Even the accompaniment of this mass has an importance of its own, and there is more art and beauty contained in the two violin parts than in many a fuller score. Not content with giving an independent course to the voices, Mozart allows the accompaniment also to go its own way, usually with a subject proper to it, treated freely, often in counterpoint, and always with visible partiality.
Inventive genius, technical scholarship, and deep, clear comprehension, are more evidently displayed by Mozart in this mass than ever before; the subjects have an intensity, a charm of beauty which had scarcely yet been suggested. Here, for the first time, we become aware of that wonderful beauty, Mozart's most special endowment, which we may designate sweetness, if we mean by that the perfect harmony of a naturally developed artistic organism. The maiden freshness of its manifestation here only increases the charm, and points to future expansion.
The Mass in D major (194 K.), composed on August 8, 1774, has been rightly placed next to the one we have been considering.[ 27 ] The whole plan, the strict form, the flowing treatment, contrapuntal throughout, the mature beauty, offer many points of resemblance, but the effort after gracefulness is more apparent in the later mass, and is achieved at the sacrifice of gravity and ideality. The Kyrie displays a very similar conception. With the opening words of the soprano—[See Page Image]
the foundation is laid on which the whole structure of the movement is built. In part in imitative combinations, in part extended into a longer subject, and in part connected with opposing subjects for the voices and the violins, this MASS IN D. MAJOR, 1774. short theme is elaborated into a fine long movement, as interesting as it is expressive. The Gloria and the Credo do not reach the same height; the contrapuntal elaboration is only apparent in isolated passages, the solos are expressive, but over-graceful, the music proceeds in a fine flow, and delights the listener, but only now and then stirs deeper feelings. On the other hand, the Sanctus, Benedictus (a solo quartet), Agnus (alternate solo and chorus), are highly finished and tersely composed movements, in which beauty of form and sentiment combine. The somewhat lengthy Dona preserves its pleasing character, without degenerating into trifling. The effort to please by mere gracefulness is most predominant in the Mass in B flat major (275 K.), the date of which is not known. The commencement with a soprano solo[ 28 ]—[See Page Image] is characteristic of the whole mass. The solo element pre-dominates, and a wealth of lovely, seductive, and expressive melodies is scattered around; but neither the conception nor the execution takes a deep hold on the mind. The chorus is generally full, one might almost say merry; where harmonic or contrapuntal treatment comes to the front, it is executed with masterly ease; and such passages stand out in all the clearer relief against their surroundings. The principal passage of the Credo is striking:—[See Page Image]
According to Lorentz it is a reminiscence—perhaps an accidental one—of a favourite Volkslied, "Bauer hang' den Pummerl an." The introduction of the following theme—[See Page Image] LATER MASSES, 1775-77. after a highly original and striking harmonic progression, cannot fail to injure the effect. The Sanctus is a short fugued movement, the Benedictus an unusually melodious soprano solo with an original accompaniment; the Agnus goes deepest, and is serious in feeling as well as wonderfully sweet. Works like the Masses in F and D major prove what Mozart was capable of in church music if his genius could have had free scope. But the "rapid advance of ecclesiastical reformation in Salzburg under the wise and immortal prince, Archbishop Hieronymus von Colloredo,"[ 29 ] had its effect on the treatment of the mass. The limitation of its duration and the abolition of solo singing proper and of fugues might appear to be the result of ecclesiastical rigour. But Hieronymus was far more inclined to favour secular taste in church music; and he was fond besides of displaying a royal magnificence and splendour. This external influence is apparent in the conception and treatment of the later masses composed after 1775, more particularly in one belonging to 1776 (262 K.), with a Kyrie in counterpoint and two elaborate fugues. Especially earnest and beautiful, both as to technical workmanship and expression, are the movements on which the musical treatment was becoming more and more concentrated, the Qui tollis (of which the accompaniment recalls the fugue, Quam olim Abrahæ in the Requiem), the Et incarnatus est, and Agnus Dei. Even the Benedictus (where the chorus answers the "Benedictus" of the solos by "Osanna") and the Dona are sustained in style. How fundamentally this mass differs from that in F major is clearly shown by the ground-tones of the Gloria and the Credo, which are animated and brilliant, but without any intensity or depth of meaning. The same tendency is still more marked in the remaining masses (220, 257, 258, 259, K.).[ 30 ] Increasing maturity is manifest in the CHURCH MUSIC. firm and skilful handling of all available means, and the subjects display uncommon fertility of invention. But real creative inspiration is crushed by the obligation to compose after a set fashion.
We do not need to look further than such church music to become aware that the Archbishop loved to bring the pomp and glitter of his royal station into the services of the church. Such a task obliges the artist to use his art more and more consciously as a means to an end. The inevitable result is inequality and exaggeration, his genius and his work being often at variance; the charm of mere grace leads to the danger of softness and effeminacy, and fluent animation becomes meaningless superficiality. The effort to be light and pleasing is manifest in these masses by their superfluity of detail. We find an over-abundance of beautiful melodies and harmonies, combined with great freedom in the treatment both of voices and orchestra, and in the working-out of the subjects.
There are isolated instances of deeper sentiment and more poetic conception which are heightened in effect by the earnest technical skill displayed in their working-out, and which give glimpses of happy inspiration, not belonging of necessity to the fundamental conception of the work.
Unhappily it is on these masses, in the composition of which Mozart's genius could only move within very confined limits, that his fame as a composer of church music chiefly rests; and musicians who have taken him as their model have striven most to imitate these, his least satisfactory works.
The great resemblance in plan and mechanism of the masses of contemporary composers, such as Hasse, Nau-mann, Joseph and Michael Haydn, proves a strict adherence to the rules of composition then in force. A consideration of their works serves to heighten the effect of Mozart's higher and nobler conceptions, of his poetical sentiment, and of that sense of proportion which regards a work of art as a whole, and recognises the limits imposed on it from without as the necessary conditions of artistic production. Many excellent qualities may be conceded to these musicians, but none of them attained to the harmonious beauty of Mozart.