Allegro for String Quintet in E♭ major (fragment), K. 613a
de Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart’s Allegro for string quintet in E♭ major (K. 613a) is an authentic but uncompleted movement, dated to Vienna in 1784–1785. Only a short autograph fragment survives, offering a glimpse of the 28-year-old composer’s chamber-music thinking at a moment when his Viennese style was rapidly consolidating.
What Is Known
Only a fragmentary Allegro movement survives under the Köchel number K. 613a. The Internationale Stiftung Mozarteum catalogues the work as authentic, extant, and uncompleted, and dates it to Vienna, 1784–1785.[1] The same entry identifies the scoring as a standard Mozart string quintet (2 violins, 2 violas, cello).[1]
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
In the surviving source description, the autograph is characterized as a short score fragment (“Partitur: 2 Bl. (3 beschr. S.)”), implying only a few notated pages.[1] Modern editions treat it among Mozart’s fragmentary works (Neue Mozart-Ausgabe, Fragmente).[2]
Musical Content
What can safely be inferred from the catalog data is modest: Mozart began (but did not finish) a fast opening movement in E♭ major for the viola-rich quintet texture he later exploited with such amplitude. Even in fragmentary form, the choice of medium is telling: in mid-1780s Vienna, Mozart was deepening his handling of inner voices and conversational counterpoint in chamber music, and the second viola of the quintet offered exactly that expressive and harmonic breadth.[1]
[1] Internationale Stiftung Mozarteum, Köchel-Verzeichnis entry for K. 613a (status, dating, key, instrumentation, source description).
[2] Digital Mozart Edition (DME), Neue Mozart-Ausgabe online pages: Series X/30/4 (Fragments) listing that includes K. 613a material.