Fugue in D minor for clavier (fragment), K. 660
par Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart’s Fugue in D minor for clavier (fragment), K. 660, is a brief surviving incipit from Salzburg, generally dated to 1771, when the composer was 15. Though only a few systems remain, the page offers a revealing glimpse of Mozart testing learned counterpoint at the keyboard—music that sounds more like a study in procedure than a finished concert piece.
What Is Known
Only a short fragment of a fugue in D minor survives under the title Fugue in D minor, K. 660, notated for a single keyboard instrument (“clavier,” i.e., harpsichord or early piano). Modern catalogues and editions place it in Salzburg and typically date it to 1771, during Mozart’s adolescence and intensive compositional training under his father, Leopold Mozart.[1]
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The surviving source is preserved as a manuscript in the Austrian National Library (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek), and it is transmitted as a torso rather than a complete composition.[1] The fragment is therefore usually understood as a contrapuntal exercise or compositional sketch—useful evidence of what interested Mozart at 15, but not sufficient to reconstruct a definitive full fugue without editorial invention.
Musical Content
What remains is enough to show the unmistakable “fugal” premise: a single-voice subject is stated and then answered in another voice, with the texture quickly thickening into a compact, imitative web. Even at this embryonic stage, Mozart favors a clear, singable subject and tidy voice-leading, suggesting he was practicing strict craft rather than improvising freely.[1]
The fragment’s D minor world—taut, serious, and harmonically pointed—anticipates Mozart’s later willingness to use minor keys for concentrated, “learned” statements, even when the surrounding musical culture expected keyboard miniatures to be lighter in tone. Precisely because the page breaks off, K. 660 is best heard not as a miniature “work,” but as a snapshot of Mozart developing fluency in counterpoint at the Salzburg keyboard.
[1] IMSLP work page for Mozart, Fugue in D minor, K. 660 (includes general information, instrumentation, and links to manuscript/NMA materials).