Enlightenment

Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet in A Major, K. 581, was dedicated to his friend and virtuoso clarinetist Anton Stadler. It is the composer’s only piece for this instrumentation and one of the first to exploit the clarinet’s agility and range. Premiered in 1789 in Vienna, the quintet spotlights the clarinet’s then-untapped potential as a solo instrument and remains one of Mozart’s most beloved works. The soloist is Elise Bonhivert, a graduate of the Royal Conservatory of the Hague, who plays, makes, restores, and repairs clarinets, with a diverse collection of more than 100 instruments of her own.

In the early 1770s, Haydn began to experiment with the string quartet, writing witty divertimenti intended for entertainment. Around 1781, his Op. 33 “Russian Quartets” replaced the traditional minuet movement with a scherzo. Following its publication, the work quickly acquired the nickname “Gli scherzi” (The Jokes), with the second quartet of Op. 33 becoming known as “Lo Scherzo” (The Joke).