How a priceless instrument was lost to the world after a night of drinking

Nicole van Bruggen owns one of Australia’s rarest and most historically significant instruments, partly invented by Mozart. Her basset clarinet is only 20 years old.

“It is a copy of the exact basset clarinet built by Theodore Lotz in Vienna and played by Anton Stadler, Mozart’s favorite clarinetist,” explains Sydney-born van Bruggen.

Only two pieces were composed specifically for basset clarinet, both by Mozart: his Clarinet Concerto and his Clarinet Quintet in A major.

Van Bruggen, who is performing a program featuring the clarinet quintet with the Australian Romantic & Classical Orchestra, likes to quote an 18th-century music critic who first saw the basset clarinet.

“The reviewer said it had a bulbous section sticking out to the side that could be used for a whistle.”

So why didn’t Mozart write more works for the instrument he helped create?

This is where the Mozart Magic Mystery Tour begins.

There was only one basset clarinet that Lotz made for Stadler, “but Stadler lost it,” says van Bruggen, as if it were normal to misplace a priceless instrument. “There was no prototype. No other contemporary composer could write music for it because the instrument didn’t exist.”

For nearly two centuries, Mozart’s clarinet compositions were never heard the way he intended, despite efforts by some instrument makers to reinvent the basset clarinet.