CHAPTER III

THE VIENNESE CLASSICS: HAYDN AND MOZART

Social aspects of the classic period; Vienna, its court and its people--Joseph Haydn--Haydn’s work; the symphony; the string quartet--Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart--Mozart’s style; Haydn and Mozart; the perfection of orchestral style--Mozart and the opera; the Requiem; the mission of Haydn and Mozart.

I

We have prefaced the last chapter with a review of the political and literary forces leading up to the classic period. A brief survey of social conditions may similarly aid the reader in supplying a background to the important characters of this period and the circumstances of their careers. First, we shall avail ourselves of the picturesque account given by George Henry Lewes in his ‘Life of Goethe.’ ‘Remember,’ he says, ‘that we are in the middle of the eighteenth century. The French Revolution is as yet only gathering its forces together; nearly twenty years must elapse before the storm breaks. The chasm between that time and our own is vast and deep. Every detail speaks of it. To begin with science--everywhere the torch of civilization--it is enough to say that chemistry did not then exist. Abundant materials, indeed, existed, but that which makes a science, viz., the power of _prevision_ based on _quantitative_ knowledge, was still absent; and alchemy maintained its place among the conflicting hypotheses of the day.... This age, so incredulous in religion, was credulous in science. In spite of all the labors of the encyclopedists, in spite of all the philosophic and religious “enlightenment,” in spite of Voltaire and La Mettrie, it was possible for Count St. Germain and Cagliostro to delude thousands; and Casanova found a dupe in the Marquise d’Urfé, who believed he could restore her youth and make the moon impregnate her![36] It was in 1774 that Messmer astonished Vienna with his marvels of mystic magnetism. The secret societies of Freemasons and Illuminati, mystic in their ceremonies and chimerical in their hopes--now in quest of the philosopher’s stone, now in quest of the perfectibility of mankind--a mixture of religious, political, and mystical reveries, flourished in all parts of Germany, and in all circles.

‘With science in so imperfect a condition we are sure to find a corresponding poverty in material comfort and luxury. High-roads, for example, were only found in certain parts of Germany; Prussia had no _chaussée_ till 1787. Mile-stones were unknown, although finger-posts existed. Instead of facilitating the transit of travellers, it was thought good political economy to obstruct them, for the longer they remained the more money they spent in the country. A century earlier stage coaches were known in England; but in Germany public conveyances were few and miserable; nothing but open carts with unstuffed seats. Diligences on springs were unknown before 1800,’ ... and we have the word of Burney and of Mozart that travel by post was nothing short of torture![37]

If we examine into the manners, customs, and tastes of the period we are struck with many apparently absurd contradictions. Men whose nature, bred in generations of fighting, was brutal in its very essence outwardly affected a truly inordinate love of ceremony and lavish splendor. The same dignitaries who discussed for hours the fine distinctions of official precedence, or the question whether princes of the church should sit in council on green seats or red, like the secular potentates, would use language and display manners the coarseness of which is no longer tolerated except in the lowest spheres of society. While indulging in the grossest vulgarities and even vices, and while committing the most wanton cruelties, this race of petty tyrants expended thousands upon the glitter and tinsel with which they thought to dazzle the eyes of their neighbors. While this is more true of the seventeenth than of the eighteenth century, and while Europe was undergoing momentous changes, conditions were after all not greatly improved in the period of Haydn and Mozart. The graceful Italian melody which reigned supreme at the Viennese court, or the glitter of its rococo salons, found a striking note of contrast in the broad dialect of Maria Theresa and the ‘boiled bacon and water’ of Emperor Joseph’s diet. A stronger paradox than the brocade and ruffled lace of a courtier’s dress and the coarse behavior of its wearer could hardly be found.

The great courts of Europe, Versailles, Vienna, etc., were imitated at the lesser capitals in every detail, as far as the limits of the princes’ purses permitted. As George Henry Lewes says of Weimar, ‘these courts but little corresponded with those conceptions of grandeur, magnificence, or historical or political importance with which the name of court is usually associated. But, just as in gambling the feelings are agitated less by the greatness of the stake than by the variations of fortune, so, in social gambling of court intrigue, there is the same ambition and agitation, whether the green cloth be an empire or a duchy. Within its limits Saxe-Weimar, for instance, displayed all that an imperial court displays in larger proportions. It had its ministers, its chamberlains, pages, and sycophants. Court favor and disgrace elevated and depressed as if they had been imperial smiles or autocratic frowns. A standing army of six hundred men, with cavalry of fifty hussars, had its war department, with war minister, secretary, and clerk. Lest this appear too ridiculous,’ Lewes adds that ‘one of the small German princes kept a corps of hussars, which consisted of a colonel, six officers and two privates!’ Similarly every prince, great or petty, gathered about him, for his greater glory, the disciples of the graceful arts. Not a count, margrave, or bishop but had in his retinue his court musicians, his organists, his court composer, his band and choir, all of whom were attached to their master by ties of virtually feudal servitude, whose social standing was usually on a level with domestic servants and who were often but wretchedly paid. We have had occasion to refer to a number of the more important centres, such as Berlin, where Frederick the Great had Johann Quantz, Franz Benda, and Emanuel Bach as musical mentors; Dresden, where Augustus the Third had Hasse and Porpora;[38] Stuttgart, where Karl Eugen gave Jommelli a free hand; Mannheim, where Karl Theodor gathered about him that genial band of musical reformers with Stamitz at their head; and Salzburg, where Archbishop Sigismund maintained Michael Haydn, Leopold Mozart, and many another talented musician.

As for the greater courts, they became the _nuclei_ for aggregations of men of genius, to many of whom the world owes an everlasting debt of gratitude, but who often received insufficient payment, and who, in some cases, even suffered indignities at the hands of their masters which are calculated to rouse the anger of an admiring posterity. London and Paris were, of course, as they had been for generations, the most brilliant centres--the most liberal and the richest in opportunities for musicians of talent or enterprise. At the period of which we speak the court of George II (and later George III) harbored Johann Christian Bach, Carl Friedrich Abel, and Pietro Domenico Paradies; at the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette Rameau was in his last years, while Gluck and Piccini were the objects of violent controversy, while Philidor, Monsigny, and Grétry were delighting audiences with _opéra comique_, and while a valiant number of instrumentalists, like Gossec, Gaviniès, Schobert, and Eckhard, were building up a French outpost of classicism. Capitals which had but recently attained international significance, like Stockholm and St. Petersburg, assiduously emulated the older ones; at the former, for instance, Gustavus III patronized Naumann, and at the latter Catherine II entertained successively Galuppi, Traetto, Paesiello, and Sarti.

But Vienna was now the musical capital of Europe. It was the concentrated scene of action where all the chief musical issues of the day were fought out. There the Mannheim school had its continuation, soon after its inception; there Haydn and Mozart found their greatest inspiration--as Beethoven and Schubert did after them--it remained the citadel of musical Germany, whose supremacy was now fairly established. It is significant that Burney, in writing the results of his musical investigations on the continent, devotes one volume each to Italy and France but two to Germany, notwithstanding his strong Italian sympathies. However, the reason for this is partly the fact that Germany was to an Englishman still somewhat of a wilderness, and that the writer felt it incumbent upon him to give some general details of the condition of the country. We can do no better than quote some of his observations upon Vienna in order to familiarize the reader with the principal characters of the drama for which it was the stage.[39]

After describing the approach to the city, which reminds him of Venice, and his troubles at the customs, where his books were ‘even more scrupulously read than at the inquisition of Bologna,’ he continues: ‘The streets are rendered doubly dark and dirty by their narrowness, and by the extreme height of the houses; but, as these are chiefly of white stone and in a uniform, elegant style of architecture, in which the Italian taste prevails, _as well as in music_, there is something grand and magnificent in their appearance which is very striking; and even those houses which have shops on the ground floor seem like palaces above. Indeed, the whole town and its suburbs appear at the first glance to be composed of palaces rather than of common habitations.’

Now for the life of the city. ‘The diversions of the common people ... are such as seem hardly fit for a civilized and polished nation to allow. Particularly the combats, as they are called, or baiting of wild beasts, in a manner much more savage and ferocious than our bull-baiting, etc.’ The better class, of course, found its chief amusement in the theatres, but the low level of much of this amusement may be judged from the fact that rough horse-play was almost necessary to the success of a piece. Shortly before Burney’s visit the customary premiums for actors who would ‘voluntarily submit to be kicked and cuffed’ were abolished, with the result that theatres went bankrupt ‘because of the insufferable dullness and inactivity of the actors.’ By a mere chance Burney witnessed a performance of Lessing’s _Emilia Galotti_, which as a play shocked his sensibilities, but he speaks in admiring terms of the orchestra, which played ‘overtures and act-tunes’ by Haydn, Hoffman, and Vanhall. At another theatre the pieces were so full of invention that it seemed to be music of some other world.

Musically, also, the mass at St. Stephen’s impressed him very much: ‘There were violins and violoncellos, though it was not a festival,’ and boys whose voices ‘had been well cultivated.’ At night, in the court of his inn, two poor scholars sang ‘in pleasing harmony,’ and later ‘a band of these singers performed through the streets a kind of glees in three and four parts.’ ‘Soldiers and common people,’ he says, ‘frequently sing in parts, too,’ and he is forced to the conclusion that ‘this whole country is certainly very musical.’

Through diplomatic influence our traveller is introduced to the Countess Thun (afterwards Mozart’s patron), ‘a most agreeable lady of very high rank, who, among other talents, possesses as great skill in music as any person of distinction I ever knew; she plays the harpsichord with that grace, ease, and delicacy which nothing but female fingers can arrive at.’ Forthwith he meets ‘the admirable poet Metastasio, and the no less admirable musician Hasse,’ as well as his wife, Faustina, both very aged; also ‘the chevalier Gluck, one of the most extraordinary geniuses of this, or perhaps any, age or nation,’ who plays him his _Iphigénie_, just completed, while his niece, Mlle. Marianne Gluck, sang ‘in so exquisite a manner that I could not conceive it possible for any vocal performance to be more perfect.’ He hears music by ‘M. Hoffman, an excellent composer of instrumental music’; by Vanhall, whom he meets and whose pieces ‘afforded me such uncommon pleasure that I should not hesitate to rank them among the most complete and perfect compositions for many instruments which the art of music can boast(!)’; also some ‘exquisite quartets by Haydn, executed in the utmost perfection’; and he attends a comic opera by ‘Signor Salieri, a scholar of M. Gassman,’ at which the imperial family was present, his imperial majesty being extremely attentive ‘and applauding very much.’[40] ‘His imperial majesty’ was, of course, Joseph II, who we know played the violoncello, and was, in Burney’s words, ‘just musical enough for a sovereign prince.’ The entire imperial family was musical, and the court took its tone from it. All the great houses of the nobility--Lichtenstein, Lobkowitz, Auersperg, Fürnberg, Morzin--maintained their private bands or chamber musicians. Our amusing informant, in concluding his account of musical Vienna, says: ‘Indeed, Vienna is so rich in composers and incloses within its walls such a number of musicians of superior merit that it is but just to allow it to be among German cities the imperial seat of music as well as of power.’

It need hardly be repeated that Italian style was still preferred by the society of the period, just as Italian manners and language were affected by the nobility. Italian was actually the language of the court, and how little German was respected is seen from the fact that Metastasio, the man of culture _par excellence_, though living in Vienna through the greater part of his life, spoke it ‘just enough to keep himself alive.’ Haydn, like many others, Italianized his name to ‘Giuseppe’ and Mozart signed himself frequently Wolfgango Amadeo Mozart!

This, then, is the city in which Haydn and Mozart were to meet for the first time just one year after Burney’s account. Though the first was the other’s senior by twenty-four years their great creative periods are virtually simultaneous. They date, in fact, from this meeting, which marks the beginning of their influence upon each other and their mutual and constant admiration. Both already had brilliant careers behind them as performers and composers, and it becomes our duty now to give separate accounts of these careers.

C. S.

II JOSEPH HAYDN

The boundaries of Hungary, the home of one of the most musical peoples of the world, lies only about thirty miles from Vienna. Here, it is said, in every two houses will be found three violins and a lute. Men and women sing at their work; children are reared in poverty and song. In such a community, in the village of Rohrau, near the border line between Austria and Hungary, lived Matthias Haydn, wagoner and parish sexton, with Elizabeth, his wife. They were simple peasant people, probably partly Croatian in blood, with rather more intelligence than their neighbors. After his work was done Matthias played the harp and Elizabeth sang, gathering the children about her to share in the simple recreation. Franz Joseph, the second of these children, born March 31, 1732, gave signs of special musical intelligence, marking the time and following his mother in a sweet, childish voice at a very early age. When he was six he was put in the care of a relative named Frankh, living in Hainburg, for instruction in violin and harpsichord playing, and in singing. Frankh seems to have been pretty rough with the youngster, but his instruction must have been good as far as it went, for two years later he was noticed by Reutter, chapel master at St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, and allowed to enter the choir school.

Reutter was considered a great musician in his day--he was ennobled in 1740--but he did not distinguish himself by kind treatment of little Joseph, who was poorly clad, half starved, and indifferently taught. The boy, however, seems, even at this early age, to have had a definite idea of what he wanted, and doggedly pursued his own path. He got what instruction he could from the masters of the school, purchased two heavy and difficult works on thoroughbass and counterpoint, spent play hours in practice on his clavier, and filled reams of paper with notes. He afterwards said that he remembered having two lessons from von Reutter in ten years. When he was seventeen years old his voice broke, and, being of no further service to the chapel master, he was turned out of the school on a trivial pretext.

The period that followed was one that even the sweet-natured man must sometimes have wished to forget. He was without money or friends--or at least so he thought--and it is said he spent the night after leaving school in wandering about the streets of the city. Unknown to himself, however, the little singer at the cathedral had made friends, and with one of the humbler of these he found a temporary home. Another good Viennese lent him one hundred and fifty florins--a debt which Haydn not only soon paid, but remembered for sixty years, as an item in his will shows. He soon got a few pupils, played the violin at wedding festivals and the like, and kept himself steadily at the study of composition. He obtained the clavier sonatas of Emanuel Bach and mastered their style so thoroughly that the composer afterward sent him word that he alone had fully mastered his writings and learned to use them.

At twenty Haydn wrote his first mass, and at about the same time received a considerable sum for composing the music to a comic opera. He exchanged his cold attic for a more comfortable loft which happened to be in the same house in which the great Metastasio lived. The poet was impressed by Haydn’s gifts and obtained for him the position of music master in an important Spanish family, resident in Vienna.

In this way, step by step, the fortunes of the young enthusiast improved. He made acquaintances among musical folk, and occasionally found himself in the company of men who had mounted much higher on the professional ladder than himself. One of these was Porpora, already successful and of international fame. Porpora was at that time singing master in the household of Correr, the Venetian ambassador at Vienna, and he proposed that Haydn should act as his accompanist and incidentally profit by so close an acquaintance with his ‘method.’ Thus Haydn was included in the ambassador’s suite when they went to the baths of Mannersdorf, on the border of Hungary. At the soirées and entertainments of the grandees at Mannersdorf Haydn met some of the well-known musicians of the time--Bonno, Wagenseil, Gluck, and Ditters--becoming warmly attached to the last-named. His progress in learning Porpora’s method, however, was not so satisfactory. The mighty man had no time for the obscure one; the difficulty was obvious. But Haydn, as always, knew what he wanted and did not hesitate to make himself useful to Porpora in order to get the instruction he needed. He was young and had no false pride about being fag to a great man for a purpose. His good-natured services won the master over; and so Haydn was brought into direct connection with the great exponent of Italian methods and ideas.

In 1755 he wrote his first quartet, being encouraged by a wealthy amateur, von Fürnberg, who, at his country home, had frequent performances of chamber music. Haydn visited Fürnberg and became so interested in the composition of chamber music that he produced eighteen quartets during that and the following year. About this time he became acquainted with the Count and Countess Thun, cultivated and enthusiastic amateurs, whose names are remembered also in connection with Mozart, Gluck, and Beethoven. Haydn instructed the Countess Thun both in harpsichord playing and in singing, and was well paid for his services.

The same Fürnberg that drew the attention of Haydn to the composition of string quartets also recommended him to his first patron, Count Morzin, for the position of chapel master and composer at his private estate in Bohemia, near Pilsen. It was there, in 1759, that Haydn wrote his first symphony. He received a salary of about one hundred dollars a year, with board and lodging. With this munificent income he decided to marry, even though the rules of his patron permitted no married men in his employ.

Haydn’s choice had settled on the youngest daughter of a wig-maker of Vienna named Keller; but the girl, for some unknown reason, decided to take the veil. In his determination not to lose so promising a young man, the wig-maker persuaded the lover to take the eldest daughter, Maria Anna, instead of the lost one. The marriage was in every way unfortunate. Maria Anna was a heartless scold, selfish and extravagant, who, as her husband said, cared not a straw whether he was an artist or a shoemaker. Haydn soon gave up all attempts to live with her, though he supplied her with a competence. She lived for forty years after their marriage, and shortly before she died wrote to Haydn, then in London, for a considerable sum of money with which to buy a small house, ‘as it was a very suitable place for a widow.’ For once Haydn refused both the direct and the implied request, neither sending her the money nor making her a widow. He outlived her, in fact, by nine years, purchased the house himself after his last visit to London and spent there the remainder of his life.

To go back, however, to his professional career. Count Morzin was unfortunately soon obliged to disband his players and the change that consequently occurred was one of the important crises of Haydn’s life. He was appointed second chapel master to Prince Anton Esterhàzy, a Hungarian nobleman, whose seat was at Eisenstadt. Here Haydn was to spend the next thirty years, here the friendships and pleasures of his mature life were to lie, and here his genius was to ripen.

The Esterhàzy band comprised sixteen members at the time of Haydn’s arrival, all of them excellent performers. Their enthusiasm and support did much to stimulate the new chapel master, even as his arrival infused a new spirit into the concerts. The first chapel master, Werner, a good contrapuntal scholar, took the privilege of age and scoffed at Haydn’s new ideas, calling him a ‘mere fop.’ The fact that they got on fairly well together is surely a tribute to Haydn’s good nature and genuine humbleness of spirit. The old prince soon died, being succeeded by his brother, Prince Nicolaus. When Werner died some five years later Haydn became sole director. Prince Nicolaus increased the orchestra and lent to Haydn all the support of a sympathetic lover of music, as well as princely generosity. He prepared for himself a magnificent residence, with parks, lakes, gardens, and hunting courses, at Esterhàz, where royal entertainments were constantly in progress. Daily concerts were given, besides operas and special performances for all sorts of festivals. The seclusion of the country was occasionally exchanged for brief visits to Vienna. In 1773 the Empress Maria Theresa--she who, as Electoral Princess, had studied singing with Porpora--was entertained at Esterhàz and heard the first performance of the symphony which bears her name. In 1780 Haydn wrote, for the opening of a new theatre at Esterhàz, an opera which was also performed before royalty at Vienna. He composed the ‘Last Seven Words’ in 1785, and in the same year Mozart dedicated to him six quartets in terms of affectionate admiration.

By the death of Prince Nicolaus, in 1790, Haydn lost not only a patron but a friend whom he sincerely loved. His life at Esterhàz was, on the other hand, full of work and conscientious activity in conducting rehearsals, preparing for performances, and in writing new music. On the other hand, it was curiously restricted in scope, isolated from general society, and detached from all the artistic movements of his period. His relations with the prince were genial and friendly, apparently quite unruffled by discord. Esterhàzy, though very much the grandee, was indulgent, and not only allowed his chapel master much freedom in his art, but also recognized and respected his genius. The system of patronage never produced a happier example of the advantages and pleasures to be gained by both patron and follower; but, after all, a comment of Mr. Hadow seems most pertinent to the situation: ‘It is worthy of remark that the greatest musician ever fostered by a systematic patronage was the one over whose character patronage exercised the least control.’ It is Haydn, of course, who is the subject of this remark.

There was, at that time, an enterprising violinist and concert manager, Johann Peter Salomon, travelling on the continent in quest of ‘material’ for his next London season. As soon as news of the death of Prince Nicolaus reached Salomon, he started for Vienna with the determination to take Haydn back with him to London. Former proposals for a season in London had always been ignored by Haydn, who considered himself bound not to abandon his prince. Now that he was free, Salomon’s persuasions were successful. Haydn, nearly sixty years of age, undertook his first long journey, embarking on the ocean he had never before seen, and going among a people whose language he did not know. He was under contract to supply Salomon with six new symphonies.

They reached London early in the year 1791, and Haydn took lodgings, which seemed very costly to his thrifty mind, with Salomon at 18 Great Pulteney street. The concerts took place from March till May, Salomon leading the orchestra, which consisted of thirty-five or forty performers, while Haydn conducted from the pianoforte. The enterprise was an immediate success. Haydn’s symphonies happened to hit the taste of the time, and his fame as composer was supplemented by great personal popularity. People of the highest rank called upon him, poets celebrated him in verse, and crowds flocked to the concerts.

Heretofore Haydn’s audiences had usually consisted of a small number of people whose musical tastes were well cultivated but often conventional; now he was eagerly listened to by larger and more heterogeneous crowds, whose enthusiasm reacted happily upon the composer. He wrote not only the six symphonies for the subscription concerts, but a number of other works--divertimenti for concerted instruments, a nocturne, string quartets, a clavier trio, songs, and a cantata--and was much in demand for other concerts. At the suggestion of Dr. Burney, the University of Oxford conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Music. The prince of Wales invited him to visit at one of the royal residences; his portrait was painted by famous artists; everybody wished to do him honor. The directors of the professional concerts tried to induce him to break his engagements with Salomon, but, failing in this, they engaged a former pupil of Haydn’s, Ignaz Pleyel from Strassburg, and the two musicians conducted rival concerts. The rivalry, however, was wholly friendly, so far as Haydn and his pupil were concerned. He visited Windsor and the races, and was present at the Handel commemoration in Westminster Abbey, where he was much impressed by a magnificent performance of ‘The Messiah.’

After a stay of a year and a half in London Haydn returned to Vienna, travelling by way of Bonn, where he met Beethoven, who afterward came to him for instruction. Arriving in Vienna in July, 1792, he met with an enthusiastic reception. Early in 1794 Salomon induced him, under a similar contract, to make another journey to London, and to supply six new works for the subscription concerts. Again Haydn carried all before him. The new symphonies gained immediate favor; the former set was repeated, and many pieces of lesser importance were performed. The famous virtuosi, Viotti and Dussek, took part in the benefits for Haydn and Salomon. Haydn was again distinguished by the court, receiving even an invitation to spend the summer at Windsor, which he declined. In every respect the London visits were a brilliant success, securing a competence for Haydn’s old age, additional fame, and a number of warm personal friendships whose memory delighted him throughout the remaining years of his life.

On his return to Vienna fresh honors awaited the master, who was never again to travel far from home. During his absence a monument and bust of himself had been placed in a little park at Rohrau, his native village. Upon being conducted to the place by his friends he was much affected, and afterwards accompanied the party to the modest house in which he was born, where, overcome with emotion, he knelt and kissed the threshold. In Vienna concerts were arranged for the production of the London symphonies, and many new works were planned. One of the most interesting of these was the ‘National Hymn,’ composed in 1797, to words written by the poet Hauschka. On the birthday of the Emperor Franz II the air was sung simultaneously at the National Theatre in Vienna and at all the principal theatres in the provinces. Haydn also used the hymn as the basis of one of the movements in the Kaiser Quartet, No. 77.

The opportunity afforded Haydn in London of becoming more familiar with the work of Handel had a striking effect upon his genius, turning it toward the composition of oratorios. His reputation was high, but it was destined to soar still higher. Through Salomon, Haydn had received a modified version of Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost,’ compiled by Lidley. This, translated into German by van Swieten, formed the libretto of ‘The Creation,’ composed by Haydn in a spirit of great humbleness and piety. It was first performed in Vienna in 1798 and immediately produced a strong impression, the audience, as well as the composer, being deeply moved. Choral societies were established for the express purpose of giving it, rival societies in London performed it during the season of 1800, and it long enjoyed a popularity scarcely less than that of ‘The Messiah.’ Even with this important work his energy was not dulled. Within a short time after the completion of ‘The Creation’ he composed another oratorio, ‘The Seasons,’ to words adapted from Thomson’s poem. This also sprang into immediate favor, and at the time of its production, at least, gained quite as much popularity as ‘The Creation.’

But the master’s strength was failing. After ‘The Seasons’ he wrote but little, chiefly vocal quartets and arrangements of Welsh and Scottish airs. On his seventy-third birthday Mozart’s little son Wolfgang, aged fourteen, composed a cantata in his honor and came to him for his blessing. Many old friends sought out the aged man, now sick and often melancholy, and paid him highest honors. His last public appearance was in March, 1808, at a performance of ‘The Creation’ at the university in Vienna, conducted by Salieri. Overcome with fatigue and emotion Haydn was carried home after the performance of the first part, receiving as he departed the respectful homage of many distinguished people, among whom was Beethoven. From that time his strength waned, and, on May 31, 1809, he breathed his last. He was buried in a churchyard near his home; but, in 1820, at the command of Prince Anton Esterhàzy, his body was removed to the parish church at Eisenstadt, where so many years of his tranquil life had been spent.

It is of no small value to consider Haydn the man, before even Haydn the musician, for many of the qualities which made him so respected and beloved as a man were the bedrock upon which his genius was built. There was little of the obviously romantic in his life, nearly all of which was spent within a radius of thirty miles; but it glows with kindness, good temper, and sterling integrity. He was loyal to his emperor and his church; thrifty, generous to less fortunate friends and needy relatives, generous, also, with praise and appreciation. Industrious and methodical in his habits, he yet loved a jest or a harmless bit of fooling. He was droll and sunny tempered, modest in his estimate of himself, but possessing at the same time a proper knowledge of his powers. He was not beglamored by the favor of princes; and, while steadfast in the pursuit of his mission, seemed, nevertheless, to have been without ambition, in the usual sense, even as he was without malice, avarice, or impatience. Good health and good humor were the accompaniment of a gentle, healthy piety. These qualities caused him to be beloved in his lifetime; and they rank him, as a man, forever apart from the long list of geniuses whose lives have been torn asunder by passions, by undue sensitiveness, by excesses, or overweening ambition--all that is commonly understood by ‘temperament.’ The flame of Haydn’s temperament burned clearly and steadily, even if less intensely; and the record of his life causes a thrill of satisfaction for his uniform and consistent rightness, his few mistakes.

It remains now to consider the nature of the service rendered by this remarkable man to his art, through the special types of composition indissolubly connected with his name. These are the symphony and the quartet.

III

The early history of the development of the symphony is essentially that of the development of the sonata, which we have described in the last chapter. When Joseph Haydn actually came upon the scene as composer, the term symphony, or ‘sinfonia,’ had been applied to compositions for orchestra, though these pieces bore little resemblance to modern productions. They were usually written in three movements, two of them being rather quick and lively, with a slow one between, and were scored for eight parts--four strings, two oboes or two flutes, and two ‘cors de chasse,’ or horns. Often the flutes or oboes were used simply to reinforce the strings, while the horns sustained the harmony. The figured bass was still in use, often transferred, however, to the viol di gamba, and the director used the harpsichord. The treatment of the parts was still crude and stiff, showing little feeling for the tone color of the instruments, balancing of parts, or variety of treatment.

The internal structure, also, was still very uncertain. The first movement, now usually written in strict sonata form, did not then uniformly contain the two contrasting themes, nor the codas and episodes of the modern schools; and the working-out section and recapitulation were seldom clearly defined. Even in the poorest examples, however, the sonata scheme was generally vaguely present; and in the best often definitely marked. We must not lose sight, however, of the epoch-making work of Stamitz and his associates at Mannheim, both in the fixing of symphonic form and the advancement of instrumental technique. Stamitz’s Opus I appeared, it will be recalled, in 1751; Dittersdorf’s emulation of the Mannheim symphonies began about 1761. The intervening decade was a period of experiment and constant improvement. Haydn, though his first symphony, composed in 1759, showed none of the new influence, must have been cognizant of the advance.

Haydn’s first symphony, written when he was twenty-seven, is described by Pohl as being a ‘small work in three movements, for two violins, viola, bass, two hautboys, and two horns; cheerful and unpretending in character.’ From this time on his experiments in the symphonic form were continuous, and more than one hundred examples are credited to him. He was so situated as to be able to test his work by actual performance. To this fortunate circumstance may be attributed the fact that he made great improvements in orchestration, and that he gained steadily in clearness of outline, variety of treatment, and enlargement of ideas.

In five years Haydn composed thirty symphonies, besides many other pieces. His reputation spread far beyond the bounds of Austria, and the official gazette of Vienna called him ‘our national favorite.’ His seclusion furthered his originality and versatility, and his history seems a singularly marked example of growth from within, rather than growth according to the currents of contemporary taste. By 1790 the number of symphonies had reached one hundred and ten, and the steps of his development can be clearly traced. There are traces of the old traditions in the doubling of the parts, sometimes throughout an entire movement; in the neglect of the wind instruments, sometimes for the entire adagio; and in long solo passages for bassoon or flute. Such peculiarities mark most of the symphonies up to 1790. Among these crudities, however, are signs of a steady advance in other respects. In the all-important first movement he more and more gave the second theme its rights, felt for new ways of developing the themes themselves, and elaborated the working-out section. The coda began to make its appearance, and the figured bass was abandoned. He established the practice of inserting the minuet between the slow movement and the finale, thus setting the example for the usual modern practice. The middle strings and wind instruments gradually grew more independent, the musical ideas more cultivated and refined, his orchestration clearer and more buoyant. His work is cheerful and gay, showing solid workmanship, sometimes deep emotion, rarely poetry. Under his hands the symphony, as an art form, gained stability, strength, and a technical perfection which was to carry the deeper message of later years, and the message of the great symphonic writers who followed him.

During Haydn’s comparative solitude at Eisenstadt, however, a wonderful youth had come into the European musical world, had absorbed with the facility of genius everything that musical science had to offer, had learned from Haydn what could be done with the symphony as he had learned from Gluck what could be done with opera, and had outshone and outdistanced every composer living at the time. What Haydn was able to give to Mozart was rendered back to him with abundant interest. Mozart made use of a richer and more flexible orchestration, achieved greater beauty and poignancy of expression; and Haydn, while retaining his individuality, still shows marked traces of this noble influence. The early works of Haydn were far in advance of his time, and were highly regarded; but they do not reveal the complete artist, and they have been almost entirely superseded in public favor by the London symphonies, composed after Mozart’s death. In these he reaches heights he had never before attained, not only in the high degree of technical skill, but in the flood of fresh and genial ideas, and in new, impressive harmonic progressions. The method of orchestration is much bolder and freer. The parts are rarely doubled, the bass and viola have their individual work, the parts for the wind instruments are better suited to their character, and greater attention is paid to musical nuances. In these last works Haydn arrived at that ‘spiritualization of music’ which makes the art a vehicle not only for intellectual ideas, but for deep and earnest emotion.

Parallel with the growth of the symphonic form and its variety of treatment came also a real growth of the orchestra. The organization of 1750, consisting of four strings and four wind instruments, had become, in 1791, a group of thirty-five or forty pieces, consisting of, besides the strings, two flutes, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets and drums. To these were sometimes added clarinets, and occasionally special instruments, such as the triangle or cymbals. Thus, by the end of the century, the form of the symphony, according to modern understanding, was practically established, and the orchestra organized nearly according to its present state. Haydn represents the last stage of the preparatory period, and he was, in a very genuine and literal sense, the founder, and to some degree the creator, of the modern symphony.

The string quartet had its birth almost simultaneously with the symphony, and is also the child of Haydn’s genius. Its ancestors are considered by Jahn to be the divertimenti and cassations designed for table music, serenades, and such entertainments, and written often in four or five movements for four wind instruments, wind instruments with strings, or even for clavier. This species of composition was transferred, curiously enough, to two violins, viola and bass--the latter being in time replaced by the 'cello. This combination of instruments, so easily available for private use, appealed especially to Haydn, and his later compositions for it are still recognized as models.

The quartet, like the symphony, is based on the sonata form, and developed gradually, in a manner similar to the larger work. Haydn’s first attempt in this species was made at the age of twenty-three, and eighty-three quartets are numbered among his catalogued works. The early ones are very like the work of Boccherini, and consist of five short movements, with two minuets. As Haydn progressed his tendency was to make the movements fewer and longer. After Quartet No. 44 the four-movement form is generally used, and his craftsmanship grows more delicate. Gradually he filled the rather stiff and formal outline with ideas that are graceful and charming, even though they may sound somewhat elementary to modern ears. He recognized the fact that in the quartet each individual part must not be treated as solo, nor yet should the others be made to supply a mere accompaniment to the remainder. Each must have its rôle, according to the capacity of the instrument and the balance of parts. The best of Haydn’s quartets exhibit not only a well-established form and a fine perception of the relation of the instruments, but also the more spiritual qualities--tenderness, playfulness, pathos. He is not often romantic, neither is there any trace of far-fetched mannerisms or fads. He gave the form a life and freshness which at once secured its popularity, even though the more scientific musicians of his day were inclined to regard it with suspicion, as a trifling innovation. Nevertheless, it was the form which, together with the symphony, was to attest the greatness of Mozart and Beethoven; and it was from Haydn that Mozart, at least, learned its use.

It is impossible to estimate rightly Haydn’s service to music without taking into account one of his most striking and original characteristics--his use of simple tunes and folk songs. Much light has been thrown on this phase of his genius by the labors of a Croatian scholar, F. X. Kuhac, and the results of his work have been given to the English-speaking world by Mr. Hadow. As early as 1762, in his D-major symphony, composed at Eisenstadt, Haydn began to use folk songs as themes, and he continued to do so, in symphonies, quartets, divertimenti, cantatas, and sacred music, to the very end of his career. In this respect he was unique among composers of his day. No other contemporaneous writer thought it fitting or beautiful to work rustic tunes into the texture of his music. Mozart is witty with the ease of a man of the world, quite different from the naïve drollery of Haydn, whose humor, though perhaps a trifle light and shallow, is always mobile, fresh, and gay. It is pointed out, moreover, by the writers above mentioned that the shapes of Haydn’s melodic phrases are not those of the German, but of the Croatian folk song, and that the rhythms are correspondingly varied. Eisenstadt lies in the very centre of a Croatian colony, and Rohrau, Haydn’s birthplace, has also a Croatian name. Many of its inhabitants are Croatian, and a name, strikingly similar to Haydn’s was of frequent occurrence in that region. Add to this the fact that his music is saturated with tunes which have all the characteristics, both rhythmic and melodic, of the Croatian; that many tunes known to be of that origin are actually employed by him, and the presumption in favor of his Croatian inheritance is very strong.

But Haydn’s speech, like that of every genius, was not only that of his race, but of the world. He had the heart of a rustic poet unspoiled by a decayed civilization. Like Wordsworth, he used the speech of a whole nation, and lived to work out all that was in him. Although almost entirely self-taught, he mastered every scientific principle of musical composition known at his time. He was able to compose for the people without pandering to what was vicious or ignorant in their taste. He identified himself absolutely with secular music, and gave it a status equal to the music of the church. He took the idea of the symphony and quartet, while it was yet rather formless and chaotic, floating in the musical consciousness of the period as salt floats in the ocean, drew it from the surrounding medium, and crystallized it into an art form.

Something has already been said concerning Haydn’s popularity in England, and the genuine appreciation accorded him in that country. Haydn himself remarked that he did not become famous in Germany until he had gained a reputation elsewhere. Even in his old age he remembered, rather pathetically, the animosity of certain of the Berlin critics, who had used him very badly in early life, condemning his compositions as ‘hasty, trivial, and extravagant.’ It is only another proof that Beckmesser never dies. Haydn was his own best critic, though a modest one, when he said, ‘Some of my children are well bred, some ill bred, and, here and there, there is a changeling among them.... I know that God has bestowed a talent upon me, and I thank Him for it. I think I have done my duty, and been of use in my generation by my works.’ He rises above all his contemporaries, except Mozart, as a lighthouse rises above the waves of the sea. With Mozart and Beethoven he formed the immortal trio whose individual work, each with its own quality and its own weight, are the completion and the sum of the first era of orchestral music.

F. B.

IV WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

Radically different from the career of Haydn is that of Mozart, which, indeed, has no parallel in the annals of music or any other art. It partakes so much of the marvellous as to defy and to upset all our notions of the growth of creative genius. What Haydn learned by years of endeavor and experience Mozart acquired as if by instinct. The forms evolved by the previous generation, that new elegance of melodic expression, the _finesse_ of articulation and the principles of organic unity, all these were a heritage upon which he entered with full cognizance of their meaning and value. It was as though he had dreamed these things in a previous existence. They made up for him a language which he used more easily than other children use their mother tongue. It is a fact that he learned to read music earlier than words. What common children express in infantile prattle, this marvel of a boy expressed in musical sounds. At three he attempted to emulate his sister at clavier playing and actually picked out series of pleasing thirds; at four, he learned to play minuets which his father taught him ‘as in fun’ (a half-hour sufficed for one), and, at five, he composed others like them himself. At six, these compositions merited writing down, which his father did, and we have the dated notebook as evidence of these first stirrings of genius. At the age of seven Mozart appeared before the world as a composer. The two piano sonatas with violin accompaniment which he dedicated to the Princess Victoire have all the attributes of finished musical workmanship, and, even if his father retouched and corrected these and other early works, the performance, as that of a child, is none the less remarkable.

The extraordinary training and the wise guidance of the father, a highly educated musician, broad-minded and progressive, were the second great advantage accruing to Mozart, whose genius was thus led from the beginning into proper channels. Leopold Mozart, himself under the influence of the Mannheim school, naturally imparted to his son all the peculiarities of their style. Through him also the influence of Emanuel Bach became an early source of inspiration. Pure, simple melody with a natural obvious harmonic foundation was the musical ideal to which Mozart aspired from the first. Nevertheless, the study of counterpoint was never neglected in the training which his father gave him, though it was not until later, under the instruction of Padre Martini, that he came to appreciate its full significance and elevated beauty.

With Mozart the musical supremacy of Germany, first asserted by the instrumental composers of Mannheim and Berlin, is confirmed and extended to the field of vocal music and the opera. Mozart could accomplish this task only by virtue of his broad cosmopolitanism, which, like that of Gluck, enabled him to gather up in his grasp the achievements of the most diverse schools. To this cosmopolitanism he was predisposed by the circumstances of his birth as well as of his early life. The geographical position of Salzburg, where he was born in 1756, was, in a sense, a strategic one. Situated in the southernmost part of Germany, it was exposed to the influence of Italian taste; inhabited by a sturdy German peasantry and bourgeoisie, its sympathies were on the side of German art, and the musicians at court were, at the time of Mozart’s birth, almost without exception Germans. Yet the echoes of the cultural life not only of Vienna, Munich, and Mannheim, but of Milan, Naples, and Paris, reached the narrow confines of this mountain fastness, this citadel of intolerant Catholicism.

But Mozart’s cosmopolitanism was broader than this. He was but six years of age, gifted with a marvellous power of absorption, and impressionable to a degree, when his father began with him and his eleven-year-old sister, also highly talented and already an accomplished pianist, the three-years’ journey--or concert tour, as we should say to-day--which took them to Munich, to Vienna, to Mannheim, to Brussels, Paris, London, and The Hague. They played before the sovereigns in all these capitals and were acclaimed prodigies such as the world had never seen. How assiduously young Mozart emulated the music of all the eminent composers he met is seen from the fact that four concertos until recently supposed to have been original compositions were simply rearrangements of sonatas by Schobert, Honauer, and Eckhardt.[41] Similarly, in London he carefully copied out a symphony by C. F. Abel, until recently reckoned among his own works; and a copy of a symphony by Michael Haydn, his father’s colleague in Salzburg, has also been found among his manuscripts. But the most powerful influence to which he submitted in London was that of Johann Christian Bach, who determined his predilection for Italian vocal style and Italian opera.

Already, in 1770, when he and his father were upon their second artistic journey, he tried his hand both at Italian and German opera, with _La finta semplice_ and _Bastien und Bastienne_, and it is significant that during their production he was already exposed to the theories of Gluck, who brought out his _Alceste_ in that year. But it must be said that neither of the two youthful works shows any traits of these theories. The first of them failed of performance in Vienna and was not produced until later at Salzburg; the other was presented under private auspices at the estate of the famous Dr. Messmer of ‘magnetic’ fame. But in the same year Mozart, then fourteen years of age, made his debut in Italian _opera seria_ with _Mitradite_ at Milan. This was the climax of a triumphal tour through Italy, in the course of which he was made a member of the Philharmonic academies of Verona and Bologna, was given the Order of the Golden Spur by the Pope, and earned the popular title of _Il cavaliere filarmonico_.

Upon his return to Salzburg young Mozart became concert master at the archiepiscopal court, and partly under pressure of demands for occasional music, partly spurred on by a most extraordinary creative impulse, he turned out works of every description--ecclesiastical and secular; symphonies, sonatas, quartets, concertos, serenades, etc., etc. He had written no less than 288 compositions, according to the latest enumeration,[42] when, at the age of twenty-one, he was driven by the insufferable conditions of his servitude to take his departure from home and seek his fortune in the world. This event marked the period of his artistic adolescence. Accompanied by his mother he went over much of the ground covered during his journey as a prodigy, but where before there was universal acclaim he now met utter indifference, professional opposition and intrigue, and general lack of appreciation. However futile in a material sense, this broadening of his artistic horizon was of inestimable value to the ripening genius.

While equally sensitive to impressions as before, he no longer merely imitated, but caught the essence of what he heard and welded it by the power of his own genius into a new and infinitely superior musical idiom. Now for the first time he rises to the heights, to the exalted beauty of expression which has given his works their lasting value. Already in the fullness of his technical power, equipped with a musicianship which enabled him to turn to account every hint, every suggestion, this virtuoso in creation no less than execution fairly drank in the gospel of classicism. Mannheim became a new world to him, but in his very exploration of it he left the indelible footprints of his own inspiration.

If he met the Mannheim musicians on an equal footing it followed that he could approach those of Paris with a certain satirical condescension. But, if his genius _was_ recognized, professional intrigue prevented his drawing any profit from it--he was reduced to teaching and catering to patronage in the most absurd ways, from writing a concerto for harp and flute (both of which he detested) to providing ballets for Noverre, the all-powerful dancer of the Paris opera. His adaptability to circumstances was extraordinary. But all to no avail; the total result of his endeavors was the commission to write a symphony for the _Concerts spirituels_ then conducted by Le Gros. Nowhere else has he shown his power of adaptability in the same measure as in this so-called ‘Paris Symphony.’ It is, as Mr. Hadow says, perhaps the only piece of ‘occasional’ music that is truly classic. The circumstances of its creation appear to us ridiculous but are indicative of the musical intelligence of Paris at this time. The _premier coup d’archet_, the first attack, was a point of pride with the Paris orchestra, hence the piece had to begin with all the instruments at once, which feat, as soon as accomplished, promptly elicited loud applause. ‘What a fuss they make about that,’ wrote Mozart. ‘In the devil’s name, I see no difference. They just begin all together as they do elsewhere. It is quite ludicrous.’ For the same reason the last movement of the Paris Symphony begins with a unison passage, _piano_, which was greeted with a hush. ‘But directly the _forte_ began they took to clapping.’ Referring to the passage in the first _Allegro_, the composer says, ‘I knew it would make an effect, so I brought it in again at the end, _da capo_.’ And, despite those prosaic calculations, the symphony ‘has not an unworthy bar in it,’ and it was one of the most successful works played at these famous concerts. Yet Paris held out no permanent hope to Mozart and he was forced to return to service in Salzburg, under slightly improved circumstances.[43]

It is nothing short of tragic to see how the young artist vainly resisted this dreaded renewal of tyranny, and finally yielded, out of love for his father. His liberation came with the order to write a new opera, _Idomeneo_, for Munich in 1781. This work constitutes the transition from adolescence to maturity. It is the last of his operas to follow absolutely the precedents of the Italian _opera seria_, and its success definitely determined the course of his artistic career. In the same year he severed his connection with the Salzburg court (but not until driven to desperation and humiliated beyond words), settled in Vienna, and secured in a measure the protection of the emperor. But for his livelihood he had for a long time to depend upon concerts, until a propitious circumstance opened a new avenue for the exercise of his talents. Meantime he had experienced a new revelation. His genius had been brought into contact with that of Joseph Haydn, whom he met personally at the imperial palace in 1781 during the festivities occasioned by the visit of Grand Duke Paul of Prussia.[44] This master’s works now became the subject of his profound study, which bore almost immediate results in his instrumental works.

The propitious circumstance alluded to above lay in another direction. Joseph II had made himself the protector of the German drama in Vienna and had given the theatre a national significance. His patriotic convictions induced him to adopt a similar course with the opera, though his own personal tastes lay clearly in the direction of Italy. At any rate, he abolished the costly spectacular ballet and Italian opera and instituted in their stead a ‘national vaudeville,’ as the German opera was called. The theatre was opened in February, 1778, with a little operetta, _Die Bergknappen_, by Umlauf, and this was followed by a number of operas partly translated from the Italian or French, including _Röschen und Colas_ by Monsigny, _Lucile_, _Silvain_, and _Der Hausfreund_ by Grétry; and _Anton und Antonette_ by Gossec. In 1781 the emperor commissioned Mozart to contribute to the repertoire a _singspiel_, and a suitable libretto was found in _Die Enführung aus dem Serail_. It had an extraordinary success. In the flush of his triumph Mozart married Constanze Weber, sister of the singer Aloysia Weber, the erstwhile sweetheart of Mannheim. This again complicated his financial circumstances; for his wife, loyal as she was, knew nothing of household economy. Not until 1787 did Mozart secure a permanent situation at the imperial court, and then with a salary of only eight hundred florins (four hundred dollars), ‘too much for what I do, too little for what I could do,’ as he wrote across his first receipt. His duties consisted in providing dance music for the court! Gluck died in the year of Mozart’s appointment, but his position with two thousand florins was not offered to Mozart. To the end of his days he had to endure pecuniary difficulties and even misery.

Intrigue of Italian colleagues, with Salieri, Gluck’s pupil, at their head, moreover placed constant difficulties in Mozart’s way, and when, in 1785, his ‘Marriage of Figaro’ was brought out in Vienna it came near being a total failure because of the purposely bad work of the Italian singers. But at Prague, shortly after, the opera aroused the greatest enthusiasm, and out of gratitude Mozart wrote his next opera, _Don Giovanni_, for that city (1787). In Vienna again it met with no success. In this same wonderful year he completed, within the course of six weeks, the three last and greatest of his symphonies.

In a large measure the composer’s own character--his simple, childlike and loyal nature--stood in the way of his material success. When, in 1789, he undertook a journey to Berlin with Prince Lichnowsky Frederick William II offered him the place of royal _kapellmeister_ with a salary of three thousand thalers. But his patriotism would not allow him to accept it in spite of his straitened circumstances; and when, after his return, he was induced to submit his resignation to the emperor, so that, like Haydn, he might seek his fortune abroad, he allowed his sentiment to get the better of him at the mere suggestion of imperial regret. The only reward for his loyalty was an order for another opera. This was _Così fan tutte_, performed in 1790.

During his Berlin journey Mozart had visited Leipzig and played upon the organ of St. Thomas’ Church. His masterly performance there so astonished the organist, Doles, that, as he said, he thought the spirit of his predecessor, Johann Sebastian Bach, had been reincarnated. It is significant how thus late in life Bach’s influence opened new vistas to Mozart--for he had probably known so far only the Leipzig master’s clavier compositions. It is related how, after a performance of a cantata in his honor, he was profoundly moved and, spreading the parts out on the organ bench, became immersed in deep study. The result is evident in his compositions of the last two years. During the last, 1791, he wrote _La clemenza di Tito_, another _opera seria_, for Prague, and his last and greatest German opera, _Die Zauberflöte_, for Vienna. The _Requiem_, by some considered the crowning work of his genius, was his last effort; he did not live to finish it. He died on December 5th, 1791, in abject misery, while the ‘Magic Flute’ was being played to crowded houses night after night on the outskirts of Vienna. The profits from the work meantime accrued to the benefit of the manager, Schikaneder, the ‘friend’ whom Mozart had helped out of difficulties by writing it. Mozart was buried in a common grave and the spot has remained unknown to this day.

* * * * *

Thus, briefly, ran the life course of one of the greatest and, without question, the most gifted of musicians the world has seen. Within the short space of thirty-six years he was able to produce an almost countless series of works, the best of which still beguile us after a century and a half into unqualified admiration. They have lost none of their freshness and vitality, and it is even safe to say that they are better appreciated now than in Mozart’s own day. The tender fragrant loveliness of his melodies, the caressing grace of his cadences will always remain irresistible; in sheer beauty, in pure musical essence, we shall not go beyond them. Much might be said of the eternal influence of Mozart on the latter-day disciples--we need only call to mind Weber, Brahms, Tschaikowsky, and Richard Strauss, whose own work is a frank and worthy tribute to his memory.

It has been said that Mozart’s is the only music sufficient unto itself, requiring no elucidation, no ‘program’ whatever. Hence its appeal is the most immediate as well as the most general. It has that impersonal charm which contrives to ingratiate itself with personalities ever so remote, and to accommodate itself to every mood. Yet a profoundly human character lies at the bottom of it all. Mozart the simple, childlike, ingenuous, and generous; or Mozart the witty, full of abandon, of frank drollery and good humor. With what fortitude he bore poignant grief and incessant disappointment, how he submitted to indignities for the sake of others, is well known. But every attack upon his artistic integrity he met with stern reproof, and through trial and misery he held steadfast to his ideal as an artist. To Hoffmeister, the publisher, demanding more ‘salable’ music, he writes that he prefers to starve; Schikaneder, successful in making the master’s talent subserve his own ends, gets no concession to the low taste of his motley audience. Inspired with the divinity of his mission, he subordinates his own welfare to that one end, and he breathes his last in the feverish labor over his final great task, the _Requiem_, ‘his own requiem,’ as he predicted.

V

We have endeavored to point out in our brief sketch of Mozart’s life the chief influences to which he was exposed. The extent to which he assimilated and developed the various elements thus absorbed must determine his place in musical history. ‘The history of every art,’ says Mr. W. H. Hadow, ‘shows a continuous interaction between form and content. The artist finds himself confronted with a double problem: what is the fittest to say, and what is the fittest manner of saying it.... As a rule, one generation is mainly occupied with questions of design, another takes up the scheme and brings new emotional force to bear upon it, and thus the old outlines stretch and waver, the old rules become inadequate, and the form itself, grown more flexible through a fuller vitality, once more asserts its claim and attains a fuller organization.’ The generation preceding Mozart and Haydn had settled for the time being the question of form. Haydn said, as it were, the last word in determining the design, applying it in the most diverse ways and pointing the road to further development. Mozart found it ‘sufficient to his needs and set himself to fill it with a most varied content of melodic invention.’ The analogy drawn by Mr. Hadow between the Greek drama and the classic forms of music is particularly apt: in both the ‘plot’ is constructed in advance and remains ever the same; the artist is left free to apply his genius to the poetic interpretation of situations, the delineation of character, the beauty of rhythm and verse. It was in these things that Mozart excelled. He brought nothing essentially new, but, by virtue of his consummate genius, he endowed the symphonic forms as he found them with a hitherto unequalled depth and force of expression, an individuality so indefinable that we can describe it only as ‘Mozartian.’ In no sense was Mozart a reformer. In opera, unlike Gluck, he did not find his limitations irksome, but knew how to achieve within these limitations an ideal of dramatic truth without detracting from the quality of his musical essence. His style is as independent of psychology as it is of formal interpretation, it is ‘sufficient unto itself,’ ineffable in its beauty, irresistible in its charm. This utter independence and self-sufficiency of style enabled him to use with equal success the vocal and instrumental idioms. And in his work we actually see an assimilation of the two styles and an interchange of their individual elements.

Mozart’s inspiration was primarily a melodic one and for that reason we see him purposely subordinating the harmonic substructure and often reducing it to its simplest terms. If he employs at times figures of accompaniment which are obvious and even trite, it is done with an evident purpose to throw into relief the individuality of his melodies, those rich broideries and graceful arabesques which Mozart knew how to weave about a simple ‘tonic and dominant.’ No composer ever achieved such variety within so limited a harmonic range. On the other hand, it has been truthfully said that Mozart was the greatest polyphonist between Bach and Brahms. He was able to make the most learned use of contrapuntal devices when occasion demanded, but never in the use of these devices did he descend to dry formalism. His _incidental_ use of counterpoint often produces the most telling effects; the accentuation of a motive by imitation, a caressing counter-melody to add poignancy to an expressive phrase, the reciprocal germination of musical ideas, all these he applies with consummate science and without ever sacrificing ingenuous spontaneity. Again in his harmonic texture there are moments of daring which perplexed his contemporaries and even to-day are open to dispute. The sudden injection of a dissonant note into an apparently tranquil harmonic relation, such as in the famous C-major Quartet, which aroused such violent discussion when first heard, or in the first Allegro theme of the _Don Giovanni_ overture, is his particularly favorite way of introducing ‘color.’

This chromaticism of Mozart’s is one of the striking differences between his music and Haydn’s. ‘Haydn makes his richest point of color by sheer abrupt modulation; Mozart by iridescent chromatic motion within the limits of a clearly defined harmonic sequence.’[45] In drawing a further comparison between the two Viennese masters we find in Haydn a greater simplicity and directness of expression, a more unadorned, unhesitating utterance, as against Mozart, to whom perfectly chiselled phrases, a polished, graceful manner of speech are second nature, whether his mood is gay or sad, his emotions careless or deep. The distinction is aptly illustrated by the juxtaposition of the following two themes quoted in Vol. IV of the ‘Oxford History of Music.’

But the difference is not so much in phraseology as in the broader aspects of invention and method. The fundamental division lies, of course, in the character of the two men. Haydn, the simple, ingenuous peasant, whose moods range from sturdy humor to solid dignity; Mozart, the keen, vivacious, witty cosmopolitan, whose humor always tends to satire, but whose exalted moments are moments of soulful, subjective contemplation. His music is accordingly more epigrammatic, on the one hand, and of a deeper, rounder sonority, on the other. Mozart and Haydn first became acquainted with each other in 1780, when both had behind them long careers full of creative activity. It is significant, however, that practically all the works which to-day constitute our knowledge of them were created after this meeting, and neither their music nor the fact of their admiration for each other leaves any doubt as to the power and depth of their mutual influence. Mozart profited probably more in matters of technique and structure; Haydn in matters of refinement and delicacy.

The complete list of Mozart’s works includes no less than twenty-one piano sonatas and fantasias (besides a number for four hands); forty-two violin sonatas; twenty-six string quartets; seven string quintets, several string duos and trios; forty-one symphonies; twenty-eight divertimenti, etc., for orchestra; twenty-five piano concertos; six violin concertos; and eighteen operas and other dramatic works, besides single movements for diverse instruments, chamber music for wind and for strings and wind, songs, arias, and ecclesiastical compositions of every form, including fifteen masses. But only a portion of these is of consequence to the music lover of our day; the portion which constitutes virtually the last decade of his activity. The rest, though full of grace and charm, has only historical significance.

His piano sonatas, we have seen, followed the model of Schobert and, in some measure, of Emanuel Bach, but the style of these works, available to the amateur and valuable as study material, is more individual than that of either of the earlier masters and their musical worth is far superior. The first of them were written about 1774 for Count von Dürnitz, of Munich, and represent his contribution to the light, elegant style of the period. In some later ones he strikes a more serious note; dashing or majestic allegros alternate with caressing cantabiles, graceful andantes or adagios of delicious beauty and romantic expressiveness. The violin sonatas, though supposed to have been written chiefly for the diversion of his lady pupils (the instrument was still considered most suitable for feminine amusement), are full of beauty, strength, and dramatic expression.

The string quartets, the first of which he wrote during his Italian journey of 1770, are in his early period slight and unpretentious but lucid and delicate compositions, in which we may trace influences of Sammartini and Boccherini. From 1773 on, however, the influence of Haydn’s genius is apparent. By 1781, when Mozart took up his residence in Vienna, quartet-playing had become one of the favorite pastimes of musical amateurs. Haydn was the acknowledged leader in this popular field and ‘whoever ventured on the same field was obliged to serve under his banner.’ During the period of 1782 to 1785 Mozart wrote a series of six quartets, which he dedicated to that master ‘as the fruit of long and painful study inspired by his example.’ After playing them over at Mozart’s house (on such occasions Haydn took the first violin part, Dittersdorf the second, Mozart the viola, and Vanhall the 'cello) Haydn turned to Leopold Mozart and said: ‘I assure you solemnly and as an honest man that I consider your son to be the greatest composer of whom I have ever heard.’ Like Haydn and Boccherini, Mozart was commissioned to write some quartets for the king of Prussia (William II), and, since his royal patron himself played the 'cello, he cleverly emphasized that instrument without, however, depriving the other instruments of their independent power of expression. Mozart’s partiality for quartet writing is evident from the many sketches in that form which have been preserved. They are among the masterpieces of chamber music, as are also his string duos, trios, and, especially, his four great string quintets. The celebrated one in G minor is, as Jahn says, a veritable ‘psychological revelation.’ Few pieces in instrumental music express a mood of passionate excitement with such energy.’

Mozart’s concertos for the piano and also those for the violin were written primarily for his own use. The best of them date from the period preceding his Paris journey, when he expected to make practical use of them, for he was a virtuoso of no mean powers on both instruments. There are six concertos for either instrument, every one full of pure beauty and a model of form. In them he substituted the classic sonata form for the variable pattern used in the earlier concertos, and hence he may be considered the creator of the classic concerto, his only definite contribution to the history of form. They are not merely brilliant pieces for technical display, but symphonic, both in proportion and import. In them are found some of the finest moments of his inspiration. ‘It is the Mozart of the early concerti to whom we owe the imperishable matter of the Viennese period,’ says Mr. Hadow, ‘and the influences which helped to mold successively the style of Haydn, Beethoven, and Schubert.’

Of Mozart’s symphonies and serenades, terms which in some cases are practically synonymous, there are about eleven that are of lasting value and at least three that are imperishable. With the exception of the Paris symphony, ‘a brilliant and charming _pièce d’occasion_,’ which was referred to above, all of them were written during the Vienna period, and the three great ones flowed from the composer’s pen within the brief space of six weeks in 1787, the year of _Don Giovanni_. In the matter of form again Mozart followed in the tracks of the Mannheim school. The usual three movements remain, but, like Haydn, he usually adds the minuet after the slow movement. The ‘developed ternary form’ is applied in the first and more and more frequently also in other movements, especially the last, where it takes the place of the lighter rondo. But the musical material is richer and its handling far more ingenious than that of his predecessors, just as the spiritual import is much deeper. The movements are more closely knit, they have a unity of emotion which clearly points in the direction of Beethoven’s later works. There is, if not an _idée fixe_, at any rate a _sentiment fixe_. It is manifested in a multiplicity of ways: more consistent use of the principal thematic material in the ‘working-out,’ reassertion of themes after the ‘transition’ (the section leading from the exposition to the development), introductions which are, as it were, improvisations on the mood of the piece, and codas ‘summing up’ the subjective matter. This same unity exists between the different movements; a note of grief or passion sounded in the first movement is either reiterated in the last or else we feel that the composer has emerged from the struggle in triumph or noble joy. Only the minuet, an almost constant quantity with Mozart, brings a momentary relief or abandon to a lighter vein, if it is not itself, as in the G minor symphony, nobly dignified and touched with sadness.

In the use of orchestral instruments, too, Mozart emulated the practice of the Mannheim composers. Their works were usually scored for eight parts, that is, two oboes _or_ flutes and two horns, besides the usual string body. Clarinets were still rare at that time, and parts provided for them were for that reason arranged for optional use, being interchangeable with the oboe parts. Mozart, although he had heard them as early as 1778 at Mannheim, used them only in his later works,[46] and even then did not often employ that part of their range which reaches below the oboe’s compass (still thinking of them as alternates for that instrument). But in the manner of writing for instruments Mozart’s works show a real novelty. In the Mannheim symphonies the wood wind instruments usually doubled the string parts, but occasionally they were given long, sustained notes and the brass even went beyond mere ‘accent notes’ (_di rinforza_) to the extent of an occasional sustained note or any individual motive. Haydn and Mozart at first confirmed this practice, but in their later works they introduced a wholly new method, which Dr. Riemann calls ‘filigree work’ and which formed the basis of Beethoven’s orchestral style. ‘The idea to conceive the orchestra as a multiplicity of units, each of which may, upon proper occasion, interpose an essential word, without, however, protruding itself in the manner of a solo and thus disturbing in any way the true character of the symphonic ensemble, was foreign to the older orchestral music.’[47] A mere dialogue between individual instruments or bodies of instruments was, of course, nothing new, but the cutting up of a single melodic thread and having different instruments take it up alternately, as Haydn did, was an innovation, and immediately led to another step, viz., the interweaving of individual melodic sections, dove-tail fashion, thus:

and this in turn brought, with Mozart, the coöperation of _groups of instruments_ in such dove-tail formations, and led finally to the more sophisticated disposition of instrumental color, as in the second theme of the great G minor symphony:

This sort of figure has nothing in common with the old polyphony, in which there is always one predominating theme, shifting from one voice to another. The equal and independent participation of several differently colored voices in the polyphonic web is the characteristic feature of modern orchestral polyphony, the style of Beethoven and his successors down to Strauss.

To Mozart Dr. Riemann gives the credit for the first impulses to this free disposition of orchestral parts. It is evident, however, only in his last works, and notably the three great symphonies--the mighty ‘Jupiter’ (in C) with the great double fugue in the last movement, the radiantly cheerful E-flat, and the more deeply shaded, romantic G-minor, ‘the greatest orchestral composition of the eighteenth century,’ works which alone would have assured their creator’s immortality. It would be futile to attempt a description of these monumental creations, but we cannot forego a few general remarks about them. They preach the gospel of classicism in its highest perfection. Beauty of design was never more potent in art. It is Praxitelean purity of form warmed with delicate yet rich color. The expositions are as perfect in form as they are rich in content; the developments a world of iridescent color, of playful suggestions and sweet reminders. The clean-cut individuality of his themes, as eloquent as Wagner’s leit-motifs, so lend themselves to transmutation that a single motive of three notes, revealed in a thousand new aspects, suffices as thematic material for an entire development section. We refer to the opening theme of the G minor:

A fascinating character displayed in every conceivable circumstance and situation would be the literary equivalent of this. But often the characters are two or three, and sometimes strange faces appear and complicate the story.

Mozart is the master of subtle variants, of unexpected yet not unnatural turns in melody. His recapitulations therefore are rarely literal. The essence remains the same, but it is deliciously intensified by almost imperceptible means. Compare the second theme of the last movement of the G minor in its original form with its metamorphosis:

What infinite variety there is within the limits of these three symphonies! The allegros, now majestic, noble; now rhythmically alert, scintillant, joyous; now full of suggestions of destiny; the andantes sometimes grave or sad, sometimes a caressing supplication followed by radiant bliss; the finales triumphant or careless, a furious presto or a mighty fugue--it is a riot of beauty and a maze of delicate dreams. But nowhere is Mozart more himself than in his minuets. The minuet was his cradle song. The first one he wrote--at four--would have set the feet of gay salons to dancing, but later they took real meaning, became alive with more than rhythm. Whether they go carelessly romping through flowery fields, full of the effervescence of youth, as in the Jupiter symphony, whether they sway languidly in sensuous rhythms or race ahead in fretful flight, with themes flitting in and out in breathless pursuit, they are always irresistible. And what balmy consolation, what sweet reassurance there lies in his ‘trios.’ Haydn gave life to the minuet; Mozart gave it beauty.

The outstanding feature, however, not only of Mozart’s symphonies, but of all his instrumental music, is its peculiarly melodic quality, the constant sensuous grace of melody regardless of rhythm or speed. Other composers had achieved a cantabile quality in slow movements, but rarely in the allegros and prestos. Pergolesi, perhaps, came nearest to Mozart in this respect and there is no doubt that that side of Mozart’s inspiration was rooted in the vocal style of the Italians. Here, then, is the point of contact between symphony and opera. Mozart is the ‘conclusion, the final result of the strong influence which operatic song had exerted upon instrumental music since the beginning of the eighteenth century.’[48] On the other hand, Mozart brought symphonic elements into the opera, in which, so far, it had been lacking; and it is safe to say that only an ‘instrumental’ composer could have accomplished what Mozart accomplished in dramatic music.