Mozart’s Requiem & Double Concerto Program Notes

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante in E-flat major, K. 364

World Premiere Unknown
30 Minutes

In addition to fortepiano, Mozart played violin and viola exceptionally well.
He composed his first opera, Apollo et Hyacinthus, when he was 11.
Mozart spoke German, Italian and French and knew a little English.
The 19th-century Austrian scholar Ludwig von Köchel catalogued Mozart’s music. That is the source of the “K.” numbers.

What exactly is a sinfonia concertante? As its name implies, the genre has roots in the Italian symphony and concerto and draws on both traditions to yield a unique synthesis. We may think of it as a post-Baroque concerto grosso for the late 18th century. Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante, K. 364, is justifiably among the best-known compositions with that title. Composed in 1779, his last year in Salzburg, it must be considered among his most important contributions to the concerto form.

A major component of the work’s appeal and mastery derive from Mozart’s intimate knowledge of both solo instruments. He probably played the viola part at its first performances in Salzburg. His growing maturity and genius are best observed in the magnificent C minor slow movement, whose ensemble writing for the two soloists (particularly in the cadenza) demands a summit of musicianship. And yet, the work’s outer movements burst with joy and enthusiasm, expressed with a confidence that belies authorship from a young man of only 23 years.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Requiem (Levin version)

World Premiere December 10, 1791; Vienna, Austria
46 Minutes

In December 1790, before leaving for London, Joseph Haydn spent his last day in Vienna with Mozart. When they parted, Mozart embraced his friend and said, “Papa, I fear that this will be our last farewell.” Haydn, no longer young at 59, took Mozart’s remark to be concerned for his welfare on such a long journey to a distant country. As it happened, Mozart’s words were prophetic of his own death. Haydn outlived his younger contemporary by 18 years and produced superb music in his old age. When he died in 1809, the work performed at his funeral was Mozart’s Requiem.

During the summer of 1791, he was hard at work with Emanuel Schikaneder on The Magic Flute. The new opera went into rehearsal in July. About the same time, a mysterious stranger presented himself to Mozart at his residence with an unusual assignment: a Requiem mass, to be composed and delivered as soon as possible. The stranger declined to identify himself or the originator of the commission and cautioned Mozart not to attempt to learn anything further about his employer.

We know these facts from written reports by Mozart’s contemporaries. Only after Mozart’s death did the full story emerge. Count Walsegg-Stuppach, an Austrian nobleman and music lover, fancied himself a composer. Lacking real talent, he often commissioned works by well-known composers for private performance, recopying the works to pass them off as his own.

In February 1791, the Count’s wife died. Stricken, Walsegg-Stuppach resolved to secure a Requiem to be performed annually on the anniversary of her death. He sent the messenger to Mozart with the request, instructing his representative to maintain secrecy.

Following his return from Prague in September of 1791, Mozart resumed work on the Requiem. The unidentified emissary called on him repeatedly to check on its progress. Unable to determine the origin of the eerie commission and drained from overwork, Mozart became convinced that a messenger from the netherworld had been sent and that he was composing his own Requiem.

At this point, Mozart’s health deteriorated. With the assistance of a composition student, Franz Xaver Süssmayr, he sketched several movements, orchestrating the first few measures of some, concentrating on the vocal lines and providing only limited instrumental detail in others. At Mozart’s death on December 5, the Requiem lay incomplete.

Constanze Mozart was unable to collect the fee owed to her late husband until the missing parts were completed. She approached several Viennese composers, eventually settling for Süssmayr, who had worked closely with Mozart during his last months.

One of Süssmayr’s cleverest ploys to conceal the participation of a second composer was to conclude the work with the repetition of the music heard at the beginning. Mozart had used this same type of self-quotation in earlier masses, so the tactic was stylistically consistent and very convincing. So successful was Süssmayr’s reconstruction and completion that the Requiem has become one of the most frequently performed choral works in the classical repertoire. Also because of Süssmayr, the Requiem is a thorny topic in Mozart scholarship, with musicologists and performers debating how much of the music is Mozart’s and how much is his gifted student’s. The Requiem’s inherent beauty and remarkable contrapuntal skill assure its following, regardless of questions about authenticity.

The overall impact of the work is heightened by the relationship of each movement to the next. Mozart’s subtle migration between tonal centers and his negotiation between major and minor modes exercise psychological power. But the sound that rings in our ears for hours afterward is the vigorous fugue of the Kyrie, repeated at the end of the work for the Cum sanctis tuis. Its resolution on stark open fifths, unsweetened by a major third and unmitigated by even a D-minor chord, is a reminder that this is funereal music.

Sinfonia concertante in E-flat major, K. 364

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Born January 27, 1756, in Salzburg, Austria · Died December 5, 1791, in Vienna, Austria

What exactly is a sinfonia concertante? As its name implies, the genre has roots in the Italian symphony and concerto and draws on both traditions to yield a unique synthesis. In some ways, we may think of it as a post-Baroque concerto grosso for the late 18th century. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians defines it as:

… a concert genre of the late 18th and early 19th centuries for solo instruments – usually two, three or four, but on occasion as many as seven or even nine – with orchestra. The term implies ‘symphony with important and extended solo parts,’ but the form is closer to concerto than symphony.

Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante in E-flat major, K. 364, is justifiably among the best-known compositions with that title. Composed in 1779, his last year in Salzburg, it must be considered among his most important contributions to the concerto form, second only to the incomparable mature piano concerti and the late Clarinet Concerto, K. 622. It eclipses the charming but youthful violin concerti (all composed in the mid-1770s) and surpasses the four horn concerti written for Joseph Leutgeb by virtue of its larger scale and profound slow movement.

A major component of the Sinfonia concertante’s appeal and mastery derive from Mozart’s intimate knowledge of both solo instruments. It is quite likely that he played the viola part of this work at its first performances in Salzburg. His growing maturity and genius are best observed in the magnificent C minor slow movement, whose ensemble writing for the two soloists (particularly in the cadenza) demands a summit of musicianship. Mozart’s biographer Eric Blom has called K. 364,

… a beautiful, dark-colored work in which a passion not at all suited to an archiepiscopal court, and perhaps disclosing active revolt against it, seems to smoulder under a perfectly decorous style and exquisite proportions.

And yet, the work’s outer movements burst with joy and enthusiasm, expressed with a confidence that belies authorship from a young man of only 23 years.

Instrumentation: The score calls for two oboes, two horns, solo violin, solo viola and strings.

A word on Mozart’s name

Mozart was born in Salzburg on January 27, 1756, and died in Vienna December 5, 1791, not quite 36 years old. He was baptized with the names Joannes Chrysost[omus] Wolfgangus Theophilus. His parents gave him the names Johann and Chrysostom because he was born on that saint’s day. Wolfgang was the first name of Mozart’s maternal grandfather. The name Theophilus (Greek for ‘beloved of God’) came from his godfather, Joannes Theophilus Pergmayr, a Salzburg businessman and local official. Days after the boy’s birth, Leopold referred to his infant son as Gottlieb (the German for Theophilus). Amadeus is the Latinate form.

In letters, the composer signed his name variously as Mozart, W.A. Mozart, Wolfg. Amad. Mozart, MZT, Wolf. Amdè Mozart and, most frequently, Wolfgang Amadè Mozart. As a boy in Italy, he occasionally signed in the Italianate spelling Wolfgango Amadeo. Despite Peter Shaffer’s stage play Amadeus and Miloš Forman’s even more popular film, Mozart did not use the name Amadeus.

In recent years, the spelling Wolfgang Amadè Mozart has supplanted the Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in common usage and printed programs. The glory of his music remains unchanged.

Requiem (Levin version)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

A poignant farewell

In December 1790, Joseph Haydn left Austria for London with the violinist and entrepreneur Johann Peter Salomon. He spent his last day in Vienna with Mozart. When they parted, Mozart embraced his friend and said, “Papa, I fear that this will be our last farewell.” Haydn, no longer young at 59, took Mozart’s remark to be concerned for his welfare on such a long journey to a distant country. As it happened, Mozart’s words were prophetic of his own death. Haydn outlived his younger contemporary by 18 years and produced superb music in his old age. When he died in 1809, the work performed at his funeral was the Mozart Requiem.

Mysterious commission

Mozart rarely composed without a specific commission, and the Requiem was no exception. During the summer of 1791, he was hard at work with Emanuel Schikaneder on The Magic Flute. The new opera went into rehearsal in July. About the same time, a mysterious stranger presented himself to Mozart at his residence, with an unusual assignment: a Requiem mass, to be composed and delivered as soon as possible. The stranger declined to identify himself or the originator of the commission and cautioned Mozart not to attempt to learn anything further about his employer.

We know these facts from written reports by Mozart’s contemporaries, including his widow Constanze and her second husband, Georg Nikolaus Nissen, who was one of Mozart’s first biographers. Only after Mozart’s death did the full story emerge. Count Walsegg-Stuppach, an Austrian nobleman and music lover, fancied himself a composer. Lacking real talent, he often commissioned works by well-known composers for private performance, recopying the works to pass them off as his own.

Distraction: a royal commission for an opera

Needing money, Mozart accepted the project and set to work, then put the Requiem aside when Emperor Leopold II was to be crowned King of Bohemia. For that occasion, Mozart was asked to compose an opera seria. Composing with lightning speed, he completed most of La clemenza di Tito in an astonishing 18 days before traveling to Prague to supervise rehearsals and the premiere. His frenetic pace included ongoing work preparing for The Magic Flute’s opening. One starts to understand the extreme degree of nervous exhaustion that compromised his health.

Mental and physical health problems

At this point, Mozart’s health deteriorated. Battling dizziness, headaches, swelling and nausea, he continued to work on the Requiem. With the assistance of a composition student, Franz Xaver Süssmayr (1766-1803), he sketched several movements, orchestrating the first few measures of some, concentrating on the vocal lines, providing only limited instrumental detail in others. At Mozart’s death on December 5, the Requiem lay incomplete.

Widow’s work

About the music

Such an embarrassment of riches graces the Requiem that singling out individual movements is gratuitous. The overall impact of the work is heightened by the relationship of each movement to the next. Mozart’s subtle migration between tonal centers and his negotiation between major and minor modes exercise psychological power. But the sound that rings in our ears for hours afterward is the dark, vigorous fugue of the Kyrie, repeated at the end of the work for the Cum sanctis tuis. Its resolution on stark open fifths, unsweetened by a major third and unmitigated by even a D-minor chord, is a reminder that this is funereal music.

Mozart, the movies and misconceptions

Thanks to Peter Shaffer’s award-winning play Amadeus (1979) and Milos Forman’s remarkable film (1984) based on the play, Mozart’s character and music have been absorbed into mainstream culture. Reinforcement came in 1991 with the bicentennial observation of Mozart’s death, and in 2006, when festivals worldwide celebrated his 250th birthday.

A singular benefit of these Mozart phenomena has been more widespread familiarity with Mozart’s music, which continues in unabated popularity on piano recitals, in concert halls, opera houses and elsewhere. This ubiquity has spawned a generation of new Mozart-lovers, who are discovering the beauty and variety of his works for the first time. But any popularization is something of a double-edged sword. Unfortunately, in hand with this exposure have been a number of misconceptions and factual errors about the circumstances of Mozart’s life and death.

Nowhere is this problem more evident or more acute than in the case of the Requiem, K. 626. Shaffer’s play and Forman’s film adjusted characters and situations for maximum dramatic and cinematic effect. Inevitably, this resulted in some distortion of what actually took place (for example, Antonio Salieri took no part in completing the Requiem, as the movie implies). Truth is indeed stranger than fiction, and the circumstances surrounding the composition of the Requiem are so remarkable that no embellishment is necessary.

Instrumentation: two bassoons, two basset horns (played by clarinets in most modern performances), two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, organ, soprano, alto, tenor and bass soloists, mixed chorus and strings.