1777-1779.
THE GREAT PARISIAN ARTISTIC JOURNEY.
Disgusted With Salzburg--In Vienna Again--Salzburg Society--Character
of Musicians in the Last Century--Jerome Colloredo, Archbishop
of Salzburg--Mozart’s Letter to Him--The Father’s Solicitude for
His Son--Paternal Advice--New Compositions--Incidents of his
Journey--Meets With Opposition--Secret Enemies--His Ambition to
Elevate the Character of the German Opera--Disappointments--His
Description of German “Free City” Life--Meeting With Stein--In His
Uncle’s Family--“Baesle”--Meeting With the Cannabichs--Attachment
for Rosa Cannabich--Influence of this Attachment on His Music--The
Weber Family--The _Non so d’onde viene_--Circumstances of its
Composition.
In a letter written in the year 1776, Wolfgang complained to Father
Martini, of Bologna, that he was living in a city in which musicians
met with little success; that the theater there had no persons of good
ability, because persons of good ability wished good pay; and he adds:
“Generosity is a fault of which we cannot be accused.” He informs the
reverend father that he was engaged writing Church music and chamber
music, but that the pieces had to be always very short, because such
was the desire of the archbishop, and he closes thus: “Alas, that we
are so far away from you, dearest master. Were we nearer to each other,
how much I would have to say to you.”
It is easy to see that the young _maestro_ felt impelled to go where he
might breathe a freer air, and prove by his deeds the power that was in
him. As early as in the summer of 1773, the father and son were again
together in Vienna, but not even the shrewdness of the father, with all
his experience, could devise any way to the success he desired there,
and Wolfgang himself wrote from Munich to his mother that she should
not wish for their immediate return, for she knew well enough how much
he needed a breathing spell, and he says: “We shall be soon enough with
----.”
They lived at home, father, son and daughter, a happy family in their
own narrow circle. They had, we are glad to say, some true and trusted
friends with whom they employed the little leisure which they could
afford to take, in the parlor games customary at the time, and other
simple pleasures. And this leisure was small indeed, for they had to
try to make both ends meet by writing musical compositions and giving
instruction in music. The father’s salary amounted to only forty
marks, and the son’s to only twenty-five marks a month. No wonder he
wrote: “generosity is not our fault.” But their sense of refinement
was offended yet more by the rude manner and the coarse tone prevalent
in the place. The Salzburgian was looked upon as a fool, and the merry
Andrews of Vienna mimicked his dialect. The mode of life and the
views of the higher and lower “noblesse” were of a nature still less
agreeable and refined. Mozart, who much preferred even the manners
of the “boorish Bavarians,” as they were then universally called, to
that of the Salzburg nobility, relates, in his letters, how one of the
latter expressed so much surprise and crossed himself so frequently at
the Munich opera, that they were greatly ashamed of him.
It is notorious that Mozart’s real colleagues, the musicians, had
a well-merited reputation during the last century, as “drunkards,
gamesters and dissipated, good-for-nothing fellows.” This was one of
the reasons which inspired him with so great a hatred for Salzburg.
“No decent man,” he writes, “could live in such company.” He was
ashamed of them, and of the coarse and dissolute music of the court.
Michael Haydn himself, Joseph Haydn’s brother, a very clever composer,
was not free from at least one of these vices. There was no one in
Salzburg but knew Haydn’s little drinking room in the _Stiftskeller_
(monastery wine-cellar). On one occasion, when the organist of one of
the city churches, drunk on the organ-seat, was struck with apoplexy,
Wolfgang’s father wrote to him asking him to divine who had been
appointed his successor. And he proceeds: “Herr Haydn--all laughed.
He is, indeed, an expensive organist. He drinks a quart of wine after
every part of the mass. He sends Lipp (another organist) to attend the
other services--another man,” he adds forcibly enough, “who wants a
drink.”
How now could it be said that here, in his own real province, the young
artist found a reward worthy of his fiery spirit and of his already
tested powers?
We have heard himself complain of the theatre, the parlor, and the
orchestra. A wandering troupe performed in the theatre during the
winter. The court-concerts were limited to, at most, an hour, during
which several pieces had to be performed. Masses, even the most solemn,
were not allowed to be longer than three-quarters of an hour. Moreover,
the orchestra was a small one, without as much as even a clarionet.
That, notwithstanding all this; that thus confined and narrowed, and
with means thus limited, Mozart was able to produce works such as we
possess in his masses, symphonies, and chamber music--works which far
surpass those of his contemporaries, and find a worthy place by the
side of the music of the same kind by Joseph Haydn, is a triumph which
bears eloquent testimony to his industry and genius. But he could
never be satisfied in Salzburg. That same genius urged him out into a
purer atmosphere, in which action such as he was capable of, becomes
possible, in which he might come in contact with men of culture. His
resolve was made. The world was before him, and he said to himself: Go
forth!
But in his way stood, bold and dark, the “---- ----” to whom they
had, as Mozart writes, returned soon enough, the “Mufti,” as he
called the man “with the keen glance from his grey eyes, the left
of which was scarcely ever entirely open, and the rigid lines about
the mouth”--Archbishop Jerome Colloredo. This man really could not
appreciate how much he possessed in Mozart. “Let them only ask the
archbishop, he will put them immediately on the right path,” Wolfgang
writes, on one occasion, referring to him concerning a concert which
had met with unusual success in Mannheim. The principal cause of
complaint, however, was the archbishop’s niggardliness. He was thus
rigorous with those in his employ, lest they should make any claims
upon him. Mozart wrote, at a later period: “I did not venture on
contradiction, because I came straight from Salzburg, where the faculty
of contradiction has been lost by long abstinence from using it.”
Whatever he composed was wrong, found fault with, and unsparingly. On
one occasion, the archbishop had the face to tell Mozart that he did
not understand anything of his art, and that he should first go to the
Conservatory at Naples to learn something about music, and this to
Mozart, the Academician of Bologna and Verona, the far-famed composer
of operas! We are informed that he never flattered Mozart except when
he wanted something; and Leopold told Padre Martini that, otherwise,
the archbishop never paid Wolfgang a farthing for his compositions.
Suffering from the mania of the time, Jerome preferred the Italians in
matters of music, and had surrounded himself with Italian musicians.
The Mozarts were, in consequence, set back in every way and made the
victims of “persecution and contempt.” All the elements of variance
were here. A breach was inevitable; for on the one side were the
father and son, both very frank, clear-headed and witty; Wolfgang,
with something in him of the impetuosity of youth, conscious of his
power and of the opinion which the world had of him, a consciousness
which he took no trouble to conceal; on the other the archbishop, whose
peculiarity it was to allow himself to be impressed by persons of fine,
handsome figure, but not to respect little, insignificant-looking
people like the slender, twenty-year-old Mozart.
We have Mozart’s letter to the archbishop. It saw the light--being
found among the official papers of the archbishopric--just one hundred
years after it was written. It gives us a great deal of information
concerning a circumstance which had a great influence on Mozart’s life,
and which was finally the cause of the most decided catastrophes to
him. It shows us, at the same time, what was the entire tone of the
period, and especially of Salzburg subserviency. Mozart writes:
“TO HIS ILLUSTRIOUS GRACE, MOST REVEREND
PRINCE OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE:
_Most Gracious Liege-Lord and Herr Herr!_
I dare not trouble your illustrious grace with any minute description
of our pitiful circumstances. My father has most humbly, upon his
honor and conscience, and with all truth, called the attention of
your illustrious grace to those circumstances in his most humble
petition presented to your grace on the 14th of March of this
year. But as your illustrious grace’s most gracious and propitious
decision, which was hoped for, did not come to him, my father would
have most humbly begged your illustrious grace, as long ago as the
month of June, most graciously to allow us to make a journey of a few
months, to the end that we might in this way do something to help
ourselves in our necessity, were it not that your illustrious grace
most graciously ordered that all your grace’s musicians should keep
themselves in readiness for the occasion of his imperial majesty’s
[Joseph II] passage through your grace’s city. After this, my father
most humbly asked this same permission, but your illustrious grace
refused it to him, and most graciously expressed a conviction that
I, who am only half engaged in your grace’s service, might travel
alone. Our circumstances are those of urgent need. My father resolved
to send me on my way alone. But here also your illustrious grace
interposed some most gracious objections. Most gracious liege-lord
and _Herr Herr_, parents laboriously strive to put their children in
a position such that they may earn their own daily bread; and this is
a duty which they owe to themselves and to the state.
The more talents children have received from God, the greater are
their obligations to make use of those talents for the amelioration
of their own and their parents’ circumstances, to assist their
parents and to take heed for their own advancement and for the
future. The gospels teach us thus to put our talents out at interest.
I therefore, in conscience, owe it to God to be grateful to my father
who spends untiringly his every hour on my education; to lighten his
burthen; and to care for my sister; for it would pain me greatly if,
after spending so many hours at the piano, she should not be able to
turn what she has so laboriously learned to account.
Your illustrious grace will, therefore, most graciously allow me to
ask most humbly for my dismissal from your grace’s service, as I
am forced to make use of the month of September this fall which is
just beginning, so that I may not be exposed to the inclemency of
the severe weather of the cold months which follow so soon upon it.
Your illustrious grace will not take this most humble petition of
mine ungraciously, as your grace most graciously pronounced against
me three years ago, when I asked leave to travel to Vienna, told me
that I had nothing to hope for, and that I would do better to seek my
fortune in some other place. Most humbly do I thank your illustrious
grace for all the high favors I have received from your grace, and
with the flattering hope of being able to serve your illustrious
grace with greater approval when I shall have reached man’s estate, I
commend myself to the favor and grace of
Your most illustrious Grace,
My most gracious liege-lord and _Herr Herr_.
Most humbly and obediently,
WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART.
[_Addressed_]
TO HIS ILLUSTRIOUS GRACE
THE ARCHBISHOP OF SALZBURG, etc., etc.;
The most humble and obedient petition of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.”
It is no easy matter to imagine all that must have occurred before the
father resolved to permit his son to take a step which might possibly
cost himself both his position and his livelihood, but it may all be
very readily divined from the following passages in the Mozart letters.
The son writes: “I hope that you meet with less vexation now than when
I was in Salzburg, for I must confess that I was its sole cause.”
And again: “I was badly treated, I did not deserve it. You naturally
sympathized with me, but too much. That was the principal reason why I
hastened away from Salzburg.” And the father: “You are, indeed, right,
my dear son. I felt the greatest vexation at the contemptible treatment
which you received. It was that that preyed on my heart so, that kept
me from sleeping, that was ever in my thoughts, and which would have
surely ended by consuming me entirely.” And here follows an outburst
characteristic of the feelings of the Mozarts: “My dear son, when you
are happy, so am I, so is your mother, so is your sister, so are we
all. And that you will be happy I hope from God’s grace, and through
the confidence I place in your sensible behavior.”
And, indeed, this last was the only cause of solicitude the father had
when his son started on his journey. Not that he had any doubt as to
the young man’s character or goodness of heart. He had as much faith
in both as in the “superiority of his son’s talents.” What alarmed him
was Wolfgang’s want of experience. Wolfgang had never traveled alone.
And who had better opportunity to know the extent of this inexperience
than the faithful mentor who, as the son himself confesses, had always
served him like a friend, nay like a servant? The father’s utterances
here are full of beauty. They show us many a trait characteristic of
the whole life of the yet youthful but immortal prodigy of art.
The father writes: “You know, my son, that you will have to do
everything for yourself, and that you are not accustomed to get along
entirely without the help of others; that you are not very familiar
with the different kinds of coin, and that you have not the least idea
how to pack your things, or to do much else which must be done.” He
continues: “I would also remind you, that a young man, even if he had
dropped down from heaven and stood head and shoulders above all the
masters of art, will never get the consideration due him. To win this,
he must have reached a certain age, and so long as a person is under
twenty, enviers, enemies and persecutors will find matter for blame
in his youth, in the little importance attached to him and his small
experience.” And later: “My son, in all your affairs, you are hasty
and headlong. Your whole character has changed since your childhood
and boyhood years. As a child, you were rather serious than childish.
Now, as it seems to me, you are too quick to answer every one in a
jesting way at the very first provocation; and that is the first step
towards familiarity which one must avoid in this world, if he cares to
be respected. It is your good heart’s fault that you can see no defect
in the person who pays you a clever compliment, who professes esteem
for you and lauds you to the heavens, and that you take him into your
confidence and give him your love.”
Even if all this paternal chiding was provoked only by the one
special cause of which we shall soon have something to say, it is,
nevertheless, true that the father here touches upon some of Mozart’s
characteristic traits, especially his confiding goodness of heart,
his wit and jocoseness in everything, which were led into wrong
channels by the quickness of his mind. The parting of father and son
was heart-rending indeed. We are sure that the words in which Leopold
Mozart describes his feelings, when Wolfgang, in company with his
mother, started out on his travels in September, 1777, came from the
very bottom of a father’s heart. “After you had gone,” he writes,
“I went, very tired, up the steps and threw myself in a chair. I
tried hard to restrain myself on the occasion of our leave-taking,
that I might not make our separation still more painful, and in my
excitement I forgot to give my son a father’s blessing. I ran to the
window and begged a blessing upon both of you, but I did not see you
go out through the gate, and we could not but think that you had
already passed it, because I sat there a long time without thinking of
anything.” Nannerl cried so much that she was taken sick, and it was
evening before either she or her father had so far recovered from the
shock as to be able to distract themselves by attending to some little
home duties, and enjoying what remained to them of domestic bliss.
“Thus did this sad day pass--a sadder day than I believed life could
ever bring me,” says the father, in his account of it, when answering
the first letter he received from his son after his departure.
Wolfgang himself was very cheerful. He was out again in the bracing
atmosphere of freedom. His confidence in human nature, the result of
inexperience, hid from his eyes the thorns of life which were destined
henceforth to sting him till he died. Trusting in his talents and his
good will, he thought that his pathway would be strewn with roses. His
father, in a somewhat gloomy excess of zeal writes him: “Cling to God,
I beg you; you must do it, my dear son, for men are all knaves.”...
“The older you get and the more you have to do with men, the more will
you learn this bitter truth. Think only of the many promises, all the
sycophancy and the hundred other things we have met with, and then draw
your own conclusions as to how much you can build on human aid.” All
Salzburg wondered and revolted at the course pursued by the archbishop,
for young Mozart got his dismissal immediately and in a very unkind and
ungracious way. The father, indeed, was allowed to retain his position,
but the dissatisfaction of the court at the loss was very great, for
strangers found nothing to admire but Wolfgang. One of the cathedral
canons afterwards admitted this to Mozart himself, and the steward of
the household, Count Firmian, who was very fond of Mozart, gives the
following account of a conversation overheard by him while waiting on
the court:
“We have now one musician less. Your illustrious grace has lost a great
performer.”
“How so?”
“He is the greatest piano-player I ever heard in my life. As a
violinist he served your illustrious grace exceedingly well, and he was
besides a very good composer.”
The archbishop was silent.
All this was a rich source of satisfaction to Wolfgang, but it did
not lessen his father’s cares. The preparations for his journey
were of course very carefully made, even in the minutest details,
especially in what related to his compositions, that he might “be able
to show what he could do in everything:” in concertos for the piano
and violin, sonatas, airs and ensemble pieces of the most various
kind. The sonatas for the piano alone--as we would remark here to the
lovers of music--known as Nos. 279-284 in L. Kœchel’s “_Chron. themat.
Verzeichniss_,” are, as to their form, perfectly full of beauty, and
the matter of them frequently interests us by the distinctness of its
almost speaking pictures of life. More significant and important yet
is the sonata in C major. Its _Andante cantabile_, in F major (3/4),
is a dramatic scene which, although on a small scale, clearly bespoke
the hand of the future composer of _Figaro_ and _Don Giovanni_. And
the variations with which the sonata in A major (6/8) begins were
hardly equaled by Beethoven in his Op. 26. The trio in the minuet, on
the other hand, was a full scene from life, taken from the Carnival to
which the closing _Alla Turca_ alludes. Compared with these youthful
works of Mozart--for they belong to the end of the year 1770--what are
the sonatas of Ph. E. Bach, and even of Joseph Haydn?
The travelers had also, with the assistance of the father, made every
other preparation for their journey. The boot-tree or stretcher, even,
which was, at the time, a necessary part of a traveler’s outfit, was
not forgotten. And yet their first stopping-place was near enough. The
father had once before knocked at the doors of Munich. Now the son went
to seek his fortune by calling personally on the good-hearted elector.
We can here, of course, touch only on the principal incidents of
Mozart’s journey, on those which influenced his subsequent life, and
must refer the reader for more detailed information to his letters. We
find in them the clearest and most charming descriptions of his life.
They appeal to our deepest feelings; for they are addressed, almost
without exception, to the father. The father’s answers had to be very
explicit, for there was ample room for advice and timely precaution,
much to deter from or to make good again, as occasion required, and
not a little place for admonition. In every one of them, we find the
reflection of the solid worth of these two faithful souls, a worth
which was destined to find a really ideal and transfigured echo in
Mozart’s music. This journey had for effect the development of Mozart’s
inmost nature. It gave his artistic creations that sovereign and
catholic character for which they are so remarkable.
Wolfgang wrote some letters home, when he reached the first station. In
one of them we read: “We live like princes. There is nothing wanting
to complete our happiness but papa. But, please God, all will be well
with us.”... “I hope that papa will be cheerful and as well satisfied
as I am. I can put up very well with my lot. I am a second papa. I look
after everything. I have undertaken to pay the postillion, too, for I
can talk to the fellows better than mamma can. Papa should take care
of his health, and remember that the mufti J. C. [Jerome Colloredo]
is a mean fellow, but that God is compassionate, merciful and kind.”
No sooner, however, had they reached their first stopping-place than
things began to wear a different aspect. Mozart received, indeed, a
warm reception. There was no lack of admiration for, or of recognition
of, his genius. But he met with no success. His receipts were small,
and employment hard to find. The innkeeper, Albert, of the sign of
the “Black Eagle” (the hotel Detzer of the present), received them.
Albert was known as the “learned host,” and took no small interest in
art. Mozart first called on the manager of the theatre, count Seeau.
He thought that if he had only one more opera, all would be well with
him. He next visited the bishop of Chiemsee, to whom he owed it that he
had the opportunity to compose the _Verstellte Gaertnerin_. Everybody
knew of his arrival, and advised him to go direct to the elector, who
was a patron of the fine arts, and esteemed Mozart himself very highly.
But many days did not pass before Wolfgang discovered that the bishop
had had a private conversation at table, in Nymphenburg, from which he
gathered that he could accomplish very little in Munich. The bishop
said: “It is too soon yet. He must go; he must take a trip to Italy
and become famous. I refuse him nothing; but it is too soon yet.” The
father was right; the want of good will hides itself too frequently
behind the mask of “youth and too little experience.” And yet, we
must ask, who was so much more celebrated than this young _Cavaliere
filarmonico_? The electoress, too, shrugged her shoulders, but promised
to do her best.
Mozart, however, insisted on going to Nymphenburg. The elector wanted
to bear mass just before going to hunt. Mozart thus dramatizes the
scene in one of his letters:
“With your electoral highness’s permission, I would fain most humbly
cast myself at your highness’s feet and offer my services to your
highness.”
“Well, have you left Salzburg for good?”
“Yes, for good, your electoral highness.”
“But why for good? Have you quarreled?”
“Well, please your electoral highness, I only asked leave to take a
trip. This was refused me, and hence I was compelled to take this step,
although I had long contemplated leaving, for Salzburg is no place for
me.”
“My God, and you a young man!”
“I have been in Italy three times. I have written three operas, am a
member of the Academy of Bologna, and have been obliged to undergo an
examination on which many a master has been obliged to work and to
sweat over for four or five hours. I got through it in an hour. This
may prove to your highness that I am able to be of service at any
court. My only wish is to serve your electoral highness, who is himself
a great....”
“Yes, my dear child, but I am sorry to say that there is not a place
vacant. If there was only a vacancy.”
“I assure your highness that I would certainly do honor to Munich.”
“Well, it’s of no use to talk that way, there’s not a place vacant.”
We have here given the whole dialogue. It is a typical example of the
way in which princes and magnates treated Mozart through the whole of
his short life. There never was “a vacancy” for him. Real genius finds
no place to lay its head. It would seem as if its god-given nature were
fated to find nothing earthly to cling to.
But, to continue. Spite of this positive declaration, Mozart was not
deterred from trying it again at court, and this spite of the fact
that his father had written to him that the elector could not create a
new place without any more ado, and that, besides, there were always
secret enemies in such cases, who prevented a thing of that kind out
of anxiety to save their own skin. Yet friends, true and false, found
means to flatter him. First of all, there was count Seeau, who had a
pecuniary interest in the theater, and understood what advantage a
fertile mind like that of Mozart might be to him. He knew how to amuse
Mozart, whom, on the occasion of the performance of his first opera,
he saw to be all fire and flame, with fair hopes: Mozart was to write
a German opera of the heroic kind, and this appealed powerfully to
his patriotic feelings. He himself next stirred up his own friends.
A number of those interested in him, it was proposed, should club
together, and enable him, by a regular monthly contribution, to remain
in Munich until he had written such a work, and thus obtained a
foothold. Seeau had, indeed, expressed himself to the effect that he
would like to retain Mozart, if he had only “a little assistance from
home.” Mozart wanted to pledge himself to write four German operas a
year, partly comic and partly serious, and estimated that his profits
from them would be at least eight hundred and fifty marks, or about two
hundred dollars; that count Seeau would give at least five hundred, and
would be always invited--and how much there was to be gained here! And
he adds: “I am very much liked here even now; but how popular I should
be if I could only elevate the German opera! and this I certainly would
be able to do, for I felt the greatest desire to write when I heard the
German vaudeville.”
“Wolfgang’s first castles in the air!” the father must have said to
himself when he read these lines. The “learned host” who had taken
the matter of contributions in hand with honest zeal and with a true
interest in young Mozart, could not find so many as ten persons to give
a trifle over a ducat a month to aid in the good cause. Yet it must be
remembered that the German national taste for art was fast awakening
together with the freedom of German national, intellectual life--the
result of many causes, but especially of the deeds and exploits of Old
Fritz (Frederick the Great); and, that a German national opera was
among the ideals both of princes and artists--at least of those of them
who shared in the broader and nobler thought of the period. We shall
have something to say on this point further on.
Thus are we able to understand Wolfgang’s warm attachment for the
German opera--and, indeed, had not the prima donna Kaiser “drawn many
and many a tear from him”--as well as his arduous endeavor to obtain
a firm and permanent foothold in Munich. But Wolfgang’s success as a
virtuoso made the father believe in him completely, and inspired him
with confidence, spite of this first want of success. The son writes:
“At the very last, I played my own _cassation_ in B major. Every one
wondered. I played as if I were the greatest fiddler in Europe.” To
which the father answered: “You don’t know yourself, my son, how well
you play the violin when you only do yourself justice and care to play
with heart and spirit, just as if you were the first violinist in
Europe.” A _cassation_ is a piece of music in the form of Beethoven’s
septett, but intended for a solo-instrument, and especially for
serenades.
But he was doomed to disappointment. To see how the father watched over
the credit of his son who, in his first endeavors to attain success,
had fallen into a condition of dependence entirely unworthy of him,
and thus become a laughing-stock for the archbishop; and how the son
excused his inconsiderate and inordinate zeal by pleading his passion
for the opera, we must consult the letters of both. Wolfgang, with his
characteristic amiability, says: “I speak from my heart, and just as
I feel. If papa convinces me that I am in the wrong, I shall submit,
however reluctantly; for I am out of myself the moment I even hear an
opera spoken of.”
They left Munich on the 11th of October, 1777--that is, a full
fortnight after their arrival. The father reminds them that neither
“fair words, compliments nor _bravissimos_ pay the postmaster or
the host.” “Do all you can to earn some money, and be as careful as
possible about your expenses. The object of your journey is, and must
be, either to obtain employment or to earn money.” This last, however,
was not their object in the rich and free imperial city of Augsburg,
whither they first directed their steps, because it was their father’s
birthplace. They received a warm welcome there from the father’s
brother, like Wolfgang’s grandfather, a book-binder. Mozart’s playing
and composition, as well as himself, here as everywhere else, met with
the greatest recognition, both in public and private, but he did not
succeed in giving a concert. The “patricians” were not in funds. And
when the Protestant patricians invited them to their boorish academy
(to the _vornehmen Bauernstub Akademie_), the total amount of the
present made was--two ducats. “I’m very sure,” the father says, “they
would scarcely have gotten me into their beggarly academy;” and, we may
add: “The prophet is without honor in his own country.”
But he has erected the best possible monument to those Gothamites, so
foolishly proud of their old imperial-city denizenship. In Mozart’s
letters to his father, we get an exquisitely faithful picture of “free
city” life and “free city” men, with the exaggerated self-consciousness
and self-satisfaction of inherited possession and honor, so frequently
met with in them that even mere youths seemed almost in their dotage.
One cannot but grow merry at the expense of that narrow little world.
“His grace,” the chamberlain to the exchequer of the town, Herr von
Langenmantel the “my lords,” his sons, and his “gracious” young wife,
fare all the worse under the lash of the Mozart’s well-known “wicked
tongue,” because Mozart might reasonably have hoped to find a becoming
welcome in his father’s birthplace. Even the golden spur given Mozart
by Pope Ganganelli did more to charm these “free citizens” than it did
to remind them of the honors so young an artist had already won, and
that he was, in consequence, the peer of any one of them. One officer
of the imperial army, especially, who ignored this fact, was very
properly snubbed, and taught the lesson that Mozart was not to be made
sport of. We read in one of the father’s letters, “Whenever I thought
of your journey to Augsburg, I could not help thinking of Wieland’s
Abderites; a man should get an opportunity to see _in natura_ what in
reading he considers a pure ideal.” But Mozart had here the best of
opportunities to pursue those studies which the artist needs, in order
to paint from life. We are reminded of his experiences, like those in
Augsburg, by the brutal, self-destructive, ridiculous haughtiness of
Osmin in the “Elopement from the Seraglio.”
Mozart’s meeting with the celebrated piano manufacturer Stein, to whom
he left it to guess who he was, was a very cheerful meeting, and the
manner of it such as Mozart delighted in. He again characterizes as
“bad” the playing of Stein’s eight-year-old little girl, afterwards
Frau Streicher, who played so honorable and womanly a part in
Beethoven’s life. His intercourse with his uncle’s family, in which
the presence of his niece, (_das Baesle_), a young girl of eighteen,
served somewhat to exercise his affections, and was the occasion,
afterwards, of a series of jocose letters between them. He writes:
“I can assure you, that, were it not that it holds a clever uncle and
aunt and a charming ‘Baesle,’ I should regret exceedingly having come
to Augsburg.” “Baesle” and he seemed made for one another, he thought;
“for,” as he said, “she, too, has a little badness in her. The two of
us banter the people, and we have very amusing times.”
Their separation was of such a nature that the father had the “sad
parting of the two persons, melting into tears, Wolfgang and Baesle,”
painted on a panel in their room. All else concerning this sojourn in
Augsburg must be looked for in the letters themselves, where the reader
will find some exquisite genre painting.
“How I like Mannheim? As well as I can like any place where ‘Baesle’ is
not,” we soon hear him answer; for Mannheim, the home of the elector,
Karl Theodore, who was as fond of reveling as he was of art, was the
next nearest destination our travelers had in view in order to attain
Wolfgang’s main object. True, he did not attain his object here either,
but he had there that first genuine heart-experience which helped to
mature his character as much as his mind was already developed beyond
his years.
His next meeting was with the electoral _Capellmeister_, Cannabich, who
knew him when he (Mozart) was a child. He was “extraordinarily polite,”
but the orchestra stared at him. As he writes: “They think that because
I am so little and young, I have not much that is great in me; but they
will soon see.” And the mother, soon after: “You cannot imagine how
highly Wolfgang is esteemed here, both by musicians and others. They
all say that he has no equal. They fairly deify his compositions.” And
yet, so far, he had composed nothing here that could be called really
great, no opera; and to write one was the chief reason why Mozart
protracted his stay in Mannheim so long. Karl Theodore was, above all,
the promoter and protector of those who endeavored to create a German
national operatic stage, and his orchestra, under the leadership of
Cannabich, was so exquisitely good that it and old Fritz’s tactics were
considered the most significant and noteworthy phenomena in Europe at
the time. Moreover, the elector was very affable with his musicians,
who were everywhere looked upon as “decent people”--a complete contrast
with those of Salzburg.
The pleasure-seeking tone of the court had, indeed, invaded the middle
classes of society, also; but what did Mozart’s pure heart know of
that? On the contrary, he was destined to find, even in voluptuous
Mannheim, a love as beautiful as it was pure.
His heart was now completely open to that irresistible impulse of
the human breast. Even when in Munich composing, his _Gaertnerin aus
Liebe_, he once said to his “dearest sister”: “I implore you, dearest
sister, do not forget your promise; that is, to make the visit, you
know, ... for I have my reasons. I beg of you to make my compliments
there, ... but most emphatically ... and most tenderly ... and ... O
... well, I should not trouble myself about it. I know my sister too
well; she is tenderness itself.” His trifling with “Baesle” had left no
impression on his heart of hearts. She was both in mind and culture too
much of the _bourgeoise_, too immature to captivate him. His jocose
correspondence with her affords sufficient proof of this. But now we
see that Cupid himself directed his pencil.
Young Mozart next informs us of the merry times he had at the houses of
the musicians of a city, in which, as a writer of the times says, “the
ladies,” were beautiful, sweet and charming. We soon find him again,
“as usual,” at Cannabich’s, for supper. Of an evening of this kind,
spent there, he writes: “I, John Chrysostome Amadeus Wolfgang Sigismund
Mozart, plead guilty, that, day before yesterday and yesterday, as I
have done frequently, I did not come home until midnight, and that
from ten o’clock, in the presence and society of Cannabich, his wife
and daughter, of Messrs. Ramm and Lang [two members of the orchestra],
I have made rhymes, and not of the most exalted nature, in words and
thoughts but not in deeds. I would not have acted in so godless a way
were it not that Lisel had excited me to it, and I must confess that
I found real pleasure in it.” On one occasion, at the house of the
flute-player, Wendling, he was in such excellent humor, and played so
well, that when he had finished, he had to kiss the ladies. He tells
us that, in the case of the daughter, he found this a very easy and
pleasant task. She had been the elector’s sweetheart, and, as Schubart
says, in his _Aesthetik der Tonkunst_, the “greatest beauty in the
orchestra.”
But Rosa Cannabich “a very sweet and beautiful girl,” as he writes of
her himself, fettered him with the complete irresistibleness of her
innocent charms more than could even this blooming flower. And this
was the beginning of those sweet love-songs which now flowed in pure
tones from his poet-heart; and, hence, this event marks a period in
our artist’s life. He writes, shortly after his arrival in Mannheim:
“She plays the piano very sweetly, and to make him (the father) a fast
friend, I am writing a sonata for mademoiselle, his daughter.” When
the first _allegro_ was finished, a young musician asked him how he
intended to write the _andante_. “I shall fashion it after mademoiselle
Rosa’s character,” he answered; and he informs us further: “When I
played it, it gave extraordinary satisfaction. It is even so. The
_andante_ is just like her.”
What was she like? A painter subsequently wrote of her thus: “How
many such beautiful, priceless hours did heaven grant me in sweet
intercourse with Rosa Cannabich. Her memory is an Eden to my heart;”
and Wolfgang now wrote of her that, for her age, she was a girl of
much mind, and of demure and serious disposition, one who said little,
but that little in an affable, nay, charming manner. In Naples stands
Psyche, a rose just opening. Mozart possessed the same refined, antique
feeling for the soul-statue of man. Here, before his clear-seeing
artist eye, the bud that in it lay was fully blown. This fruitful
heart-life was destined soon to sow deeper germs in his own soul, and
to cause his own art to bloom fully forth.
Here, accordingly, we discover one of those turning points in the
development of Mozart’s inner nature, which had much to do with his
intellectual growth, inasmuch as his passion disclosed to him for the
first time the meaning of the homely truth, that both life and art are
serious things. We proceed to show how this effect was produced.
The court had heard him in the very first week of his stay in
Mannheim. “You play incomparably well,” said the elector to him.
Shortly after Mozart spoke to the elector as “his good friend,” and
the latter began: “I have heard that you wrote an opera in Munich.”
“Yes, your highness,” Mozart replied, “I commend myself as your grace’s
obedient servant. My highest wish is to write an opera I beg your
highness not to forget me quite I know German also, and may God be
praised and thanked for it.” “That is not at all impossible,” answered
his most serene highness, and so Mozart made his arrangements for a
longer sojourn in Mannheim. He took some pupils, and as we saw when
speaking of the pretty Rosa Cannabich, he wrote sonatas, or variations
for them. For this he needed a copyist But copying was, as he once
complained to his father, very dear in Mannheim, and he was, therefore,
overjoyed, copying being to himself a real torment, after a while--it
was at the beginning of 1778--to find a man who performed that task for
him, in consideration of his instructing his daughter in music.
This man was Fridolin von Weber, brother of the father of C. M. von
Weber, and at that time, a prompter and a copyist in the Mannheim
theater. The daughter’s name was Aloysia, later the celebrated singer,
Madame Lange.
The family had seen better days, but the father’s passion for the stage
had led him into these straits, where he had for years to support
a family of six children on an annual salary of three hundred and
fifty marks. But he made such good use of his knowledge of music that
his second daughter, who was at this time--she was in her fifteenth
year--an excellent singer, cooperated with him at the theater, and thus
doubled her father’s salary. Mozart as a musician felt at home in the
family--for the eldest daughter, Josepha became afterwards Frau Hofer,
for whom the “Queen of the Night” in the _Magic Flute_ was written--and
so the sympathy of his good heart was soon awakened. “She needs nothing
but action, and then she will make a good prima donna on any stage.
Her father is a thoroughly honorable son of our German fatherland. He
brings his children up well, and that is the very cause why the girl
is persecuted here.” Thus did he sum up the chief points in this
affair in the first news he sent home. Subsequently he wrote _a propos_
of a performance at the house of the princess of Orange: “I may pass
over her singing with a single word--it was superb!” And at the close
of his letter: “I have the inexpressible pleasure to have formed the
acquaintance of thoroughly honest and really Christian people. I only
regret that I did not know them long ago.”
This tells the whole story. He henceforth devoted nearly all his
leisure to the family, rehearsed with the young vocalist all her
arias, procured her opportunities to have her music heard, and had the
satisfaction to know that Raaff himself, the most celebrated tenor in
Mannheim, and even in Germany, declared that she sang not like a pupil,
but like an adept in the vocal art.
One incident here deserves to be specially mentioned, for it had a
decided, far-reaching and direct influence on Mozart’s action, and on
his development as an artist. He had set about writing an aria for
the great tenor already mentioned, in order to win him over for his
contemplated opera. “But,” he writes, with the utmost frankness, “the
beginning of it seemed to me too high for Raaff, and I liked it too
well to change it. I therefore resolved to write the aria for Miss
Weber. I laid it aside, and resolved on other words for Raaff. But to
no purpose. I found it impossible to write. The first aria haunted my
mind and would not away, and then I decided to write it out to suit
Miss Weber exactly.”
What was the import of those words which he selected simply because an
air to the same words, composed by the London Bach, had pleased him so
much and kept forever ringing in his ears, and because he wanted to try
whether, spite of everything, he was not able to write an aria entirely
unlike Bach’s? What were the words?
A king orders a youth who has made an attempt upon his life to be
led to execution. But when he sees the young culprit, he immediately
exclaims: “What is this strange power that agitates and moves me? His
face, his eye, his voice! My heart palpitates; every fibre of my body
quivers! Through all my feelings I look for the cause of this strange
effect, and cannot find it. What is it, O God, what is it that I
feel?” And hereupon follows that very aria, _Non so d’onde viene_:
“I know not whence this tender feeling. Mere pity cannot produce a
change so sudden!” Was not this the condition of Mozart’s own heart?
He imagined that pity, and pity only, for the condition of the Weber
family, and, at most, an interest in the “beautiful, pure voice,”
and wonder at the combination of so much ability with such extreme
youth, bound his heart to their home; but it was not that; it was the
undivined depths which the first feeling of love opens before us; the
wonder, the charm, the trembling, glowing exultation, the heart-felt,
floating, exquisite bliss which with a longing foreboding discovers
us to ourselves for the first time, and which, in the throes of our
heart of hearts, seems to give a new birth to every drop of blood in
our veins. In such a state, we may imagine, it was that he sang this:
_Non so d’onde viene_--not as a musician, not as an artist, but urged
thereto by that powerful, irresistible impulse of the heart which, in
the last instance, begets in us all our truest life. And as Pygmalion,
in a fit of such fiery ardor, moved the marble so Mozart melted
in this first fire of the fullest and most human of feelings, the
elemental substances of all music, and gave it what it hitherto had
possessed only in isolated cases and accidentally, an impression full
of soul, a meaning to its every tone.
It is hard to find before Mozart, except it be in national melodies,
anything of this living, animated, thoroughly personal expression of
feeling, such as we possess in this _Non so d’onde viene_. It is like
Aloysia’s picture itself. Here we find a language plainer and more
universally intelligible than words. It charms and enchants us; looks
us in the face; speaks to us with an expression as if we alone were
addressed. This is the highest, the very highest effect of art, and
this the time when it becomes a second, an ideal, a transfigured life.
The language which Mozart thus acquired for his art, he never forgot or
dropped. He embellished it, amplified it, deepened it, until he reached
that expression of the soul in which, like the melody in the _Magic
Flute_, the soul itself stands face to face with its Creator, and in
the calmness of its bliss, feels that it is “the image of God,” and His
portion forever.
We here close the account of Mozart’s inner awakening. We may now
compare with his first heart-trials his first intellectual exploits,
the very beginning of which was this aria, _Non so d’onde viene_, to
write which he was inspired by his love for Aloysia Weber.