Nevertheless he continued to patronise Mozart, drew him out on every occasion, and if he had only been Elector of Cologne, Mozart would have been kapellmeister by this time, as he told his father. He had used his influence with the Princess to take Mozart as her music-master, but received for answer that if it depended on herself she would certainly have chosen him, but the Emperor—"he cares for no one but Salieri," cries Mozart in disgust—had recommended Salieri to her on account of his singing, and she felt obliged to engage him, to her great regret.
It was quite true that Salieri stood high in the favour of Joseph II. He had been pupil of the Emperor's special favourite Gassmann, and had in a sense grown up under the royal eye;[ 30 ] he was regularly engaged at the imperial private concerts, and retained possession of his patron's favour by means both of his music and his personal demeanour. It was plain, therefore, that the preference for Salieri shown by the Emperor on this occasion did not arise from any ill-will towards Mozart; he was in close personal intercourse with Salieri, and esteemed him highly as a vocal composer, while Mozart was only known to him as a clavier-player. As such he had great admiration for him, and Mozart informed his father (December 26, 1781) that the Emperor had lately "passed the greatest éloge on him in the words 'C'est un talent décidé.'"
He had also (on December 14) commanded Mozart to play at court, and had arranged for him a contest of skill with Clementi, who had come to Vienna with the reputation of a clavier-player of unheard-of excellence. Clementi relates the encounter to his pupil L. Berger:[ 31 ]—
I had only been a few days in Vienna when I received an invitation to play before the Emperor on the pianoforte. On entering the music-room I beheld an individual whose elegant attire led me to mistake him for an imperial valet-de-chambre. But we had no sooner entered into conversation than it turned on musical topics, and we soon recognised in each other with sincere pleasure brother artists—Mozart and Clementi.
Mozart continues the description of the scene (January 16, 1782):—
After we had paid each other all manner of compliments, the Emperor gave the signal that Clementi should begin. "La santa chiesa cattoüca!" said the Emperor—Clementi being a native of Rome. He preluded, and played a sonata.
"It is worthy of note here," says Berger, "that Clementi was peculiarly fond of extemporising long and very interesting and elaborate interludes and cadenzas in the pauses of his sonatas; it was this propensity which led him to select a sonata for performance which lent itself easily to such treatment, although in every other respect this sonata stands behind his earlier compositions of the same kind. It was the following—[See Page Image]
and we have perhaps to thank this subject for the allegro in the overture to the 'Zauberflote,' a composition never surpassed of its kind: [ 32 ]—