This lost composition by Mozart has not been heard for centuries. Now you can listen to it

A 12 minutes piece of music composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was discovered in a library in Germany. Researchers believe the composer wrote the previously unknown piece, called Serenade in C– when he was a young teenager.

The composition was hidden in Germany’s possessions Municipal Libraries of Leipzig– about 300 miles north of Salzburg, Austria, where Mozart was born in 1756. At the age of 5, he was a child prodigy who toured Europe performing for royals and aristocrats. As a teenager he built a reputation as a composer. He spent a few years in Salzburg and Vienna before moving to Italy in 1769.

Mozart probably wrote the recently discovered composition in the mid-1860s, according to a statement of the Leipzig Municipal Libraries. Library researchers were compiling an edition of the Köchel catalogue, an extensive archive of Mozart’s work, when they came across a mysterious bound manuscript containing a handwritten composition in brown ink.

WA Mozart – Serenata ex C – Eine ganz kleine Nachtmusik (Leipzig Première)

The composition is attributed to “Wo[l]failure Mozart.” However, the handwriting is not Mozart’s, which indicates that the manuscript is a copy of the original composition. Researchers think it was made around 1780.

Serenade in C consists of seven miniature movements for a string trio (two violins and a bass), according to a statement of the International Mozarteum Foundationa Salzburg-based non-profit organization dedicated to Mozart’s life and work. The attribution to “Wo[l]fgang Mozart” indicates that the piece dates from the composer’s youth, as he began regularly adding “Amadeo” to his name around 1769.

Researchers say the music fits stylistically with other works from the 1760s, when Mozart was between 10 and 13 years old. Ulrich Leisinger, head of research at the foundation, explains Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA) that the young composer was no longer making pieces that sounded like this by the time he was in his late teens.

In his early years, however, Mozart wrote many chamber music works Serenade in Cwhich his father included on a list of his son’s compositions. Many of these works were thought to be lost to history, as Leisinger says in the statement. Fortunately, this particular piece was saved – thanks to the composer’s sister.

“It seems that – thanks to a series of favorable circumstances – an entire string trio has survived in Leipzig,” adds Leisinger. “The source was apparently Mozart’s sister, and it is therefore tempting to think that she preserved the work as a memento of her brother. Perhaps he wrote the trio especially for her.”

By the time Mozart fell ill and died at the age of 35, he had composed more than 600 works. Under his most sustainable pieces are Requiem in D minorthe Jupiter Symphony and operas such as Don Giovanni And The Marriage of Figaro.

The newly discovered Serenade in C has been renamed All kinds of little night music in the Köchel catalog (presumably referring to Mozart’s famous serenade A little Night Music). On September 19, at the unveiling of the new catalog in Salzburg, a string trio played the rediscovered work.

The composition was performed again in front of a packed audience at the Opera Leipzig on September 21. According to DPAthree musicians replayed the piece outside the opera house, where eager crowds were waiting.