This release brings together Mozart’s four flute quartets — K.285, K.285a, K.285b, and K.298 — alongside Hoffmeister’s own arrangement for flute quartet of the Piano Sonata K.311. The programme traces the works’ scattered origins, from the 1777–78 Mannheim commission from flute-loving amateur Ferdinand Dejean through to Mozart’s later Vienna years, including K.298’s playful finale built on a popular Paisiello aria and a French street tune.

Anna Besson, founding member of A Nocte Temporis alongside Reinoud Van Mechelen, brings a personal thread to the recording: she first played these quartets at fifteen, on a Nile riverboat cruise, and returns to them here twenty years later. Joined by violinist Louis Créac’h, violist Manuela Bucher, and cellist Ronan Kernoa, the ensemble makes the case — as Besson puts it — that Mozart’s famous reluctance about writing for flute never once compromised his invention.

Anna Besson – flute
Louis Créac’h – violin
Manuela Bucher – viola
Ronan Kernoa – cello
A Nocte Temporis – early music ensemble