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stores: a genuine question and re Mozart and the score. K311, 1st movt, bar 51. My Henle Urtext edition gives a naturalised C in the 2nd half of the bar (RH). It has always sounded wrong to me - I play the C# as in the 1st half of the bar. Apart from bar 41 it's the first appearance of a C natural, although there are quite a few further on. No comments in the notes to the edition.

Is there a good harmonic reason for the C natural? Should I just get used to the shock (to me) of the C natural in that bar? It has puzzled me for some time as I much prefer to play the notes as written and learn the reasons for what appears to be a "wrong" note.

Because you like it doesn't mean it is correct

Do what you like... it makes no difference to me

but keep in mind that you'll never be taken seriously

I guarantee you it will be highlighted should you decide to insert your own alterations into the score while playing in a masterclass, or for any notable, knowledgeable teacher.

It isn't about whether I think it sounds good and saying so simply means you don't understand the point.

Perhaps I got a little off topic?

.....and to Peter's post:

When some knowledgeable people say that something can only be one way, and other equally knowledgeable people say it's more complicated and that it's flexible and arguable, which side would usually tend to be right?

I'd also love to see anyone on your side reply to Antony's point about doubling the leading tone. I don't mean that this says you have to do the 3-note version, just that it's a point in favor of it -- and if you want to try to be academic and doctrinaire about it, you need to deal with points like that.

From "Perspectives on Mozart Performance" (R. Larry Todd and Peter Williams, editors):



Badura-Skoda goes on to say:

"Not only in piano music, but in orchestral works, there
are many instances where a main-note start of a trill is
desirable for harmonic and melodic reasons."

He then gives two examples and says:

"Alas, nowadays nearly all orchestral players start these
trills with the upper note, evidently because they are 'well
instructed' that a Mozart trill must start from above."

Calling Stores, Peter, Polyph, Greg, and anyone who might still want to insist that the rigid "start-on-the-upper-note" view is the only 'correct' one and that the rest of us are dolts.

Hey, wait a minute....

Luthrin: Thanks for posting this!


Calling Stores, Peter, Greg, and anyone who might still want to insist that the rigid "start-on-the-upper-note" view is the only 'correct' one and that the rest of us are dolts.

To be clear: I'm not saying at all that starting on the principal note is how you have to do it in the current example; I'm not even sure I'd do it that way, although I'm pretty sure I would, with the "leaping-to-the-leading-tone" factor mentioned by Antony being the probable clincher (and not because of pure music theory but because I regard this as a probable underlying explanation for why my ear seems to dislike and reject that version). But all I'm really saying is that the subject is open for reasonable debate and subjectivity, and that it's simply WRONG to say that your way is the only correct way. If you insist otherwise, you're up against Badura-Skoda (as well as many others).

But don't worry -- you've got company: ME.
Because if he meant to imply that the short upper-note trill (like the 4-note version in the current example) 'doesn't exist' -- and he seems to come close to that, doesn't he -- I would disagree with him too, just as I'd disagree with your saying that the 3-note version "doesn't exist." I don't think we can say that either way is simply wrong, and to that extent, I'm supporting you, against Badura-Skoda -- supporting the reasonableness of your preference, although not your insistence on it, and I think you'd be on firmer ground if you cited reasons besides just a supposed rule.


By the way: The others that you're up against would seem to include even C.P.E. Bach, because of how he allowed for exceptions.

Well, I was going on that post of yours about "feeble arguments." The fact that you said someone else's arguments were also feeble didn't seem to outweigh what you led off with.

Relatively nice post, Stores -- mere condescension rather than insults.

Still no comment on the relevant questions, but I guess that is indeed too much to expect.

Regarding the basis for my possible disagreement with Badura-Skoda, which you lambasted: There are any number of bases. The easiest is simply that in the current example, most high-level performances seem to do a version of the trill (i.e. the "4-note version") that he comes close to implying doesn't exist. In fact, it's the version that you yourself have endorsed. This is very odd: you criticized (actually mocked) my possible disagreement with Badura-Skoda even though you share it. Somehow you must not have realized that you do, although that's hard to understand.

B-S (as we loved calling him, though not to his face ha!) does more than imply a 4 note trill, Mark. Every ornament on his list makes use of 4 notes.