String Quartet No. 17 (Mozart)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's String Quartet No. 17 in B-flat major, K. 458, nicknamed "The Hunt", is the fourth of the quartets dedicated to Haydn. It was completed in 1784.^[1] It is in four movements:

1. Allegro vivace assai
2. Menuetto and Trio. Moderato
3. Adagio, in E-flat major
4. Allegro assai

Bars 1 to 5

Neither Mozart nor Artaria (the publisher) called this piece "The Hunt". "For Mozart's contemporaries, the first movement of K.458 evidently evoked the 'chasse' topic, the main components of which were a 6/8 time signature (sometimes featuring a strong upbeat) and triadic melodies based largely around tonic and dominant chords (doubtless stemming from the physical limitations of the actual hunting horns to notes of the harmonic series)."^[2] According to Irving, Mozart's first intention was to conclude with a polonaise and sketched 65 bars (p. 17).