Did you really believe that Mozart only composed 41 symphonies? Well, he didn't! And to prove it, please take a look at the programme here below.
You will discover that on October 15, 1939, leading the Vienna Philharmonic, it is said that Furtwängler conducted Symphony No. 47 by the Salzburger genius. A premiere, no doubt!
But it won't take you long — looking closely at the Köchel number and the key — to rectify what seems to be a brilliant typo. It is indeed the Symphony n° 39.
That said, the audience at the concert probably smiled. What about the conductor?
He probably paid no attention. Because every newspaper the next day informed us that he conducted... Haydn's 88th, not Mozart!
And as if that weren't enough, the journalist from the Illustrierte Kronen Zeitung of the 17th reported on the event that Furtwängler had superbly conducted the Symphony... “The Clock” (in fact the 101st)… and marvelled at the “tick-tock” he thought he recognized in the 4th movement. A “tick-tock” in the 88th? A parcel bomb perhaps?
The archives of the VPO were informed of this. When they checked the archived programme, they discovered a slip of paper in the booklet announcing the change of musical work. The VPO, as we did, updated its database.