The finale of Mozart’s Sonata No. 6 in D major, K. 284, presents a theme followed by twelve variations. A simple melodic outline becomes the basis for running figures, displaced accents, changing registers, a minor-key variation, and an extensively ornamented slow section. Rather than keeping one texture throughout, the music repeatedly changes which hand supplies the movement and how the melody is surrounded. The last variation changes to three beats per measure and leads into an extended ending.

Theme and early variations: The theme begins with a short pickup and a plainly shaped melody over broken-chord accompaniment. Both halves repeat. Variation I keeps the upper line moving in eighth notes, while Variation II passes short, decorated sixteenth-note figures between the hands. Variation III builds a more continuous upper stream; Variation IV shifts the running notes into the left hand beneath a more sustained upper part.

Middle variations: Repeated upper notes, lower thirds and chords, and exchanges between the hands change the balance of the texture. Variation VI places pairs of quick notes off the beat above widely separated bass positions, including crossings of register. Variation VII turns to D minor, bringing dotted melodic gestures and trills over repeated lower chords. The return to D major in Variation VIII introduces paired notes, stronger chords, and clearly marked detached articulation.

Later variations: Overlapping dotted figures give Variation IX a distinct rhythmic profile. Variation X then uses rapidly alternating octave positions, first in the upper part and later in the lower part, with other notes sustained around the moving line. The theme and these first ten variations retain the repeated two-part structure.

Adagio and final variation: Variation XI slows the pace and greatly expands the decoration of the melody. Small-note flourishes, trills, and chromatic runs appear above a steadier accompaniment; its elaborated returns are written out. Variation XII restores a quick Allegro pace in three-beat meter. The melody rides over active lower figures, and an extended coda adds chromatic chords, register changes, and running passages before the final detached chord.

Interesting fact: The finale changes meter for its last variation. After the common-time theme and preceding variations, the final Allegro’s three-beat measures give the familiar material a different rhythmic shape.