Movement to a Violin Sonata in A (draft to K. 526), K. 526a
ヴォルフガング・アマデウス・モーツァルト作
Mozart’s Movement to a Violin Sonata in A (K. 526a) is a short, unfinished draft from Vienna (1787), apparently connected with the completed Violin Sonata in A major, K. 526. Preserved only as a fragment, it offers a fleeting glimpse of Mozart’s working process at age 31.
What Is Known
K. 526a survives as a single-page fragment for violin and keyboard in A major, transmitted as an incomplete “instrumental movement” and commonly treated as an auxiliary draft to the A-major sonata K. 526 rather than an independent work [1]. The source situation does not allow a confident reconstruction of a full movement plan; what remains reads as a sketch in which Mozart tests material without carrying it through to a finished, performable continuity.
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
The usual dating and localization place it in Vienna, 1787, the year Mozart completed K. 526 itself [2]. In that intensely productive period—between major theatrical commitments and a remarkable run of instrumental works—Mozart’s mature handling of the keyboard–violin partnership had reached an unusually conversational balance, and K. 526a seems to belong to the same creative orbit.
Musical Content
On the page, the music presents incipient sonata-like rhetoric rather than a self-contained miniature: an opening idea in A major is set out with brisk, forward-moving figuration and a texture that suggests shared thematic responsibility between the two parts (rather than violin accompaniment to keyboard) [1]. The fragment breaks off before any cadence strategy or modulatory trajectory can be confirmed, but its bright, extrovert profile sits comfortably beside the athletic, high-classical surface of K. 526’s outer movements [2].
[1] IMSLP work page for the fragment (catalogued as K.Anh.50 / K.526a), including the 1-page score scan and basic catalog metadata.
[2] Wikipedia overview of Mozart’s Violin Sonata No. 35 in A major, K. 526 (Vienna, 1787) for contextual dating and genre relationship.