Mozart’s Symphony No. 35 ’Haffner’ by Bernard Haitink and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

Multi-award-winning conductor Bernard Haitink leads the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in the Concertgebouw Amsterdam. They perform Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Haffner Symphony. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed the Symphony No. 35 in D major, K. 385, known as the Haffner Symphony, in 1782. As early as 1776 he had been commissioned to compose a serenade for the wedding of the Salzburg bridal couple Franz Xaver Späth and Maria Elisabeth Haffner, the daughter of Salzburg’s mayor Sigmund Haffner. The Haffner Serenade is Mozart’s most extensive serenade (KV 250) and has eight movements. Six years later, he was to compose another serenade on the occasion of the award of the title of nobility “Edler von Innbachhausen“ to Sigmund Haffner Junior. Mozart arranged it as a symphony by omitting the movements 2 to 4 or 5 of the serenade composed for Haffner’s wedding, thus creating an independent work. Bernard Haitink began his conducting career with Netherlands Radio: he became chief conductor of the Netherlands Radio Phi