Lucy Vincent (oboe)
Richard Walthew (clarinet)
William Foote (bassoon)
John Denison (horn)
W. K. Stanton (pianoforte)
At the time Beethoven wrote this quintet (when he was in his middle twenties) he almost idolised Mozart, and there are strong traces of the latter's influence. In a performance of the work in which the composer took the piano part, he played a characteristic joke on the other performers. In the last movement, when the main tune was about to come round again, he intervened with a piano improvisation upon it that was not in the copies, keeping the others on tenterhooks, for they did not know when they should come in again and so made several false starts before Beethoven gave them a cue.