Melodic Notation in C minor (fragment), K. 702
ヴォルフガング・アマデウス・モーツァルト作
Mozart’s Melodic Notation in C minor (K. 702) is a tiny surviving keyboard sketch, preserved only as an autograph fragment and dated by the International Mozarteum Foundation to Vienna, 1785–1786.[1] Though slight in scale, it belongs to the intensely productive mid-1780s, when Mozart was refining a darker, more dramatic C-minor idiom at the keyboard.
What Is Known
The work catalogued as Melodic Notation in C minor (K. 702) survives as an extant autograph and is explicitly classified as an uncompleted work.[1] The Mozarteum catalogue associates it with a sketch sheet labeled “Skizzenblatt 1785c” and dates the fragment to Vienna, 1785–1786 (rather than a more specific day or month). [1] No secure occasion, intended larger context, or early performance tradition is documented in the catalogue entry.
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At this point in Mozart’s life (aged 29), Vienna was the center of his activity as composer-pianist; the fragment’s C-minor tonality places it, at least temperamentally, near the expressive world of his major keyboard works of the period.
Musical Content
What survives is best understood as a melodic jotting rather than a complete piano piece: the catalogue describes it as “melodic notation,” and the source as a brief autograph on a single leaf (written on both sides).[1] In other words, it appears to capture an incipit-like idea—enough to fix a musical thought on paper, but not enough to establish full form, texture, or a finished continuity.
[1] International Mozarteum Foundation (Köchel Verzeichnis): KV 702 “Melodic notation in C minor” — status, dating (Vienna 1785–1786), and source description.