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MOZART AND THE PRACTICE OF SACRED MUSIC, 1781-91 a ...

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suggests that Mozart took part in the procession and mass in order to make a good<br />

impression with the school’s authorities. 234<br />

The Piaristenkirche’s music, directed from 17<strong>91</strong>-94 by Pater Aloisius Vorsix (1752-<br />

1817), 235 was among the most extensive of such programs in the suburban churches of<br />

Vienna, and Mozart no doubt heard it during his two visits. The most well-known musical<br />

event in the Piaristenkirche’s history was the performance on 26 December 1796 of a Haydn<br />

mass, possibly the Missa in tempore belli, under the direction of the composer. As Joseph<br />

Richter reported in the Eipeldauer-Briefe, the performance was to honour the first mass<br />

celebrated by a priest, Joseph Hoffmann:<br />

Hernach bin ich die Täg beyn Piristen in der Kirchn gwesen. Dort hat ein braver geistlicher Herr<br />

sein Priminz ghalten, und da hat der berühmte Haiden d’Musik dazu gmacht, und da hab ich aus<br />

bsondrer Gnad ein Antrebilliet aufn Chor kriegt; denn sonst hätten s’mich in der Kirchen<br />

erdruckt. Herr Vetter in keiner Predig ists noch so voll gwesen, aber es ist auch der Müh werth<br />

gwesen, Herr Vetter: denn so ein schöne Musik hab ich fast noch in kein Theater ghört. 236<br />

Mozart’s motet Ave, verum corpus has become indelibly associated with Anton Stoll and the<br />

Baden Pfarrkirche. The autograph is dated “Baaden, li 17. di giunnio 17<strong>91</strong>”, although the<br />

Verzeichnüss dates it 18 June. There seems little doubt that it was intended for Corpus<br />

Christi given the proximity to the feast, although contemporary settings allowed for a wide<br />

range of uses. 237 But where was it performed? The usual assumption is that it was first heard<br />

in Baden on Corpus Christi, 23 June 17<strong>91</strong>. Mozart, in his letter to Stoll of late May 17<strong>91</strong><br />

had requested that the choirmaster find Constanze suitable lodgings for her forthcoming<br />

234 MBA, vi.416. Till is surely incorrect in his statement that Mozart “often” visited the Piarists; Nicholas Till,<br />

Mozart and the Enlightenment: Truth, Virtue, and Beauty in Mozart's Operas (New York: Norton, 1993), 128.<br />

235 Otto Biba, Der Piaristenorden in Osterreich. Seine Bedeutung für Bildende Kunst, Musik und Theater im 17.<br />

und 18. Jahrhundert, vol. 5, Jahrbuch für Österreichische Kulturgeschichte (Eisenstadt: Institut für österreichische<br />

Kulturgeschichte, 1975), 160. Vorsix’s birth and death dates are from the “Portheim-Katalog” in A-Wsa.<br />

236 Quoted in Ibid., 128-9.<br />

237 Other eighteenth-century settings designate Ave, verum corpus as an offertory or elevation motet, and<br />

strophic settings of it were sung during stations of the Corpus Christi procession.<br />

334

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