Posthumous portrait of Mozart. By Barbara Krafft. 1819 • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS On March 17, 1781, Mozart wrote to his father. It was the only time he addressed Leopold in such an affectionate way:“My very dear friend! A certain excitement shines through in the letter. The young composer had just arrived in Vienna and entered the court of his employer, Archbishop Colloredo. This is not the first time that Mozart has come to the capital; he has already done it three times. Vienna, a new horizon He was then a child (at the age of 6, he played in front of the Empress Marie-Thérèse), then a promising teenager when he tried in vain to have his work La Fausse Ingénue performed. . Now 25, Mozart sees Vienna with different eyes. The city dazzled him with the width of its streets, the crowds of people, the profusion of its activities. It cannot be compared to the provincial and cramped atmosphere of Salzburg, his hometown, where his career as a musician began. The letters he subsequently addressed to his father abounded with new names:the Mesmer family, Baron Braun, Count Cobenzl, Countess von Rumbeke, the painter Rosa Hagenauer-Barducci... human contacts and opportunities. For the first time, Mozart feels understood (“Here everyone listens to the music in silence”) and thinks he is in his element. With a population of around 200,000 and citizens from all parts of the Empire, Vienna had a true cosmopolitan vocation. The city was a powerful magnet for a musician. All social classes took pleasure in listening to music and cultivated this pleasure as best they could. There was a plethora of concerts in private homes and in public places, in closed places as well as in the open air. The nobility commissioned compositions for their parties, and its members included many amateurs or enthusiasts seeking music teachers. The Italian style dominated opera, but other forms of musical theater were cultivated with a more popular character and in the German language, sometimes in the Viennese dialect. Obviously, such a demand led to a profusion of supply. No other place attracted musicians in search of fortune in such a way, so the competition was fierce. Teaching and composing Seduced by Vienna, Mozart showed a little more impatience every day with the attitude of his employer, Colloredo, the Archbishop of Salzburg. In 1781, tensions between the two men grew increasingly heated. Mozart complained about his low salary and the fact that his superiors treated him like a child; for his part, the archbishop was unwilling to put up with the arrogance of a subordinate. The rupture was consummated in June when, faced with yet another quarrel, the Count of Arco, chamberlain of Colloredo, kicked the composer out of the street. It is no longer possible to go back. From that day on, Mozart will lead a career as an independent musician, with all the risks that this decision entails. Working for the nobility was the main source of income for a musician without a stable job. The aristocratic houses hosted concerts in which Mozart took part with the double charge of pianist and composer. Teaching was another option. The offspring of the aristocracy and upper middle class generally devoted themselves to the study of an instrument. Mozart had several pupils, although he was never a teacher by vocation and saw in the educational activity only a financial income. Public concerts were often financed by a subscription:the musician published the announcement of the concert in a newspaper and those interested bought a participation, until the desired sum was reached. This system, however, had a high failure rate, as shown by some of the subscriptions launched by Mozart. Another source of income was selling compositions to music publishers, which were then booming, but the sums offered were usually modest. Overwhelmed by work Despite Mozart's optimism, the context was not simple. Moreover, as his father feared, the young musician had no sense of reality and was not able to establish relationships, to weave adequate social ties, and he lacked the initiative to impose himself on to more resourceful competitors. Mozart's early years in Vienna were, however, encouraging. As a pianist, without being a virtuoso, he was gifted, and his playing was expressive. His improvisational skills were prized and sought after. His compositions also enjoyed a good reputation. Admittedly, his work pace was stressful, as his letters reveal. He got up at 6 a.m. and dialed from 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. The rest of the morning was devoted to his lessons. In the afternoon, he resumed composing until 9 p.m., except on days when he had to play in concert. The money flowed in regularly, but was never enough. All his life, the musician was tormented by financial problems. Mozart had just married Constance Weber, and the children were born. But, undeniably, the musician led a standard of living far beyond his means. Spacious house, servants, clothes in the latest fashion were among the heaviest debits, recorded in the column of expenses. The couple even owned a carriage with horses. Such luxury can, however, be explained by the need to adapt to the wealthy aristocratic environment that the composer frequented for professional reasons. A musician among others His main objective was to rub shoulders with the Emperor Joseph II, a great music lover and patron of the arts, in order to obtain an important position or a stable job as a court musician. This last wish was never granted:Mozart only obtained a symbolic appointment as chamber musician, responsible for writing the dances for the court festivities. Nothing to do with the more prestigious position – and much better paid – of choirmaster, held by Antonio Salieri. Mozart obtained from the Emperor the commission of a Singspiel – an opera with spoken parts, a cousin of the French comic opera – for the Burgtheater, the city’s first theatre. Performed for the first time on July 16, 1782, The Abduction from the Seraglio was an important step in the slow process of conquering a place in the sun in the Viennese musical context. The opera was well received, even if the emperor's praises were tinged with less optimistic nuances:"Too pretty for our ears and too many notes, my dear Mozart. To which the musician replied in a burst of pride:“As many notes as it takes, Your Majesty. » “Too pretty for our ears and too many notes, my dear Mozart,” Emperor Joseph II told the composer after the performance of his first opera. The Emperor's words reflected a reality:Viennese audiences were never fully in tune with Mozart. His language was too dense for ears more receptive to the tender melodies of Paisiello or the sober classicism of Salieri. Too many notes, too much formal work, too much “substance”:everything that constitutes for us the greatness of his music was an obstacle for his contemporaries. Once the curiosity that had aroused his arrival subsided, Mozart was only one of the many musicians struggling to obtain recognition in Vienna. This was granted to him punctually, but he always lacked the decisive consecration. And day-to-day survival was getting harder and harder. The era of great operas The composer was welcomed with more enthusiasm outside the capital. The comic opera The Marriage of Figaro , presented for the first time at the Burgtheater on 1 st May 1786 without much success, had a triumph in Prague:"Because here, we only talk about Figaro , we only play, ring, sing, whistle Figaro writes the composer from the Czech city. The next opera, Don Giovanni , experienced a reverse course, but the result was identical. It was first given successfully in Prague, before having a more mixed reception in Vienna. Joseph II’s comment is once again revealing:“The opera is divine; maybe even more beautiful than Figaro , but this is not bread to put in the teeth of my Viennese. "Let's give them time to chew," Mozart replies. And there was plenty! The Marriage of Figaro , Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte – the latter was given at the Burgtheater on January 26, 1790 – form a trilogy considered to be the pinnacle of the history of opera. The way the music unveils the psychology of the characters and guides the rhythm of the drama is a lesson for future generations. In Vienna, Mozart discovered the work of two composers who would profoundly influence his music:Bach and Handel. Vienna also made it possible to meet people and form friendships that would positively mark Mozart's personal and artistic development. Shortly after arriving in the city, he made contact with Baron Gottfried Van Swieten, prefect of the court library, now the Austrian National Library. During his stay as ambassador in Berlin, Van Swieten compiled the scores of Johann Sebastian Bach and Georg Friedrich Handel, composers who had then sunk into oblivion. He brought them to Vienna, and you can listen to them at the concerts he organizes on Sundays at home. Mozart participates in these concerts as a musician and arranger. The discovery of Bach and Handel will leave a deep mark on his music. In Vienna is also Haydn, the living composer for whom Mozart will profess a great, if not mutual, admiration. Their first meeting dates perhaps from the end of the year 1783 or from 1784. Mozart expressed this adulation in a series of six string quartets – the Haydnian genre par excellence – which he published in 1785, preceded by a dedication obsequious in Italian for Haydn. Mention should also be made of Michael Puchberg, merchant and fellow Freemason, who helped Mozart on several occasions by lending him money. From 1788, when his financial situation became catastrophic, the composer turned to Puchberg to ask him for advances of money, in an increasingly dramatic tone. Requests intensify in the summer, when nobility and wealthy families – the musician's main sources of income – leave Vienna for their country residences. A flute tune that enchants Vienna The death of Joseph II in 1790 spelled the end for Mozart of his dream of one day being a court musician. His limited understanding of Mozart's art did not prevent the late ruler from showing interest in the musician. He supported the creation of his three great Italian operas, despite the controversial themes of Lorenzo Da Ponte's librettos:The Marriage of Figaro , inspired by the comedy of Beaumarchais, depicted a nobleman ridiculed by his servants. If Joseph II had in certain aspects the profile of an enlightened and reforming monarch, his successor Leopold II turned out to be much more conservative, and his interest in music was non-existent. Despite everything, in 1791, the horizon seemed to brighten for Mozart:Emanuel Schikaneder, a strange character who was at the same time impresario, actor and playwright, commissioned a Singspiel from him. . Mozart also begins to write The Magic Flute , one of his masterpieces, which he however had to interrupt to tackle a last-minute commission:the impresario Guardasoni had asked him for a serious opera as part of the festivities for the coronation of Leopold II which take place in Prague. The offer is attractive, but the delays are a real problem. Mozart accepts. It is said that he then composed La Clémence de Titus in less than 20 days (we know today that it took him longer, but it was nevertheless a feat). The icy reception reserved for this work – according to an undocumented testimony, the Empress Marie-Louise described it as “German filth” – was fairly quickly compensated by the warm applause garnered from the premiere of The Magic Flute September 30, 1791. This success will be the last joy of an already exhausted Mozart. The unfinished work In October, during a walk in the Prater, the large public park in Vienna, the composer burst into tears and confided to Constance that he feared that he was being poisoned. His paranoia has continued to grow since a person who refused to reveal his identity ordered him a requiem mass. The mysterious client, we will know later, was Count Franz von Walsegg, an aristocrat and dilettante musician, who wanted to pay homage to his late wife while presenting the work as his own composition, hence the need to conceal the circumstances of the order and the name of the real author. Either way, Mozart feels like he's writing a requiem for himself, and his physical decline is becoming more and more visible. The debacle takes place at the end of November:the composer's body is so swollen that he can no longer get out of bed. His hand stops on the eighth bar of the Lacrimosa; the rest of the Requiem will be completed by Süssmayr, his pupil. On December 5, Mozart dies in the early morning in his house in rue Rauhensteinasse, after a night of high fever. Due to the precarious financial conditions of the composer, Constance opts for a third-class burial, the cheapest. Very few people attend the funeral, which is celebrated in a hurry due to the rapid decomposition of the corpse. Mozart is buried in a mass grave in the Sankt Marx cemetery, a district located on the far outskirts of Vienna, but no one since then has managed to find the location Find out more Mozart. Complete match G Geffray (established by), Flammarion, 2011.Mozart, M Brion, Perrin, 2005. Timeline 1756 Wolfgang Mozart was born in Salzburg. His father, a violinist, directed him towards a musical career, when the child was only 3 years old.1781 In Vienna, Mozart left his employer, the Archbishop of Salzburg, preferring to make a living from his works, concerts and piano lessons.1784 He joined a Masonic lodge in Vienna and met eminent figures of local Freemasonry.1786 The Marriage of Figaro , the first of three operas that Mozart composed with the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, met with great success.1790 The ascent to the throne of Leopold II deprives Mozart of the little support that the imperial court had until then granted him.1791 Mozart dies of kidney failure shortly after the premiere of The Magic Flute and without having completed his Requiem . Music ''a Freemason Mozart joined Freemasonry in 1784 as a member of the "A la Charité" lodge, which later merged with the "Newly Crowned Hope" lodge. The composer quickly rose through the ranks of apprentice, journeyman and master. The key principles of the Masonic ideal were fraternity and individual virtue, understood as intimate adherence to the principles of reason and natural law. Many of Mozart's friends were part of the Masonic network:Puchberg, Stadler, Schikaneder and Van Swieten etc. Haydn too. Ignaz von Born, naturalist who inspired the character of Sarastro in The Magic Flute , a work heavily influenced by Masonic symbolism, was a major figure in Viennese Freemasonry. Strange Death Mozart's death, rumors of poisoning circulate, naming in particular and without the slightest foundation Antonio Salieri, of whom Mozart was supposed to be the rival in matters of music; posterity will feed calumny. There was also talk of revenge against the musician on the grounds that he would have revealed Freemason secrets in The Magic Flute . Nowadays, historians rule out the poisoning hypothesis. In the absence of conclusive data and relying on the symptoms described by relatives and friends, modern medicine instead attributes Mozart's death to kidney failure due to streptococcal infection.
