Ex. 8-3: Dans un bois solitaire

Composed in Mannheim, early 1778 (K.308/295b), to a poem by Antoine Houdar de La Motte. This is the companion piece to "Oiseaux, si tous les ans" (K.307) — both were written for Elisabeth Auguste Wendling during Mozart's extended stay in Mannheim. (Ex. 1-2: Oiseaux, si tous les ans by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart)

Mozart's letters to his father in Salzburg document the timeline. On 7 February 1778 he wrote: "I composed a French song for Mlle Gustl as soon as I arrived, with words she gave me. She sings it incomparably well. At the Wendlings' it is sung every day. They are absolutely mad about it." On 28 February he wrote: "I have also promised the daughter some more French ariettes. Today I started on one of them." This second arietta is believed to be "Dans un bois solitaire."

Mozart wrote these songs during a long job-hunting trip. In 1777 he had given up his post in Salzburg and set out with his mother to find work, heading for Paris. But he stayed about five months in Mannheim, drawn by its famous court orchestra — and by his love for the young soprano Aloysia Weber, whose sister Constanze he would later marry. His father, still in Salzburg and increasingly worried, finally exploded by letter, telling Mozart to move on to Paris at once: "Off with you to Paris! and that soon."

The poem tells a playful little story. A man walks in the woods and finds Cupid — the little god of love — asleep. His sigh wakes him, and the god is angry. As punishment, Cupid shoots him with an arrow and curses him to suffer in love forever, longing for a woman named Sylvie. Mozart sets it as a through-composed song: instead of repeating the same tune for every verse, the music — and its tempo — changes as the story moves on, almost like a tiny opera scene.

From the album Mozart: Lieder by Barbara Bonney and Geoffrey Parsons (1991)
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