The concerto is scored for solo horn and an orchestra of two oboes, two horns, and strings. This is one of two horn concerti of Mozart to omit bassoons.[1] It is also one of Mozart's two horn concerti to have ripieno horns (horns included in the orchestra besides the soloist), though in contrast to K. 495, the solo horn in this one does not duplicate the first ripieno horn's part in the tutti passages.[2]
Mozart's good-natured ribbing of his friend is evident in the manuscript inscription "W. A. Mozart took pity on Leitgeb, ass, ox and fool in Vienna on 27 May 1783."[3]
The finale of the concerto was used in various movies and TV shows such as Little Einsteins and JFK.
Given its duration (no more than 20 minutes), the Concerto is typically grouped with Mozart's other 3 for the instrument. The foremost example [5]isDennis Brain's November 1953 recording of the four horn concertos on EMI with The Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Herbert von Karajan.
^Martha Kingdon Ward, "Mozart and the Bassoon" Music & Letters30, 1 (1949): 9
^Ralph Leavis, "Mozart's Last Horn Concerto" Music & Letters34, 4 (1953): 316
^Andrew Steptoe, Mozart. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (1997): 94
^Jean-Pierre Marty, The Tempo Indications of Mozart. New Haven & London: Yale University Press (1988): 43. "The very absence of sixteenths is also an incentive towards overly fast tempos, and this is why the finales of the Horn Concertos K.386b, 417 and 447 are almost always performed faster than 88/264. Yet, the finale of K.417 ends with a coda marked Più allegro, and the finale of the fourth horn concerto (K.495), though very similar in style to the other three, is marked Allegro vivace."
