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String Quartet No. 19 in C major, K. 465 ('Dissonance')

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart · 1785

The last of six string quartets Mozart dedicated to Joseph Haydn in 1785, named for its unusual opening dissonance.

Mozart composed this quartet as the final piece in a set he personally dedicated to Joseph Haydn, whom he admired.

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Handwritten manuscript page of music on aged paper, with four staves of brown ink notation for strings labeled Violino, Viola, and Violoncello, headed Adagio and Quartetto VI, with Mozart's inscription at top right. Dense sketched notes and dynamic markings like cresc. and p fill the page.
Opening folio of Mozart's String Quartet in C major, K. 465 ('Dissonance'), 1785.

About this source

What it is

This string quartet by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was completed on 14 January 1785, the last of six quartets he dedicated to Joseph Haydn. Mozart and his father performed it along with two others for Haydn himself on 12 February 1785.

Why it matters

Unlike most of Mozart's works, these quartets were not commissioned by a patron, making them a personal project; Mozart called them his 'children' in his dedication to Haydn. The quartet's unusual opening harmonies puzzled early listeners and later gave the work its nickname, showing both Mozart's admiration for Haydn and his own harmonic daring.

Look closer

  • What does Mozart calling these quartets his 'children' suggest about how personally he valued them?
  • Why might unconventional harmonies in the opening have unsettled listeners used to simpler music?
  • What can the handwritten manuscript tell us about how carefully Mozart composed each of the four instrumental parts?

This document is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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