That may very well be so, but a Mass does not have to complete to be a
full-blown slap in the face of the ecclesiastical taste. And eccessive
melancholy has always been viewed with suspicion by the authorities. Still
is.
RT
From: "howard posner" <[email protected]>
Howard,
That's BS, because you should know that a goodly portion of the Mass
nicely predates the events in question, having been composed previously
as an oratorio "Davidde Penitente".
You have it backwards: the oratorio Davidde Penitente,K. 469, is a
contrafactum of parts of the C minor Mass. Mozart put the oratorio
together to meet a commission from the Wiener Tonkünstler-Societät in
1785, two years after he performed what he'd finished of the Mass.
And I distinctly recall a famous musicologist referring to the choice of
c-minor as a "slap in the face of excclesiastical taste".
I have no doubt that a musicologist would say something like that, and
absolutely no doubt that it was unsupported by any evidence that any
ecclesiastic in the 1780's said anything about having his face slapped.
RT
----- Original Message ----- From: "howard posner"
<[email protected]>
TOn Jul 2, 2011, at 7:01 PM, Roman Turovsky wrote:
In fact a public expression of feelings through the choice of c-minor
for his Great Mass did cost Mozart his job in Salzburg.
What cost Mozart his job in Salzburg was that he didn't want it. He
insisted that he be released, and it took months to finally settle the
issue, with the Archbishop's steward, Count Arco, urging him to stay
before famously kicking him out of the room in exasperation in May 1781.
The C minor Mass dates from two years later (such parts of it as managed
to finish were performed during a visit to Salzburg in 1783), and I'm
not aware that anyone remarked on the choice of key at the time.
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