Quintet in B♭ major (after the “Gran Partita”), K. 46? (spurious)
볼프강 아마데우스 모차르트 작
Often encountered as “Mozart’s Quintet in B♭ major, K. 46,” this compact four-movement work is now generally understood as an anonymous chamber arrangement of selected movements from the Serenade in B♭ major, K. 361/370a (“Gran Partita”), composed c. 1781–82. Heard on its own terms, it distills Mozart’s grand wind-serenade style into a more domestic, string-led texture.
Background and Context
The so-called Quintet in B♭ major, K. 46 circulates under Mozart’s name in older references and recordings, but its musical substance aligns closely with the Serenade in B♭ major, K. 361/370a (“Gran Partita”). Modern cataloguing and library listings commonly treat it as spurious—an anonymous arrangement drawing on movements from the serenade rather than an original Mozart quintet.[1][2]
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Placed against Mozart’s documented chamber output, the arrangement makes best historical sense in the wake of the Gran Partita’s Viennese milieu (c. 1781–82), when wind serenades flourished and music was frequently recopied and adapted for the forces available in salons and private circles.[3] The “age 370” sometimes attached to the piece in secondary metadata is simply erroneous.
Musical Character
In the sources and performances that transmit it, the work is laid out as a short, four-movement cycle—Largo – Allegro molto, Menuetto, Adagio, and a concluding fast movement—matching a subset of the seven movements of the Gran Partita.[2][4]
What changes is not Mozart’s melodic fingerprint—still audible in the broad phrases, the courtly minuets, and the cantabile slow movement—but the sonic premise: the original serenade’s opulent wind choir is translated into a leaner chamber medium, where inner voices must supply the color and sustain that winds naturally provide. Cadential punctuation and bass support tend to feel more “string-classical” in profile, and the famous lyricism of the slow movement can read as more intimate than ceremonial.
As a listening experience, this quintet is therefore best approached not as a missing link in Mozart’s authentic quintets, but as a historically plausible way later musicians brought one of his most expansive wind works into closer quarters.
[1] IMSLP work list entry noting “Quintet in B-flat major, K.46? (arr. of the wind serenade K.370a)” and related catalog context.
[2] Performance upload explicitly describing the work as a spurious arrangement of movements from the “Gran Partita” (K. 361).
[3] IMSLP page for *Serenade in B♭ major, K. 361/370a* (“Gran Partita”), including Neue Mozart-Ausgabe publication details and general work identification.
[4] Wind Repertory Project overview of the “Gran Partita” with movement list (useful for matching the arrangement’s selected movements).