9 Variations in C on “Lison dormait” (K. 264)
沃尔夫冈·阿马德乌斯·莫扎特
Mozart’s 9 Variations in C on “Lison dormait” (K. 264) is a compact, salon-sized set completed in Paris on 22 May 1781, turning a fashionable French stage tune into a miniature study in character and keyboard wit.[1] Though outwardly modest, the work shows Mozart (aged 25) treating variation form not as mere decoration, but as a vehicle for quick changes of texture, register, and affect.[2]
Background and Context
Mozart’s keyboard variations often begin with an act of cultural listening: he takes a melody already “in the air,” then tests how many fresh personas it can sustain. In K. 264 he chose “Lison dormait,” an arietta from Nicolas Dezède’s opéra-comique Julie—a genre built on immediacy, charm, and conversational clarity.[1] In Paris (where such tunes circulated rapidly in theatres and salons), this kind of theme offered Mozart a shared language with amateur players and connoisseurs alike.
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The piece also belongs to a wider Mozartian practice: writing variations that sit between entertainment and pedagogy. Like the better-known “Ah, vous dirai-je, Maman” variations, K. 264 suggests domestic music-making, yet its technical demands and stylistic poise place it firmly in the realm of professional craft.[3] For modern listeners, its appeal lies precisely here: it is “small Mozart,” but not slight Mozart.
Composition
The Neue Mozart-Ausgabe preface dates the work to 22 May 1781 and identifies the source melody as “Lison dormait” from Dezède’s Julie.[1] That date is striking because it places the set at a moment of transition—Mozart is still in a Francophone musical world, yet already on the cusp of the Viennese years that would reshape his keyboard writing.
The complicated dual numbering (K. 264 / K. 315d) reflects Köchel catalogue revisions rather than any musical uncertainty: the work is a finished, self-contained set of nine variations for solo keyboard.[2] Surviving sources and later print history underscore its life in the private sphere—music intended to be owned, played, and enjoyed at the keyboard, rather than “premiered” in a single public event.[3]
Form and Musical Character
K. 264 is a single-movement theme-and-variations design: a clear, singable theme followed by nine concise transformations. Each variation tends to preserve the theme’s harmonic outline while changing surface features—figuration, rhythm, register, and accompaniment pattern—so that the listener experiences continuity of skeleton with variety of dress.[4]
What makes the set distinctive within Mozart’s variation output is its French theatrical DNA. Even without words, one senses the opéra-comique habit of quick character turns: a delicate lyrical line becomes ornamented; a simple accompaniment is recast as a more animated texture; and the right hand’s cantabile can suddenly yield to a more brilliant, display-oriented profile. In other words, the variations behave almost like a sequence of stage “costumes,” while the melody remains the recognisable protagonist.
The final pages concentrate the virtuoso impulse. The concluding variation is marked Allegro and (in common performance tradition as well as in editorial description) includes cadenza-like writing that briefly loosens the regularity of the earlier pattern—Mozart’s way of giving a salon piece a pointedly concert-like finish.[1]
Reception and Legacy
K. 264 has never been a “headline” work in the way the piano concertos or late symphonies are, yet it has remained present in the repertory as a refined teaching and recital miniature. Its afterlife is also documented through its editorial and publication trail: the Neue Mozart-Ausgabe includes it among the keyboard variations and discusses the work’s source situation and transmission.[3]
Today the set deserves attention as a snapshot of Mozart’s cosmopolitan skill. It shows him responding to Parisian popular theatre not by simplifying his style, but by distilling it—compressing invention into short spans, balancing accessibility with craft, and treating the variation principle as a laboratory for texture and character. For pianists, it offers a compact tour of Classical-era touch and articulation; for listeners, it offers the pleasure of recognizing a tune while hearing Mozart repeatedly out-think it.
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[1] Bärenreiter preface excerpt for Mozart keyboard variations (includes K. 264, source tune from Dezède’s *Julie*, and date 22 May 1781).
[2] IMSLP work page for *9 Variations on “Lison dormait”*, K. 264/315d (catalog identifiers and basic reference).
[3] Digital Mozart Edition (Mozarteum) — *New Mozart Edition* volume preface for Keyboard Variations (context, editorial framing, transmission notes).
[4] French Wikipedia article summarizing formal layout and measure scheme of the variations (useful orientation, secondary reference).