musicians there having died, the Archbishop Hieronymus offered their
posts to the Mozarts, father and son, at a salary of a thousand
florins for the two. The father anxiously entreated his son to return
and accept this offer, mentioning as a further bait, that Aloysia
Weber would probably be engaged to sing in Salzburg. Much as Wolfgang
hated Salzburg, or rather the people living there, his love for his
father and sister prevailed over his aversion; and though with no
pleasure at all in the prospect of seeing the hateful archbishop
again, he set out from Paris, travelling to Salzburg in very leisurely
fashion via Strasbourg, Mannheim, and Munich. At Strasbourg he was
induced to give several concerts, but they were not pecuniary
successes, and he did not make by any one more than three louis d'or.
But how the artist peeps out in every line of the letters in which he
describes these! After saying how few were present, and how cold it
was, he proceeds: "But I soon warmed myself, to show the Strasbourg
gentlemen how little I cared, and played to them a long time for my
own amusement, giving a concerto more than I had promised, and at the
close extemporizing. It is now over, but at all events I gained honor
and fame."
At Munich a great shock awaited him. He visited the Webers, and being
in mourning for his mother, wore, after the French fashion, a red coat
with black buttons. When he appeared, Aloysia hardly seemed to
recognize him, and her coldness was so marked, that Mozart quietly
seated himself at the piano, and sang in a loud voice, "Ich lass das
Maedchen gern das mich nicht will" (I gladly give up the girl who
slights me). It was all over, and he had to bear the loss of the
fickle girl as best he might. There is a significant line in one of
his letters at this time to his father: "In my whole life I never
wrote worse than I do to-day, but I really am unfit for anything; my
heart is so full of tears." After two years' absence he returned home
to Salzburg, where he was warmly welcomed back. Here he remained for a
little while, and wrote his first serious opera, "Idomeneo," to the
text of an Abbe Varesco, a Salzburger. This opera Beethoven thought
the finest of all that Mozart wrote. It was brought out at Munich in
January, 1781, and was brilliantly successful. In the March following,
an order was received from the archbishop to follow him to Vienna,
where he wished to appear with all the full pomp and brilliant retinue
of a prince of the church; and as one of this retinue Mozart had to
follow him, little thinking at the time that he should never return to
Salzburg, but that Vienna henceforth was to be his home.
In Vienna he found that he had to live in the archbishop's house, and
was looked upon there as one of the ordinary servants. He says, "We
dine at eleven o'clock in the forenoon, unluckily rather too early an
hour for me. Our party consists of the two valets, the comptroller,
Herr Zetti, the confectioner, the two cooks, Cecarilli, Brunetti (two
singers), and my insignificant self. N. B.--The two valets sit at the
head of the table. I have, at all events, the honor to be placed above
the cooks; I almost believe I am back to Salzburg."
Mozart was a true gentleman, with no foolish false pride, but with the
honorable self-respect that every gentleman must possess, and it was
very galling to him to have to suffer such odious treatment from the
mean-spirited archbishop. Indeed, it was only for his father's sake
that he submitted to the continued contumely and petty slights to
which the archbishop delighted in subjecting him. At last the open
rupture came. The archbishop called him a knave and dissolute fellow,
and told him to be off; and when Mozart waited upon Count Arco, the
principal official, to obtain the regular dismissal that was
necessary, the fellow poured abuse upon him, and actually kicked him
out of the room. Poor Mozart was in a state of violent excitement
after this outrage, and for some days was so ill that he could not
continue his ordinary work. But now at least he was free, and though
his father, like a timid, prudent old man, bewailed the loss of the
stipend which his son had been receiving, Mozart himself knew that the
release was entirely for the best.
In 1782 appeared "Die Entfuehrung aus dem Serail," his first really
important opera, full of beautiful airs, which at once became
enormously popular with the Viennese. The Emperor Joseph II. knew very
little about music, but, as frequently happens in such cases,
considered that he possessed prodigious taste. On hearing it he said,
"Much too fine for our ears, dear Mozart; and what a quantity of
notes!"
The bold reply to this was, "Just as many notes as are necessary,
your Majesty."
Much of the delight which Mozart felt in the success of the opera
arose from the fact that it enabled him seriously to contemplate
marriage. Aloysia Weber had been faithless to him, but there was
another sister--with no special beauty save that of bright eyes, a
comely figure, and a cheerful, amiable disposition--Constanze, whom he
now hoped to make his wife. His father objected to all of the Weber
family, and there was some difficulty in obtaining the paternal
consent; but at last the marriage took place, on August 4, 1782. How
truly he loved his wife from first to last, his letters abundantly
show; her frequent illnesses were afterward a great and almost
constant source of expense to him, but he never ceased to write to her
with the passionate ardor of a young lover. He says: "I found that I
never prayed so fervently, or confessed so piously, as by her side;
she felt the same." And now for some time everything went smoothly in
the modest little menage in Vienna. Mozart had plenty of lessons to
give, but none of the commissions for operas which he would have
wished.
Passing over a visit to Leipsic--where he studied with the keenest
delight a number of the unpublished works of the great Sebastian
Bach--and to Berlin, he returned to Vienna, and at once set to work
upon some quartets which the King of Prussia had ordered from him.
"Cosi fan tutte," a comic opera, with the beautifully flowing music
that only Mozart could write, but with a stupid plot that has
prevented its frequent repetition in later times; and the glorious
"Zauberfloete," written to assist a theatrical manager, Schikaneder,
were his next works. At this time a strange melancholy began to show
itself in his letters--it may be that already his overwrought brain
was conscious that the end was not far distant. Such lines as these,
pathetic and sad in their simple and almost childlike expression,
occur in a letter he wrote during a short absence from his wife, at
Frankfort, in 1790: "I am as happy as a child at the thought of
returning to you. If people could see into my heart I should almost
feel ashamed--all there is cold, cold as ice. Were you with me, I
should possibly take more pleasure in the kindness of those I meet
here, but all seems to me so empty." On his return to Vienna pecuniary
want was rather pressingly felt; his silver plate had to be pawned,
and a perfidious friend, Stadler, made away with the tickets, and the
silver was never redeemed. On one occasion Joseph Deiner, the landlord
of the "Silberne Schlange," chanced to call upon him, and was
surprised to find Mozart and his wife Constanze dancing round the
room. The laughing explanation was that they had no firewood in the
house, and so were trying to warm themselves with dancing. Deiner at
once offered to send in firewood, Mozart promising to pay as soon as
he could.
That grand work, the "Zauberfloete," had just been completed when a
strange commission was given him. One day a tall, haggard-looking man,
dressed in gray, with a very sombre expression of countenance, called
upon Mozart, bringing with him an anonymous letter. This letter
contained an inquiry as to the sum for which he would write a mass for
the dead, and in how short a time this could be completed. Mozart
consulted his wife, and the sum of fifty ducats was mentioned. The
stranger departed, and soon returned with the money, promising Mozart
a further sum on completion, and also mentioned that he might as well
spare the trouble of finding out who had given this commission, for it
would be entirely useless. We now know that the commission had really
been given by Count Walsegg, a foolish nobleman, whose wife had died,
and who wanted, by transcribing Mozart's score, to pass it off as his
own composition--and this he actually did after the composer's death.
Poor Mozart, in the weak state of health in which he now was, with
nerves unstrung and over-excited brain, was strangely impressed by
this visit, and soon the fancy took firm possession of him that the
messenger had arrived with a mandate from the unseen world, and that
the "Requiem" he was to write was for himself. Not the less did he
ardently set to work on it. Hardly, however, was it commenced than he
was compelled to write another opera, "La Clemenza di Tito," for which
a commission had been given him by the Bohemian Estates, for
production on the occasion of the Emperor Leopold's coronation in
their capital. This was accomplished in the short space of eighteen
days, and though it does not contain the best music, yet the overture
and several of the numbers are full of a piquant beauty and liveliness
well suiting the festival of a people's rejoicing. But a far greater
work, the "Zauberfloete," was produced in Vienna shortly afterward. It
did not take very well at first, but subsequent performances went
better.
[Illustration: Mozart Singing his Requiem.]
His labors in bringing out the "Zauberfloete" over, Mozart returned to
the "Requiem" he had already commenced, but while writing he often had
to sink back in his chair, being seized with short swoons. Too plainly
was his strength exhausted, but he persisted in his solemn work. One
bright November morning he was walking with Constanze in the Prater,
and sadly pointing out to her the falling leaves, and speaking of
death, with tears in his eyes, he added; "I well know I am writing
this 'Requiem' for myself. My own feelings tell me that I shall not
last long. No doubt some one has given me poison--I cannot get rid of
this thought." With these gloomy fancies haunting his mind, he rapidly
grew worse, and soon could not leave his room. The performances of the
"Zauberfloete" were still going on, and extraordinarily successful. He
took the greatest interest in hearing of them, and at night would take
out his watch and note the time--"Now the first act is over, now is
the time for the great Queen of Night." The day before his death he
said to his wife, "Oh, that I could only once more hear my 'Flauto
Magico!'" humming, in scarcely audible voice, the lively bird-catcher
song. The same day, at two o'clock in the afternoon, he called his
friends together, and asked for the score of his nearly completed
"Requiem" to be laid on his bed. Benedict Schack sang the soprano; his
brother-in-law, Hofer, the tenor; Gerl, the bass; and Mozart himself
took the alto in a weak but delicately clear voice. They had got
through the various parts till they came to the "Lacrymosa," when
Mozart burst into tears, and laid the score aside. The next day
(Sunday), he was worse, and said to Sophie, his sister-in-law, "I have
the taste of death on my tongue, I smell the grave, and who can
comfort my Constanze, if you don't stay here?" In her account of his
last moments, she says: "I found Suessmayer sitting by Mozart's bed.
The well-known 'Requiem' was lying on the coverlet, and Mozart was
explaining to Suessmayer the mode in which he wished him to complete
it after his death. He further requested his wife to keep his death
secret until she had informed Albrechtsberger of it, 'for the
situation of assistant organist at the Stephen Church ought to be his
before God and the world.' The doctor came and ordered cold
applications on Mozart's burning head.... The last movement of his
lips was an endeavor to indicate where the kettledrums should be used
in the 'Requiem.' I think I still hear the sound."
HAYDN
By C. E. BOURNE
(1732-1809)
[Illustration: Haydn.]
No composer has ever given greater or purer pleasure by his
compositions than is given by "papa" Haydn; there is an unceasing flow
of cheerfulness and lively tone in his music, even in the most solemn
pieces, as in his Masses, the predominant feeling is that of gladness;
as he once said to Carpani: "At the thought of God my heart leaps for
joy, and I cannot help my music doing the same." But it is not alone
as the writer of graceful and beautiful music that Haydn has a claim
on our remembrance; he has been truly called the "father of the
symphony." Mozart once said: "It was from Haydn that I first learned
the true way to compose quartettes;" and "The Creation," which must
ever be counted one of the masterpieces of oratorio music, was his
work.
His family were of the people, his father being a master wheelwright
at Rohrau, a small Austrian village on the borders of Lower Austria
and Hungary and his mother having been employed as a cook in the
castle of Count Harrach, the principal lord of the district. Joseph
Haydn was born on March 31, 1732 the second child of his parents; and
as ten brothers and sisters afterward came into the world, it can
easily be understood that his lot was not a very luxurious one. His
parents were simple, honest people of the laboring class, very
ignorant, but, like most German peasants, with a certain love for and
facility in music, not quite so common in this country. Haydn's father
had a good voice, and could sing well, accompanying himself on the
harp, though he did not know a single note of written music. Then
there was the village schoolmaster, who could actually play the
violin, and whom little Joseph watched with wondering eyes, extracting
those marvellously sweet sounds from his wooden instrument, until,
with the child's spirit of imitation, as his parents sang their
"Volkslieder," the little fellow, perched on a stone bench, gravely
handled two pieces of wood of his own as if they were bow and fiddle,
keeping exact time, and flourishing the bow in the approved fashion of
the schoolmaster. From this very little incident came an important
change in his life; for a relation, Johann Mathias Frankh, of
Hainburg, happened to be present on one occasion, and, thinking he saw
an aptitude for music in the boy, offered to take him into his own
school at Hainburg, where accordingly young Haydn went at the age of
six years.
There he remained for two years, making rapid progress in singing and
in playing all sorts of instruments, among others the clavier, violin,
organ, and drum. He said afterward, with the unaffected piety, far
removed from cant, that was characteristic of him: "Almighty God, to
whom I render thanks for all his unnumbered mercies, gave me such
facility in music that, by the time I was six years old, I stood up
like a man and sang masses in the church choir, and could play a
little on the clavier and violin." Of Frankh, a very strict, but
thorough and most painstaking teacher, he also said afterward: "I
shall be grateful to that man as long as I live for keeping me so hard
at work, though I used to get more flogging than food;" and in Haydn's
will he remembered Frankh's family, leaving his daughter a sum of
money and a portrait of Frankh himself, "my first instructor in
music."
For some years he seems to have lived a miserable, struggling life,
giving lessons, playing the organ in churches, and studying when and
where he could. He had a few pupils at the moderate remuneration of
two florins a month, and he had contrived to obtain possession of an
old worm-eaten clavier, on which he used diligently to practise in the
garret in the Kohlmarkt, where he lived. A pitiable description is
given of the lodging he then occupied. It was on the sixth story, in a
room without stove or window. In winter his breath froze on his thin
coverlet, and the water, that in the morning he had to fetch himself
from the spring for washing, was frequently changed into a lump of ice
before his arrival in that elevated region. Life was indeed hard; but
he was constantly at work, and, having made a precious "find" on an
old bookstall one day of Fux's "Gradus ad Parnassum," in a very
dilapidated condition, but very cheap, he was ardently preparing
himself for the life--he now vowed should be his--of a composer.
About this time Haydn received a commission from Felix Kurz, a comic
actor of the Stadt-Theatre, to put a farce of his, "Der neue krumme
Teufel," to music. This farce, of which the words still remain, though
the music has been lost, was very successful, and was played in
Vienna, Prague, Berlin, and a number of other towns. The well-known
story of Haydn's "Tempest Music" is connected with this. In one part
of this piece a terrible storm was supposed to be raging, and the
accompanying music must of course be suitably descriptive; but the
difficulty was that Haydn had never seen the sea: therefore had not
the slightest notion of what a storm at sea was like. Kurz tries to
describe the waves running mountains high, the pitching and tossing,
the roll of thunder, and the howling of the wind; and Haydn produces
all sorts of ugly, jerky, and noisy music, but none of it is in the
remotest degree like a storm at sea, or anywhere else. At last, after
Kurz had become hoarse with his nautical disquisitions, and Haydn's
fingers were tired of scrambling all over the piano, the little
musician in a rage crashed his hands down on the two extremes of the
instrument, exclaiming: "Let's have done with this tempest!"
"Why, that's it; that's the very thing!" shouted the clown, jumping up
and embracing him; and with this crash and a run of semitones to the
centre of the piano this troublesome tempest was most satisfactorily
represented.
When, many years afterward, Haydn was crossing the Straits of Dover to
England, amid his sufferings he could not help laughing at the
ludicrous recollections of this early experience of his.
Things still went on improving, and Haydn, who was always lucky in the
patrons he secured (at least according to the notion about patrons
that then prevailed), was invited to the country-house of Herr von
Fuernberg, a wealthy amateur, to stay there and compose quartettes for
him--a style of music for which von Fuernberg had an especial liking.
To his prompting it is that we owe the lovely series of quartettes
which Haydn wrote--still as fresh and full of serene beauty as when
first tried over by the virtuosi of Weinzirl. The next piece of good
fortune was Haydn's appointment as director of the band and composer
to Count Ferdinand Morzin at Lukaver near Pilsen; and here, in 1759,
his first symphony was written. His salary was very small, only 200
florins a year (or L20), with board and lodgings; but on the strength
of it he unfortunately determined on the serious step of embarking in
matrimony. A barber, named Keller, is said to have been very kind to
him in the days of his poverty, and out of gratitude Haydn gave
music-lessons to his daughters. One of them, the youngest, was very
pretty, and Haydn fell in love with her. But she became a nun; and the
father then prevailed upon Haydn to marry the elder one, who was three
years older than he--a sour-tempered, bigoted, and abominably selfish
woman, who contributed little to the happiness of his life, and was
always bringing priests and friars to the house and worrying her
good-tempered husband to compose masses and other church music for
these men.
Count Morzin was compelled to give up his band in 1761; but Haydn did
not remain long without employment, as Prince Esterhazy, who had heard
his symphonies at Morzin's house, engaged him to assist Werner, his
Capellmeister. As director of Prince Esterhazy's band, Haydn was fated
to remain for many years living at Esterhaz, the prince's
country-seat, composing there nearly all his operas and songs, and
many of his symphonies.
In 1785 Haydn received a commission which showed the wide reputation
he had then gained. The Chapter of Cadiz Cathedral requested him to
write some instrumental music for performance on Good Friday. "The
Seven Words of our Saviour on the Cross" was in consequence written by
him.
Several invitations had been sent from England for Haydn to pay a
visit there; but it was only after Prince Esterhazy was dead that he
was prevailed on by Salomon to cross the sea. A characteristic
conversation between him and Mozart--which took place before he
undertook this, in those days, really formidable journey--is recorded.
"Papa," said Mozart, "you have no training for the great world, and
you speak too few languages."
Haydn replied: "My language is understood by all the world."
He set out on December 15, 1790, and did not return to Vienna till
July, 1792. In London, where he wrote and conducted a number of
symphonies for Salomon, he was the "lion" of the season, being in
constant request for conducting concerts and paying visits to the
nobility. Of these symphonies Salomon once said to him: "I am strongly
of opinion that you never will surpass this music."
"I never mean to try," was the answer.
But this must not be taken to mean that Haydn had given up striving
after the truest perfection in his art, and it probably meant no more
than that for the time he was satisfied with his work. Far more like
the genuine expression of the feeling of the great artist was his
utterance, just before he died, to Kalkbrenner: "I have only just
learned in my old age how to use the wind-instruments; and now that I
do understand them, I must leave the world."
[Illustration: Haydn Composing his "Creation."]
Great as the work accomplished in his youth and early manhood
unquestionably was, it remained for his old age to accomplish his
greatest work, and that by which he is best known--the oratorio of
"The Creation." It is said that the first ideas for this came to him
when, in crossing the English Channel, he encountered a terrific
storm. Soon after his leaving London, where the words had been given
him by Salomon, Haydn set about composing the music. "Never," he says,
"was I so pious as when composing 'The Creation.' I knelt down every
day and prayed God to strengthen me for my work." It was first
produced on March 31, 1799, his 67th birthday, at the National
Theatre, Vienna, and was at once accorded an extraordinary share of
popular favor. There is a pathetic story of the last performance of
the work, at which Haydn, in extreme old age, in 1808, was present,
when Salieri conducted. He was carried in an arm-chair into the hall,
and received there with the warmest greeting by the audience. At the
sublime passage, "And there was light!" Haydn, quite overcome, raised
his hand, pointing upward and saying, "It came from thence." Soon
after this his agitation increased so much that it was thought better
to take him home at the end of the first part. The people crowded
round him to take leave, and Beethoven is said to have reverently
kissed his hand and forehead. After composing "The Creation," Haydn
was prevailed upon to write another work, of somewhat similar
character, to words adapted from Thomson's poem, and entitled "The
Seasons." This, though containing some fine descriptive music and
several choruses of great beauty, is not at all equal to the earlier
work, though at the time its success was quite as complete. But the
exertion of writing two such great works, almost without rest between
them, was too great, and he himself said: "'The Seasons' gave me the
finishing stroke." The bombardment of Vienna by the French in 1809
greatly disturbed the poor old man. He still retained some of his old
humor, and during the thunder of the cannons called out to his
servants: "Children, don't be frightened; no harm can happen to you
while Haydn is by!" He was now no longer able to compose, and to his
last unfinished quartette he added a few bars of "Der Greis," as a
conclusion:
"Hin ist alle meine Kraft:
Alt und schwach bin ich.
--JOSEPH HAYDN."