this kind, and no-one would venture into it unless specifically invited and, in a way, feeling obliged to do so. Let us not see in it any pretentiousness, but the simple expressions of love and admiration, which only increase with the years.

In: Mitteilungen Basler Kammerorchester N° 82, January 17, 1959. Alte und neue Musik II, Atlantis Verlag Zürich 1977, p. 259.
English translation by Rachel Ann Morgan

Premiere

World première (broadcast): Geneva, 10 December 1956. Ernest Ansermet, conductor

Recordings (selective list)

  • ‘Hommage à Mozart’
    Zürcher Kammerorchester
    Muhai Tang, conductor
    ZKO 476 591-2 ℗ + © 2006 (FMS201)

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