# Mozart - Easy as that



## Craig Duke (Apr 1, 2006)

_I thought this might be of interest. There currently exists more than 100 letters (maybe more), as I recall, written by Mozart. I have read many of them and find them of quite interest. Some of his letters are very racy and profain at times (even more interesting). Historians say Mozart's letters are unstudied and written only for the person who received the letter and not, like with some composers, for posterity (Wagner for instance). Mozart wrote this letter to a certain baron who had made him a gift of wine. Its was in response to the baronâ€™s questions about Mozart's method of composing. I do not know its date. _

"When I am, as it were, completely myself, entirely alone, and of good cheer -- say traveling in a carriage, or walking after a good meal, or during the night when I cannot sleep: it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly. Whence and how they come, I know not; nor can I force them. Those ideas that please me I keep in my memory, and am accustomed, as I have been told, to hum them to myself. If I continue in this way, it soon occurs to me how I may turn this or that morsel to account, so as to make a good dish of it, that is to say, agreeably to the rules of counterpoint, to the peculiarities of the various instruments, etc.

"All this inspires my soul, and provided I am not disturbed, my subject enlarges itself, becomes methodized and defined, and the whole, though it be long, stands almost complete and finished in my mind, so that I can survey it, like a fine picture or a beautiful statue, at a glance. No do I hear in my imagination the parts successively, but I hear them, as it were all at once (gleich alles zusammen). What a delight this is I cannot tell! All this inventing, this producing takes place in a pleasing lively dream. Still the actual hearing of the tout ensemble is after all the best. What has been thus produced I do no easily forget, and this is perhaps the best give I have my Divine Maker to thank for.

"When I proceed to write down my ideas, I take out of the bag of my memory, if I may use that phrase, what has been previously collected into it in the way I have mentioned. For this reason the committing to paper is done quickly enough, for everything is as I said before already finished and rarely differs on paper from what it was in my imagination. At this occupation I can therefore suffer myself to be disturbed; for whatever may be going on around me, I write, and even talk, but only of fowls and geese, or of Gretel or Barbel, or some such matters. But what my productions take from my hand that particular form and style that makes them Mozart's, and different from the works of other composers, is probably owning to the same cause which render my nose so large aquiline, or in short, make it Mozart's, and different from those of other people. For I don't study or aim at an originality."

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

So, I guess Mozart would have had no use for a sample library. Bethoveen on the other hand ...


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## jibrish (Apr 1, 2006)

Craig,

This is my first post here. I have been over at NSS for awhile and saw a reference to this forum posted by Doug Wellington.

Thanks for posting this letter, I have heard (or read) reference to it but had never seen the text.

Do you happen to know a source (on the web) that might have more of the same?

Thanks again.


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## Craig Duke (Apr 1, 2006)

jibrish wrote:

_This is my first post here. I have been over at NSS for awhile and saw a reference to this forum posted by Doug Wellington.

Thanks for posting this letter, I have heard (or read) reference to it but had never seen the text._

[cd] I had also heard it for through the years and had never seen it in writing. I was looking through my library the other day and came across the book Letters of WGM." I decided to re-read it and found this letter in the Editor's Preface (which I had apparently skipped over the last time).

_Do you happen to know a source (on the web) that might have more of the same?_

[cd] I'm not sure about a web source but the book it "Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" selected and edited by Hans Mersmann ($6.95). It's a lot of fun and includes many Leopold letter as well. I do understand that some think it is a fake, but not others.


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## Doug Wellington (Apr 1, 2006)

jibrish @ Sat Apr 01 said:


> This is my first post here. I have been over at NSS for awhile and saw a reference to this forum posted by Doug Wellington.


Welcome to VI Control!!!


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## jibrish (Apr 4, 2006)

Craig,

Thanks for the reply and additional information. I must admit my biographical collection is much better on Beethoven than Mozart.

Doug,

Thanks much for the welcome, and the tip on this forum. It looks like a really good resource.

Also, really suprised at the quality of some of the composer's websites I have been able to check out so far.


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## Hannes_F (Apr 12, 2006)

Craig,

very interesting. Is there any info about which letter it was exactly?


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## Craig Duke (Apr 14, 2006)

Hannes_F, I found this article about the letter to Baron Pulini:

http://www.mozartforum.com/Lore/article.php?id=108

"Perhaps the most flagrant of these is the â€œLetter to Baron von P---â€ mentioned above. While coming to the attention of readers of the AMZ in 1815, this letter was considered dubious at best by Otto Jahn in his biography of Mozart issued 37 years later. Further research has only confirmed Jahnâ€™s comments, yet portions of this letter continue to be quoted as representing Mozartâ€™s personal statements on how he composed. Undoubtedly, some writers simply canâ€™t pass up a good story, while others are willing to use quotes from this letter on the assumption that since there appears to be no hard, definitive proof that it is a fake, a benefit of the doubt is in order."
...

"What we can say is that Mozart was one of the most creative musicians the world has yet seen, and it would not be surprising, given his level of genius, that what would seem an incredible amount of work for an "average" composer would come much easier for someone with such talent, memory and- largely thanks to his father- such a complete musical education. Perhaps the best example of the way he could compose things so well so quickly would be in the improvisational performances he gave that so impressed his listeners. Obviously it is unfortunate that recording equipment of any kind wasn't around yet to capture these events.

In total, there are hundreds of sketches, drafts, manuscripts and fragments remaining that show Mozart worked, reworked, rejected and modified his musical ideas. As well, we have testimony that Mozart wrote down musical ideas while in public view; all of these facts stand as proof that he did not ordinarily create music complete in his head, and then write it all out without changes. Some of these remnant works clearly belong to compositions we know, others may or may not be related to the works we have from Mozart, and many are probably ideas for works that never got written out. The remaining fragments, drafts and sketches are being collected and published, as well as issued on CDs. Considering the circumstances, it is frankly amazing how many of these fragments, sketches, drafts and cross-outs are still remaining. Considering that most of what we have dates from Mozartâ€™s Vienna decade, there must have been many more from the Salzburg years. Either he threw those efforts away as being unworthy of what he was now capable of, or Leopold/Nannerl perhaps cleared them out once Wolfgang established himself in Vienna. Certainly, once Leopold died and Wolfgang sparred with Nannerl over being sent his remaining scores from Salzburg, the early material almost certainly was thrown out."

So, it's false that Mozart rarely sketched or corrected his works, or even rewrote at least some written out movements. For the latter, we have many remaining manuscripts that show cross-outs and additions. Actually, there is no real firm answer one way or another. I believe that Mozart was certainly capable of composing complete items in his head and then laying out the works on paper. The â€œLinzâ€ Symphony K. 425 may be the best-known large-scale example. But, did he do this every time? No. Some works had to have flowed very smoothly for him and thus went from his head to his hands finished; others required good old trial and error.

Thus, the fragments and sketches indicate that he in fact must have needed to place some ideas down on paper before moving to a finished product. Obviously, one can see from the opera scores and letters we have that those works took months of effort; they didn't "gush" forth from him. Research by Alan Tyson shows that Mozart appears to have stopped and started many works; hardly indicative of someone with a completely formed work in his mind. One might remember that the manuscript of the overture to Figaro had a slow center section started, then omitted. The struggle to create an effective "Oracle" scene in the opera Idomeneo as well comes to mind.

Finally, in the letter of 5 April 1778, from Mozart's mother to Leopold, reporting their progress in Paris, she writes about their living quarters: "The hall and the stairs are so narrow that it would be impossible to bring up a clavier. So Wolfgang can't compose at home, but has to go to the house of Monsieur Le Gros who has one." In the previous letter she mentions that without a clavier, Wolfgang is bored. So, at least at that point in time, he didn't amuse himself by sitting at home composing in his head and then writing out completed works, he appears to have used the clavier to try out material. Otto Jahn as well notes an anecdote by a barber who attended Mozart that the composer rarely sat still and was often getting up to try ideas on the keyboard.

I'm sure both methods came into play over the course of Mozart's 850 some-odd works. But, to prove which method applies to which work is, I think, impossible to say for the great majority of them, unless we in fact have separate material (such as sketches, fragments, etc.) or modified manuscripts in Mozartâ€™s hand. In any event, the letter to the Baron cannot be accorded as proof of Mozartâ€™s compositional abilities."

Final Note: As noted above, Rochlitz gives the name as â€œBaron von Pâ€ while Holmes give the name as â€œBaron Vâ€ and as well you will find references to this letter giving the name as â€œBaron B.â€ Regardless of the name, the effect of this letter has rippled down the years, appealing to the inner longing of many to see Mozart as divinely (or otherwise) inspired; less the musician endowed with a remarkable talent and memory and more the Gift of God to the world of Man. Either may be true, but this letter is not the proof required in order to decide.


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## Hannes_F (Apr 17, 2006)

Craig,

thank you very much for this interesting information.

Whether the letter is original or not - hearing a musical idea with the inner ear before writing it down is a common process, at least for me. That does not mean it has to remain unchanged. That is not contradiction.

And if I can do this, how much better could Mozart!!! :smile: :mrgreen:


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## Kennith Nichol (May 29, 2006)

How much better was Mozart you say, well for starters.. I don't think he's comparable in that manner. More like unique, he often stated his abilitu was a labour of dedication to his practice. Often quoted "No one has dedicated as much time to the art of composition as I have." (that's not an exact quote). 

I have this to say on the subject,

When you compare music, via ear, or by score. Mozart's is almost always simple. That does not mean to say it isn't complicated. On paper a score appears very simplistic, not many notes, chose his tempos and time signatures appropriatly.

His mastery was in his orchestration, and melody writting. use of compositional tools and rules such as harmony, counter-point, and musical form were second to his ability to write such delicious memorable melodies, and orchestrate them in such a way to be as though divine with sound.

Compare a symphony by Mozart to one of Beethoven. Beethoven's music is fantasticly complicated.

Point I am trying to make is:

Mozart's music is extravagently orchestrated as to provide the lush sounds, where most others make up for this lack of experties in technical writing. It's noticable check it out!

-k


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