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

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een written by Wolfgang to his father in <strong>1781</strong>-2 are now missing. 83 The best we can do in<br />

these circumstances is to construct reasonable inferences and conjectures based on the small<br />

amount of surviving material.<br />

Between <strong>1781</strong> and the introduction of the Gottesdienstordnung in April 1783, Mozart<br />

was connected with at least two Viennese churches, although the precise extent of these<br />

contacts is unknown. The first of these is St. Stephen’s Cathedral, site of Mozart and<br />

Constanze’s marriage on 4 August 1782. As we have seen at the beginning of this chapter,<br />

the choice of venue was determined by the residence of the bride, and the hurried<br />

circumstances of the wedding were preceded by discussions between Mozart, Constanze’s<br />

guardian Johann Thorwart, and the St. Stephen’s authorities. 84 The issue of Constanze’s<br />

residence may have caused some trouble for Mozart: the list of his Viennese residences in the<br />

marriage entry at the Cathedral does not mention all the locations at which he is known to<br />

have lived, and Frau Weber’s apartment is documented only as a residence “unter dem<br />

Tuchlauben.” This may imply that Mozart was concealing the fact of his earlier co-<br />

habitation with his future bride and her family during <strong>1781</strong>. 85<br />

In contrast to the splendours of St. Stephen’s, the other church Mozart is known to<br />

have attended in <strong>1781</strong>-3 maintained a much lower profile. The visit of the Salzburg court to<br />

Vienna in early <strong>1781</strong> coincided with the season of Lent, and among its observances was a<br />

communion administered on Maundy Thursday by Archbishop Colloredo himself. 86 This<br />

83 MBA, iii.161, iii.212, iii.230, iii.243. See also Ruth Halliwell, The Mozart Family: Four Lives in a Social<br />

Context (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 351-2, 649-50 for discussion of this problem and evidence that MBA<br />

likely underestimates the number of lost letters written in the first half of <strong>1781</strong>.<br />

84 See Chapter Four. The marriage contract, signed on 3 August, is now in GB-Lbl, Zweig 69. For a colour<br />

facsimile of the last page see the exhibition catalogue, Mozart: Prodigy of Nature (New York: Pierpont Morgan<br />

Library and London: British Library, 19<strong>91</strong>), 57.<br />

85 Vienna, Pfarrarchiv St. Stephan, Copulations-Buch Tom. 74, f. 270, transcription in Deutsch, Dokumente,<br />

180-81.<br />

86 Where this service took place is unfortunately unknown. One possibility is the Church of St. Elisabeth<br />

(Deutschordenskirche), which adjoined the building in which the Salzburg court was staying.<br />

40

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