This work consists of settings for soloists or choir and orchestra of a sequence of
Latin psalms. It was composed in 1779 when Mozart was 23 years old and
employed by Archbishop Colloredo of Salzburg as court and cathedral organist.
The Archbishop liked church music to be short and simple: he had imposed a
45-minute limit on masses and forbidden “operatic” arias and complex
counterpoint. Mozart’s music demonstrates what he was able to achieve even
when severely constrained.
In 1783, Mozart was in Vienna making his living as a freelance composer and
musician, an almost unprecedented feat in the 18th century. In May of 1781, he
had resigned from the service of the Archbishop of Salzburg, who had repeatedly
insulted him.
Back in Salzburg, Wolfgang’s father, Leopold, was appalled at his
son’s impetuousness, especially when Wolfgang married Constanze Weber without
his blessing on August 4th 1782.
On January 4th 1783, Wolfgang wrote a letter
to his father with New Year’s greetings and the following rather cryptic
remarks:
It is quite true about my moral obligation and indeed I let the word flow from my pen on purpose. I made the promise in my heart of hearts and hope to be able to keep it. When I made it, my wife was not yet married; yet, as I was absolutely determined to marry her after her recovery, it was easy for me to make it — but, as you yourself are aware, time and other circumstances made our journey impossible. The score of half a mass, which is still lying here waiting to be finished, is the best proof that I really made the promise.
The “half a mass” is what we now know as the Great Mass in C minor, the adjective
“great” being applied to distinguish it from a work in the same key composed by
Mozart when he was 12 years old. But what “moral obligation” was Mozart
talking about?
Apparently some illness of Constanze had delayed their
marriage, but the obligation seems to have involved a journey by the two of
them, and related in some way to a Mass that he, Wolfgang, had been
composing.
What seems most likely is that Wolfgang had promised his father that he and Constanze would visit Salzburg and perform there a Mass which he would compose and which would allow Constanze to demonstrate her vocal skills to the skeptical Leopold. But commentators have suggested many diverse interpretations of these remarks. It is somewhat ironic that, had this letter never been found, it would be perfectly clear why Mozart composed this Mass: to demonstrate, now that he was free of the Archbishop’s constraints, what great sacred music should have, that is, ornamented operatic-style arias and complex polyphonic choruses, the very features prohibited by his former employer.
Some historians have convinced themselves that Mozart must have been
influenced by J. S. Bach’s monumental Mass in B minor when he composed
K. 427. This isn’t impossible, but there seems to be no real evidence for the
conjecture. Mozart was exposed to Bach’s keyboard music and Handel’s choral
works at the home of Baron Gottfried van Swieten, a notable Viennese patron of
music, but it seems Bach’s choral music was not known to Mozart until later.
Here is an account by Friedrich Rochlitz of Mozart’s encounter with Bach’s
motet for double chorus Singet dem Herrn (BWV 225) in Leipzig in
1789:
Hardly had the choir sung a few measures when Mozart sat up, startled; a few measures more and he called out: “What is this?” And now his whole soul seemed to be in his ears. When the singing was finished he cried out, full of joy: “Now, there is something one can learn from!” He requested a copy and valued it very highly.
Although Rochlitz was sometimes imaginative in his Mozart anecdotes, a late 18th-century copy of Singet dem Herrn with notes in Mozart’s handwriting has turned up in the holdings of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna, so it seems that this particular anecdote should be given some credence, and if Mozart had in fact been familiar with the Mass in B minor in 1782, it is unlikely he would have been so startled by a Bach motet in 1789.
The inspiration for Mozart may have come from a Mass by Michael Haydn performed in Salzburg on November 1st 1777. The 75-minute duration of this performance must have annoyed the Archbishop; nevertheless, he later gave Haydn the position of court and cathedral organist when Mozart resigned, imploring him to “show more diligence” than “young Mozart.”
On June 17th 1783, Constanze gave birth to Raimund Leopold Mozart and in
July, Wolfgang and Constanze finally travelled to Salzburg to visit Leopold and
Wolfgang’s sister, Nanerrl, leaving the infant in the care of a nursemaid.
Performance of Wolfgang’s new Mass in Salzburg Cathedral, the domain of the
Archbishop, was out of the question, and so its first performance was in a
monastery church, St. Peter’s Abbey, on Sunday, October 26th 1783, with
Constanze singing the demanding soprano part and the court musicians
playing and singing the other parts, perhaps in defiance of the Archbishop’s
orders.
The music for the Mass that has come down to us is incomplete. It seems that Mozart was unable to complete the composition, possibly from grief on learning of the sudden death from dysentery of their first-born Raimund Leopold in Vienna on August 19th. Because performance of an incomplete Mass would have been liturgically unthinkable, it is presumed that Mozart used material from earlier compositions to fill in the gaps. In any case, Leopold and Nanerrl were unimpressed both by the music and by Constanze. The next day Wolfgang and Constanze returned to Vienna; he never returned to Salzburg and never saw Nanerrl again.
Why did Mozart not subsequently complete the composition and perform it in
Vienna where it might get a more favourable reception?
Unfortunately, Emperor
Joseph II, who had famously expressed the opinion that Mozart’s opera Die
Entfhrung aus dem Serail had “too many notes,” agreed with the Archbishop of
Salzburg on church music, and orchestral masses were forbidden. Even Joseph
Haydn composed no masses at all between 1782 and 1796. But in 1785,
Mozart was commissioned to compose music for a Lenten performance of
Davidde penitente, an Italian cantata; under pressure, he simply re-cycled
the music of the Kyrie and Gloria from K. 427, adding just two new
arias.
The music was well received and Leopold, in attendance, was pleased to see how warmly regarded Wolfgang was among the musical connoisseurs in Vienna. But until its re-discovery in the 20th century, there were no other performances of Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor, now considered (with Bach’s B minor Mass and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis) among the most impressive sacred works of music ever created.
R. D. Tennent