by Glover, Jane
After the great success of Ascanio in Alba, Leopold delayed their departure from Milan. He was still desperately trying to find permanent employment in Italy: this after all had been the ultimate aim of all the Italian trips. In his letters to Maria Anna he concocted a series of stories about bad rheumatism and other ailments, which prevented him from travelling (for this was the narrative to be circulated throughout Salzburg), and all the while he was hanging on in the hope of receiving good news. Evidently unaware of the reputation he had acquired, he believed his Habsburg connections in Milan and Florence might bring some prestigious offer for Wolfgang and himself. And at least one Archduke did actually consider it. No doubt pleased with his wedding serenata, Archduke Ferdinand suggested to his mother Maria Theresa that he should give Wolfgang a job in Milan. On 12 December 1771, the Empress’s reply was blistering:
You ask me to take the young Salzburger into your service. I do not know why, not believing that you have need of a composer or of useless people. If however it would give you pleasure, I have no wish to hinder you. What I say is intended only to prevent you burdening yourself with useless people and giving titles to people of that sort. If they are in your service it degrades that service when these people go about the world like beggars. Besides, he has a large family.65
Not surprisingly, Ferdinand dropped the whole idea.
So although Leopold and Wolfgang began their return journey with some remnants of optimism (‘the affair is not quite hopeless,’66 Leopold wrote), in fact they had no prospects at all. They arrived back in Salzburg on 15 December 1771 and on the following day Archbishop Schrattenbach died. The era of the supportive employer was over.
THERE WERE THEN ten months of family life at home. Wolfgang and Nannerl resumed their music-making, and he wrote the first of his piano duets, the sonata in D, K381 (123a), for them to play together. This most basic form of chamber music, for two players at one keyboard, their bodies touching, their hands intertwined, became for later composers a vehicle not just for shared expression and virtuosity, but also for flirtation and seduction. (Schubert was particularly enthusiastic about this aspect of the activity.) But for Nannerl and Wolfgang, physical proximity was entirely uninhibited and familiar. They had played and performed together throughout their childhood, and this D major piano duet can be seen as a touching portrait of their sibling relationship at this later stage of their lives. Quite apart from Wolfgang’s enjoyment of the whole range of the keyboard being shared through the dimensions of four hands rather than two, and his continuing invention with regard to colour, texture and the exploration of keys, the duet has a lively conversational style, punctuated with wit and cheeky humour (the return to the recapitulation in the last movement positively chuckles), and a slow movement of tender poignancy. It is significant that there is absolute parity between the Primo and Secondo parts: as a player, Nannerl was entirely Wolfgang’s equal. They derived great pleasure from playing their new sonata, and no doubt gave the same to their listening parents.
At Court, Schrattenbach’s successor was appointed. The new Archbishop was Count Hieronymus Franz de Paula Colloredo, son of the Imperial Vice-Chancellor. Like Joseph II himself, he was a man of the Enlightenment, who encouraged scholarship and freedom of enquiry, but at the same time resisted excessive decoration in ecclesiastical buildings and similarly preferred his church music to be simple and unadorned. One of his first tasks was to reform the musical household he had inherited, for in Schrattenbach’s last years disciplines and standards had slackened considerably. Domenico Fischietti was appointed as a second Kapellmeister, equal in status to the current incumbent, Giuseppe Francesco Lolli – a move to which Leopold took the greatest exception. Despite his prolonged absence from Salzburg over the years, he had somehow assumed that the next promotion of this type was bound to be his own. Leopold never really recovered from being passed over, and held Colloredo, together with Fischietti, Lolli and indeed all Italian composers, in barely concealed contempt from then on. In his eyes his new employer had not got off to a good start. Leopold’s seething resentment must have created an uncomfortable atmosphere in the tiny Getreidegasse apartment.
But despite this hostility towards usurping Italians, Leopold and Wolfgang did have one more Italian journey to make. After the success of Mitridate for the 1771 Carnival, Wolfgang had been commissioned to write another opera for 1773. And so, for the third and last time, father and son made the long trip through the Dolomites to Milan in October 1772. The women, as usual, remained at home.
In comparison with the elated excitement of the last two visits, this final Italian sojourn was considerably more muted. Wolfgang was under great pressure with the composition of his opera Lucio Silla, K135, and Leopold’s job-seeking energies had lost their edge of true conviction. Maria Anna must have noticed her husband’s genuinely deteriorating spirits. In November he hinted at homesickness and depression: ‘. . . now that I have been here for almost a fortnight, some trifling disorders have begun to plague me again; indeed I drop into thinking about Salzburg and, without noticing it, I go on brooding for some time.’67 And a week later, in an isolated flash of true tenderness towards his wife, he acknowledged: ‘Today is the anniversary of our wedding day. It was twenty-five years ago, I think, that we had the sensible idea of getting married, one we had cherished, it is true, for many years. All good things take time!’68
If Maria Anna noticed these changes in her husband, Nannerl may not yet have perceived any in her brother. Almost out of habit he continued the shared sibling secrets (‘I thank you, you know for what’69 on 21 November) and games (‘I have learnt a new game here in Milan, called Mercante in fiera, and as soon as I come home, we shall play it’70 on 5 December). There were puzzle-letters too. On 16 January he wrote to tell his sister about a new commission, for his motet ‘Exsultate, jubilate’, K165 (158a), (‘I have to compose a motet for the primo uomo which will be performed tomorrow at the Theatine Church’), only he scrambled the order of his words: ‘I for have the primo a uomo motet compose which to tomorrow at Church the Theatine performed be will.’71 He still wanted to show off to Nannerl. In one letter, of 18 December, every other line was written upside down, there was a comic drawing, and much repetition of the phrases ‘dear sister’ and ‘my child’, almost like a musical leitmotif. But these flourishes of exuberance were now less frequent, and were perhaps conduits for the release of his own nervous tension (the 18 December letter was written immediately before the premiere of Lucio Silla), as was to be increasingly the case later in his life. His cheeky physicality was still there (‘Please please, my dear sister, something is biting me. Do come and scratch me’72 – whatever that meant); but so too were his touching homesickness and vulnerability. ‘We kiss Mamma 100,000 times (I did not bring any more noughts with me) and I kiss Mamma’s hands and prefer to embrace my sister in person than in imagination.’73
Perhaps Wolfgang too was now disenchanted with the huge labour, ultimately unrewarded, of operas for Milan, and fundamentally alarmed about his immediate lack of prospects. For indeed he had none. And by 13 March 1773, when the family was again reunited in Salzburg, they must surely have stared at one an other and wondered what to do next. Leopold’s salary was meagre, especially in comparison with those of his superior colleagues, and he resented ‘every kreuzer spent in Salzburg’. At the very least, Nannerl should start teaching too. Leopold had written to Maria Anna on 12 December, ‘I send greetings to Nannerl and a message urging her to practise hard and to teach little Zezi conscientiously. I know well that she herself will benefit if she accustoms herself to teaching someone else very thoroughly and patiently. I am not writing this without a motive.’74 But for Wolfgang, since he had failed to secure any employment in Italy, it was perhaps time to have another try in Vienna itself.
‘IN JULY 1773 the father made a short visit with the son to Vienna, in October they came back.’75 Even taking into account Nannerl’s customary telegraphic style, the baldness of this 1792 reco
llection speaks volumes. Nothing was achieved. The timing was not good: many people were away from the capital during the summer months. But Leopold was determined to go anyway, and equally determined that, once more, it would be far too expensive to bring the women along too. So Maria Anna could only read about their staying with old friends (the Mesmers) in lovely accommodation, meeting other friends who asked fondly after her and Nannerl and expressed surprise that they were not in Vienna too. Again Leopold was carelessly mean-spirited in justifying his actions: ‘If I had known Frau von Mesmer’s circumstances, which, as you know were very doubtful, I could have brought you both with us. But not only was it not possible for me to know them, there were other difficulties.’76 His grumpiness continued when Maria Anna did not think to make use of a Salzburg visitor to Vienna to bring something he might need (‘did no shimmer of an idea occur to you, prompting you to make use of this convenient opportunity and send a cloth travelling coat of mine?’77). He was bad-tempered again after the Empress granted another cool audience to the Mozarts: ‘Her Majesty the Empress was very gracious to us, but that was all.’78 (Little did Leopold realize her true feelings towards them.) Poor Maria Anna was as usual the ultimate repository for all Leopold’s anxieties and frustrations.
But Wolfgang at least was in cheerful spirits now that he was away from Salzburg, and he shared these with his sister in his usual eccentric way. Just as his musical composition frequently teases the ear by delaying the perfect cadence, instead spinning ever more intriguing departures from the home key, so his epistolary composition effortlessly pursued all manner of diversion, to delay the full stop. His letter of 14 August, where in addressing her as his ‘queen’ he surely refers to their imagined childhood realm, the ‘Kingdom of Back’, is a case in point:
I hope, my queen, that you are enjoying the highest degree of health and that now and then or rather, sometimes, or, better still, occasionally, or, even better still, qualche volta, as the Italians say, you will sacrifice for my benefit some of your important and intimate thoughts, which ever proceed from that very fine and clear reasoning power, which in addition to your beauty, and although from a woman, and particularly from one of such tender years, almost nothing of the kind is ever expected, you possess, O queen, so abundantly as to put men and even graybeards to shame. There now, you have a well-turned sentence. Farewell.79
He might sign his name backwards (‘Gnagflow Trazom’), or send his sister one line, but in four languages: ‘Hodie nous avons begegnet per strada Dominum Edelbach, welcher uns di voi compliments ausgerichtet hat, et qui sich tibi et ta mère empfehlen lässt. Addio.’80 (‘Today we met in the street Herr Edelbach who has given us your compliments, and who asks to be remembered to you and your mother. Farewell.’) He asked after the dog, and sent greetings from ‘Her Majesty the Empress’. And all the while, according to his father, he was composing enthusiastically, and had some of his music performed, including his Dominicus Mass (K66), which Leopold conducted at the Jesuits’ Church. Although there was no sign of a permanent job for him, he clearly felt energized and at home in Vienna.
Leopold and Wolfgang returned to Salzburg empty-handed, in September 1773. And then the family did make one enormous change in their lives, which somewhat belied Leopold’s constant carping about money: they finally left the small apartment in Getreidegasse. They had wanted to move for some time. As early as 1765, when his young children were well into their boisterous years, Leopold had continually shown anxiety about the lack of space for the family and the hoards of acquisitions from their Grand Tour. But with Wolfgang and Leopold away from Salzburg so much between 1769 and 1773, Maria Anna and Nannerl had in fact been quite comfortable in the small Getreidegasse apartment. It was only after the three Italian journeys and the 1773 Vienna trip had all failed to secure the job that would take the family away from Salzburg altogether, that a move to a larger space was recognized as being not merely desirable but essential. So Leopold entered into negotiations with Anna Maria Raab, who owned the Tanzmeisterhaus in Hannibalplatz (now Makartplatz) on the other side of the river, and rented from her a spacious eight-room apartment on the first floor. With its large main room (the former dancing master’s hall) serving as a magnificent music room, and its small garden at the back where they could play skittles or Bölzlschiessen (a form of darts shot with air-guns at specially designed targets), the Mozarts regularly entertained their friends and acquaintances here. If they had become resigned to being in Salzburg, at least they were now living in some considerable style.
Family life in the new home continued for just over a year. Wolfgang wrote another piano duet, K358 (186c) in B flat, for himself and Nannerl to play. And like his father he toed the Salzburg line at Court, writing the sort of music that would please his new employer – concertos, serenatas and well-behaved, old-fashioned Masses. But he did receive a most welcome commission, to write an opera (La finta giardiniera, K196) for Munich in the coming Carnival season. Colloredo gave him and his father permission to go, and even planned to attend a performance himself. And at last Leopold agreed that Nannerl, who had been so longing to travel again, should be allowed to join them for the opera’s premiere. Only Maria Anna would remain in Salzburg while the rest of her family were away.
Wolfgang and Leopold arrived in Munich on 9 December. Wolfgang was invigorated by his new opportunity and resumed his high spirits, expressing them to Nannerl, together with his feelings about pretty girls (he was now almost nineteen), in his usual flamboyant way: ‘Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Amadeus Sigismundus Mozartus Mariae Annae Mozartae matri et sorori, ac amicis omnibus, praesertimque pulchris virginibus, ac freillibus, gratiosisque freillibus.’81 (‘Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Amadeus Sigismundus Mozartus sends many greetings to the Maria Anna Mozarts, mother and sister, and to all his friends, and especially to the pretty girls, and Fräuleins, and gracious Fräuleins.’) Nannerl herself was to join her father and brother three weeks later, by which time Leopold would have found suitable accommodation for her. This proved to be more problematic than he had anticipated – he was of course very fussy – and he even suggested at one point that Nannerl should not come to Munich at all. (How tantalizing it must have been for poor Nannerl to read that.) But Leopold did eventually find something appropriate, and then concentrated on issuing her with the most detailed instructions about absolutely everything else. ‘Nannerl must certainly have a fur rug for the journey, or she will not be able to stand the cold in the half-open coach. She must wrap up her head well and she must protect her feet with something more than felt shoes only, which after a time do not keep out the cold. She ought therefore to slip on the fur boots which she will find in the trunk under the roof’,82 and so on. (Did he really think that Maria Anna and Nannerl could not have thought of these things for themselves? Nannerl was twenty-three years old.) He told her what to do about her hair, her make-up, which music to bring and which pieces she should especially practise – he was clearly expecting her to perform too in Munich. And at the last minute he also told her to bring ‘five or six copies of the copper engraving of our Paris portrait’.83 This Carmontelle painting had of course been done eleven years previously, when the children were twelve and seven, and surely had no relevance now to either Wolfgang’s or Nannerl’s abilities. But for poor Leopold, perhaps it still defined his own position in his son’s life, and so he required several copies of it to give to his Munich acquaintances.
Nannerl arrived, with her bulging trunks and two girlfriends, on 4 January 1775, and Wolfgang was delighted to see her: ‘She is drinking coffee with Wolfgang at this very moment,’84 reported Leopold to Maria Anna. She was still her brother’s best friend, and he had much to share with her. She sent the briefest of notes to her mother to confirm her arrival, but kept a daily diary (now lost) of her activities, which she would read out to Maria Anna on her return. Her only other letter home was written at the very end of her stay, when she asked after her pet birds and her pupils (in that order). For all her
elaborate preparation and practising, there is no evidence that she ever did take part in any music-making, public or private. But she had a thrilling time, attending Wolfgang’s premiere, going on visits to castles and palaces, to many balls and dances (dressed as an Amazon for one of them), and generally getting caught up in the whole whirl of Munich Carnival. ‘We are never at home the whole day long,’85 Leopold recounted.
It was Wolfgang himself who sent his mother an account of his opera’s success. He alone seemed to realize that she must have felt left out of a glorious family occasion, and therefore included her by his detailed description of it.
Thank God! My opera was performed yesterday, the 13th, for the first time and was such a success that it is impossible for me to describe the applause to Mamma. In the first place, the whole theatre was so packed that a great many people were turned away. Then after each aria there was a terrific noise, clapping of hands and cries of ‘Viva Maestro’. Her Highness the Electress and the Dowager Electress (who were sitting opposite me) also called out ‘Bravo’ to me. After the opera was over and during the pause when there is usually silence until the ballet begins, people kept on clapping all the time and shouting ‘Bravo’; now stopping, now beginning again and so on. Afterwards I went off with Papa to a certain room through which the Elector and the whole Court had to pass and I kissed the hands of the Elector and Electress and Their Highnesses, who were all very gracious. Early this morning His Grace the Bishop of Chiemsee sent me a message, congratulating me on the extraordinary success of my opera. I fear that we cannot return to Salzburg very soon and Mamma must not wish it, for she knows how much good it is doing me to be able to breathe freely.’86