W. A. Mozart / Clarinet Concerto

A serenade of serenity I turn to whenever I want to connect with the instrument that helped me find my voice.

Juan Gris (Spanish, 1887–1927). Guitar and Clarinet, 1920. Oil on canvas. Kunstmuseum Basel

For 23 years, I dedicated the majority of my days to playing the clarinet. Slogging through my first scales in elementary school, when I produced as many squeaks as I did actual notes. Pursuing two performance degrees on two continents. And for the final decade as a freelance musician, playing with any orchestra within a four-hour drive of home.

Given this instrument was the focal point of my artistic development for half my life, you might assume my relationship with the clarinet was a case of love at first sight.

Not at all.

In fact, back in the fourth grade when everyone in my class had to select an instrument to study, it was my third choice. I still remember rolling my eyes with disappointment when my music teacher, Mr. Turek, told me too many students had already signed up for my top pick, the flute, and because I was left-handed, the cello wouldn't be an ideal choice for me.

Despite my neutral feelings for this cylinder of hard black wood and its gamey-tasting cane reeds, I took to the instrument quickly. And as I navigated my way through middle and high school as a painfully introverted kid, the clarinet became an extension of my voice — one I could always count on to express myself, unlike the many moments when I was hit with a tidal wave of shyness and words failed me.

But no, I didn't really love the clarinet. Not until college, when two teachers introduced me to the instrument's remarkable character. Under their guidance, I came to realize the clarinet isn't just the shrieky instrument that sounds maddeningly out of tune when played by dozens of students in a school band. It's actually one of the most mysterious and supremely vocal instruments of the orchestra — its tone alternately burnished and bright, wistful and passionate.

In all those years of practicing and performing, no work spent more time on my music stand than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Clarinet Concerto. It was the first piece I learned to audition for Connecticut's annual All-State Music Competition, and one of the solo works I had to prepare for not only college and graduate school auditions, but also every single orchestral audition I took. (I wasn't unique in this regard — it's downright impossible to be a professional clarinetist without spending thousands of hours with Mozart's concerto.)

Part of the reason it's a standard audition requirement is that the work leaves no room to hide. The solo lines don't sound complicated, but they're deceptively challenging to pull off, with no overwrought passages of flashy virtuosity to conceal a performer's lack of musicality or emotionality. Yes, you have to be able to play the work without rushing or slowing down, and every permutation of rhythm has to be as exact as the mechanized gears of a music box. 

But most importantly, you have to sing Mozart's music, like an operatic soprano delivering a rapturous aria, standing alone under a center-stage spotlight.

The first Mozart compositions people usually encounter in pop culture are his perenially popular Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music) for string orchestra or the delicate strains of his "Elvira Madigan" concerto for piano and orchestra. 

Mozart produced hundreds of such instrumental works with unparalleled charm and effortless grace, but many of these were pieces he doled out primarily to pay the bills as a freelance musician. At his core, the Austrian wunderkind was devoted to producing music for the human voice — from sacred works for full choir to evening-length operas, both comedic and dramatic.

Even today, as most of his symphonies and concertos appear less frequently on the orchestral stage, his operas — including the holy trinity of Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro), Così fan tutte (They're All Like That), and Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) — play to sold-out crowds in opera houses around the world. But regardless of whether Mozart was writing for a human voice or an instrumental one, his melodies always require the musician to sing with precision, clarity, and direct emotionality.

Mozart didn't begin writing for the clarinet until the final years of his life. Although the instrument was invented in the early 1700s, it wasn't until the closing decades of the century that it began to secure a place in the standard orchestra. It was primarily because of the music Mozart wrote for the clarinet — not only his Concerto, but a Quintet for clarinet and string quartet and the "Kegelstatt" Trio for clarinet, viola, and piano — that the instrument became a permanent member of the orchestra's woodwind family.

And for that, we have Anton Stadler to thank.

Among the most acclaimed clarinetists of his time, Stadler was a member of the Austrian Court's finest wind bands and orchestras when, in 1784, he performed one of Mozart's serenades for wind octet at Vienna's National Theatre — where Mozart himself was in the audience. Clarinetist and composer had much in common: they were both Freemasons, terrible at managing their finances, and shared a love of gambling and parlor games. ("Kegelstatt," the nickname Mozart attached to the trio he wrote for Stadler, is an Austrian version of duckpin bowling.)

Left: Barbara Krafft (Austrian, 1764–1825). Portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1819. Right:  Britide Vincent. Portrait of Anton Stadler, 1801.

What really inspired Mozart to write for Stadler, however, was the clarinetist's singular style of playing, which focused first and foremost on producing a vocal quality of sound that stood worlds away from the pinched, piercing timbre often associated with the instrument. In 1780, a German critic offered a representative statement of praise for Stadler's playing, writing:

"Never have I heard the like of what you contrive with your instrument. Never should I have imagined that a clarinet might be capable of imitating the human voice as deceptively, as faithfully as it was imitated by you. Your instrument has so soft and so lovely a tone that none can resist it who has a heart, and I have one, dear Virtuoso. Let me thank you!"

Those aspects of Stadler's artistry — the pearly tone, the range of human emotion he could channel — proved an ideal fit for Mozart's music. 

After composing his quintet and trio for Stadler in the late 1780s, Mozart returned to the clarinet for his concerto — the final major work he would complete before his death in December 1791. Although Mozart was struggling financially and his health slowly deteriorating, his concerto offers us nothing but peace and serenity — especially in the slow movement, which I've always considered the heart and soul of the work.

Over a bed of softly swaying strings, the clarinet sings a gentle serenade whose beauty lies in its profound sense of simplicity. Soloist and orchestra trade a pair of sighing, melancholic melodies back and forth as if in communal prayer, their sense of longing amplified by the warm, velvety orchestral textures Mozart conjures.

The clarinet takes on a mercurial character as the movement develops. Here the soloist delivers long, elegantly spun phrases and playfully plunges through the instrument's nearly three-octave range, only to reverse course and soar once again in its silvery soprano register, all with the grace and agility of a butterfly.

And as the music achieves ever-grander heights of lushness, an enchanting transformation occurs. The orchestra falls silent, and the soloist delivers a brief monologue, perfumed with wonder, that seamlessly returns us to the movement's opening melody, where the clarinet reveals one of its most captivating qualities: the ability to sing in a true whisper. More than three decades after first hearing this piece, this moment never fails to give me goosebumps.

My performance career lasted just over a decade, roughly the amount of time since I last played the clarinet. And while I don't miss sanding reeds, dealing with leaky pads, or drilling scales that always left my fingers in knots, I do miss tapping into that voice — the one that sustained me for years when I struggled to express myself. In those moments, I turn to Mozart's tender concerto and bask in the clarinet's capacity for sustained melody, its woodsy timbre, and its uncanny ability to mimic the human voice.

This music also invites me to reflect on those many years spent practicing the concerto, and how my approach to the work changed over time — from a high school freshman just trying to nail down the notes, to a 30-something freelancer developing new ideas for singing its glorious phrases at my final orchestral audition. Now, at 45 years old, I recognize how Mozart's concerto hasn't just served as a benchmark for my development as a classical musician, but as a writer. By connecting me to my past, this serenade of serenity reminds me how far I've come in developing my voice — first through music, and now through words. 

That ideal future I longed for as a young musician, in which I could share my voice with the world, is now a reality made manifest with every sentence I write in service to all of you who are here seeking calm, connection, and healing in your lives. Words never fail me now. Instead, they flow freely — each one infused with joy, with tenderness, with love.

Take a listen …

Jon Manasse, clarinet
Seattle Symphony
Gerard Schwarz, conductor

There was no doubt which recording of Mozart's concerto I would share with you here. It had to be one of the teachers who unlocked my deep love for the clarinet: Jon Manasse, whom I had the honor to study with at the Eastman School of Music. The beauty of his smooth, bell-like sound immediately captivated me when our lessons began in 1998, and I hope it does the same for you today.

---

Want to share your experience with Mozart's serenade of serenity? I'd love to hear about it! Leave a comment below or reply to this email. (And if you enjoyed your time here today, would you ever so kindly tap that little heart below? 👇🏼)

Thank you for reading Shades of Blue! 

This newsletter is free, but paid subscribers help support the 20+ hours of research, writing, editing, and production that goes into every essay. If you look forward to reading Shades of Blue when it arrives in your inbox, please consider becoming a paid subscriber …

Or if you'd like to buy me a coffee as a token of thanks for this article, you can make a one-time donation to support this newsletter: