Double Canon for Six Voices (lost), K. 572a
par Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart’s Double Canon for six voices, K. 572a, is a lost (or still unidentified) vocal work associated with Leipzig in 1789, when the composer was 33. No musical text is securely transmitted, and what survives is essentially a trail of cataloguing and anecdotal references.
What Is Known
K. 572a is described in modern reference sources as a double canon for six voices, connected with Mozart’s Leipzig visit in 1789, but with no surviving score or autograph presently identified.[1]
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A more specific Leipzig tradition links the work to Johann Friedrich Doles (1715–1797), Thomaskantor and one-time pupil of J. S. Bach: a later report, transmitted via Constanze Mozart’s correspondence with the Leipzig publisher Breitkopf & Härtel, says Mozart “supposedly improvised” a six-voice canon for Doles.[2] This points to a social, occasional origin—music made for skilled singers in the moment—rather than a carefully copied fair manuscript.
Some secondary cataloguing traditions supply a German farewell text (reported as Lebet wohl, wir sehen uns wieder), but this cannot presently be checked against a known musical source.[3]
Musical Content
Because no notated musical text is available for consultation, the canon’s key, subject, entries, and contrapuntal design (beyond the label “double canon”) cannot be described with confidence.[1]
[1] Wikipedia — Köchel catalogue entry listing K. 572a as a “Double canon for six voices (lost or unidentified)” and giving Leipzig/1789 context.
[2] Mozart-Digital (International Mozarteum Foundation), English transcription — Constanze Mozart to Breitkopf & Härtel (1799), note mentioning Doles and that Mozart supposedly improvised the six-voice canon KV App. 4 (572a).
[3] Mozart la caduta degli dei — secondary catalogue list that includes K. 572a as a six-voice double canon with a reported German farewell text.