I. Allegro vivace
II. Andante cantabile
III. Minuetto: allegretto; trio
IV. Finale: allegro molto
Hearing the _andante_, the _minuet_, and the wonderful _finale_, one no
longer questions the famous and subtle saying of Rossini. When asked who
was the greatest composer, he answered “Beethoven”; he then said, “But
Mozart is the only one.”
Let the first movement pass with its second theme that reminds one of
charming music in _The Marriage of Figaro_. The _andante_ could have
been written only by Mozart. There is spiritualized sensuousness; there
is perfect form, exquisite proportion, and euphony.
Has there not too much been said about the marvelous display of science
in the construction of the _finale_? The wonder of it is that the
display does not impress the hearer unduly. To him it is merely gay and
charming music. It ravishes his ear without his taking interest in the
technical devices, even if he could recognize and understand them. If
the title should be “Symphony in C major with the Fugue,” the word
“fugue” would not fill his soul with dismal foreboding. There has been
only one Mozart, as there has been only one Handel.
It is not known who gave the title “Jupiter” to the symphony. There is
nothing in the music that reminds one of Jupiter Tonans, Jupiter
Fulgurator, Jupiter Pluvius; or of the god who, assuming various
disguises, came down to earth, where by his adventures with women
semi-divine or mortals of common clay he excited the jealous rage of
Juno. The music is not of an Olympian mood. It is intensely human in its
loveliness and its gayety.
* * *
It is possible that the “_Jupiter_” symphony was performed at the
concert given by Mozart in Leipsic. The two that preceded the great
three were composed in 1783 and 1786. The latter of the two (D major)
was performed at Prague with extraordinary success. Publishers were not
slow in publishing Mozart’s compositions, even if they were as
conspicuous niggards as Joseph II himself. The two symphonies played at
Leipsic were probably of the three composed in 1788, but this is only a
conjecture.
Some say the title “Jupiter” was applied to the symphony by J. B.
Cramer, to express his admiration for the loftiness of ideas and
nobility of treatment. Some maintain that the triplets in the first
measure suggest the thunderbolts of Jove. Some think that the “calm,
godlike beauty” of the music compelled the title. Others are satisfied
with the belief that the title was given to the symphony as it might be
to any masterpiece or any impressively beautiful or strong or big thing.
To them “Jupiter” expresses the power and brilliance of the work.
The eulogies pronounced on this symphony are familiar to all—from
Schumann’s “There are things in the world about which nothing can be
said, as Mozart’s C major symphony with the fugue, much of Shakespeare,
and pages of Beethoven,” to Bülow’s “I call Brahms’ First symphony the
Tenth, not because it should be placed after the Ninth: I should put it
between the Second and the _Eroica_, just as I think the first not the
symphony of Beethoven but the one composed by Mozart and known by the
name of ‘Jupiter.’” But there were decriers early in the nineteenth
century. Thus Hans Georg Nägeli (1773-1836) attacked this symphony
bitterly on account of its well-defined and long-lined melody, “which
Mozart mingled and confounded with a free instrumental play of ideas,
and his very wealth of fancy and emotional gifts led to a sort of
fermentation in the whole province of art, and caused it to retrograde
rather than to advance.” He found fault with certain harmonic
progressions which he characterized as trivial. He allowed the composer
originality and a certain power of combination, but he found him without
style, often shallow and confused. He ascribed these qualities to the
personal qualities of the man himself: “He was too hasty, when not too
frivolous, and he wrote as he himself was.” Nägeli was not the last to
judge a work according to the alleged morality or immorality of the
maker.
Mozart wrote his three greatest symphonies in 1788. The one in E flat is
dated June 26; the one in G minor, July 25; the one in C major with the
_fugue-finale_, August 10.
His other works of that year are of little importance with the exception
of a piano concerto in D major which he played at the coronation
festivities of Leopold II at Frankfort in 1790. Why is this? 1787 was
the year of _Don Giovanni_; 1790, the year of _Cosi fan tutte_. Was
Mozart, as some say, exhausted by the feat of producing three symphonies
in such a short time? Or was there some reason for discouragement and
consequent idleness?
The Ritter Gluck, composer to the Emperor Joseph II, died November 15,
1787, and thus resigned his position with a salary of 2,000 florins.
Mozart was appointed his successor, but the thrifty Joseph cut down the
salary to 800 florins. And Mozart at this time was sadly in need of
money, as his letters show. In a letter of June, 1788, he tells of his
new lodgings, where he could have better air, a garden, quiet. In
another, dated June 27, he says: “I have done more work in the ten days
that I have lived here than in two months in my other lodgings, and I
should be much better here, were it not for dismal thoughts that often
come to me. I must drive them resolutely away; for I am living
comfortably, pleasantly, and cheaply.” We know that he borrowed from
Puchberg, a merchant with whom he became acquainted at a Masonic lodge,
for the letter with Puchberg’s memorandum of the amount is in the
collection edited by Nohl.
Mozart could not reasonably expect help from the Emperor. The composer
of _Don Giovanni_ and the “_Jupiter_” symphony was unfortunate in his
emperors.
The Emperor Joseph was in the habit of getting up at five o’clock; he
dined on boiled bacon at 3.15 P.M.; he preferred water as a beverage,
but would drink a glass of Tokay; he was continually putting chocolate
drops from his waistcoat pocket into his mouth; he gave gold coins to
the poor; he was unwilling to sit for his portrait; he had remarkably
fine teeth; he disliked sycophantic fuss; he patronized the English, who
introduced horse-racing; and Michael Kelly, who tells us many things,
says that Joseph was “passionately fond of music and a most excellent
and accurate judge of it.” We know that he did not like the music of
Mozart.
Joseph commanded from his composer Mozart no opera, cantata, symphony,
or piece of chamber music, although he was paying him 800 florins a
year. He did order dances, for the dwellers in Vienna were dancing mad.
Kelly, who knew Mozart and sang in the first performance of _Le Nozze di
Figaro_ in 1786, says in his memoirs (written by Theodore Hook): “The
ridotto rooms, where the masquerade took place, were in the palace; and,
spacious and commodious as they were, they were actually crammed with
masqueraders. I never saw or indeed heard of any suite of rooms where
elegance and convenience were more considered, for the propensity of the
Vienna ladies for dancing and going to carnival masquerades was so
determined that nothing was permitted to interfere with their enjoyment
of their favorite amusement.... The ladies of Vienna are particularly
celebrated for their grace and movements in waltzing, of which they
never tire. For my own part, I thought waltzing from ten at night until
seven in the morning a continual whirligig, most tiresome to the eye and
ear, to say nothing of any worse consequences.”[39] Mozart wrote for
these dances, as did Haydn, Hummel, Beethoven.
We know little or nothing concerning the first years of the three
symphonies. Gerber’s “_Lexicon der Tonkünstler_” (1790) speaks
appreciatively of him: the erroneous statement is made that the Emperor
fixed his salary in 1788 at 6,000 florins; the varied ariettas for piano
are praised especially; but there is no mention whatever of any
symphony.
The enlarged edition of Gerber’s work (1813) contains an extended notice
of Mozart’s last years, and we find in the summing up of his career: “If
one knew only one of his noble symphonies, as the overpoweringly great,
fiery, perfect, pathetic, sublime symphony in C.” And this reference is
undoubtedly to the “_Jupiter_” the one in C major.
Mozart gave a concert at Leipsic in May, 1789. The programme was made up
wholly of pieces by him, and among them were two symphonies in
manuscript. At a rehearsal for this concert Mozart took the first
_allegro_ of a symphony at a very fast pace, so that the orchestra soon
was unable to keep up with him. He stopped the players and began again
at the same speed, and he stamped the time so furiously that his steel
shoe buckle flew into pieces. He laughed, and, as the players still
dragged, he began the _allegro_ a third time. The musicians, by this
time exasperated, played to suit him. Mozart afterwards said to some who
wondered at his conduct, because he had on other occasions protested
against undue speed: “It was not caprice on my part. I saw that the
majority of the players were well along in years. They would have
dragged everything beyond endurance if I had not set fire to them and
made them angry, so that out of sheer spite they did their best.” Later
in the rehearsal he praised the orchestra, and said that it was
unnecessary for it to rehearse the accompaniment to the pianoforte
concerto: “The parts are correct, you play well, and so do I.” This
concert, by the way, was poorly attended, and half of those who were
present had received free tickets from Mozart, who was generous in such
matters.
Mozart also gave a concert of his own works at Frankfort, October 14,
1790. Symphonies were played in Vienna in 1788, but they were by Haydn;
and one by Mozart was played in 1791. In 1792 a symphony by Mozart was
played at Hamburg.
The early programmes, even when they have been preserved, seldom
determine the date of a first performance. It was the custom to print:
“_Symphonie von Wranitsky_,” “_Sinfonie von Mozart_,” “_Sinfonia di
Haydn_.” Furthermore, it should be remembered that _Sinfonie_ was then a
term often applied to any work in three or more movements written for
strings, or strings and wind instruments.