The piece
Mozart entered Eine kleine Nachtmusik, a serenade for strings in G major, in his catalogue of works on 10 August 1787 in Vienna, while he was working on Don Giovanni; it was only published in 1827, after his death. The first movement opens with a signal played by the whole orchestra in unison, a G major chord climbing as an arpeggio, answered by a light phrase in the violins. This easy version, written for Noctave after the Breitkopf edition of 1883, takes its first seventeen bars.
In the first four bars, both hands play the same line an octave apart, like the strings together: place the rests carefully, they are part of the signal. Then the left hand holds a G in quarter notes while the right hand sings, and follows the cellos' line after that. At bar 11 the dynamic drops to piano and the right hand plays two held thirds: listen to them sound together. The eighths at the end should stay even, without speeding up towards the last chord.
