THE accession of Leopold II. to the Imperial throne (March 13, 1790) was not an event of good omen for music and the opera. Up to the month of July he had not entered the theatre, nor had any private concerts, nor MOZART'S POSITION AT COURT, 1790. displayed any sort of partiality for music; his consort, the Empress Louise, visited the opera and laid claim to some musical knowledge, although she expressed herself dissatisfied with the state of music in Vienna; the young princes, too, were instructed in music.[ 1 ] The difference between Joseph and his successor in point of taste was very soon manifested by the reintroduction of ballets, and by the favour bestowed on opera seria as well as opera buffa. It was rumoured that a new court theatre was to be built, in which the boxes were to be arranged for card-playing, and that Salieri had determined in consequence to resign his post, which was to be filled by Cimarosa.[ 2 ] Those individuals who had enjoyed the esteem of Joseph had little favour to hope for from Leopold; a fact which soon became evident in matters theatrical. Count Rosenberg was removed from the management, which was intrusted to Count Ugarte;[ 3 ] Da Ponte and Madame Ferraresi fell into disfavour;[ 4 ] Salieri thought it advisable to retire from the conductorship of the opera, and his place was filled by Jos. Weigl, "that the master might be reverenced in the pupil."[ 5 ] Mozart had stood too high in the favour of Joseph to be able to expect much from Leopold II.; his candidature for the post of second kapellmeister was as little successful as his request to be honoured with the musical instruction of the princes. Proof positive of the low esteem in which he was held by the court was afforded to him on the occasion of the visit of King Ferdinand of Naples, who came to Vienna (September 14) with his Queen, Caroline, to celebrate the marriages of his daughters, Maria Theresa and Louise, with the Archdukes Francis and Ferdinand. Ferdinand's LABOUR AND POVERTY. two passions were music and the chase;[ 6 ] and the instrument which he most affected was the lute. In his honour a new opera by Weigl ("La Cafetiera Bizarra") was performed (September 15);[ 7 ] the Emperor made his first appearance at the opera with King Ferdinand, when Salieri's "Axur" was played (September 21); in honour of the weddings, open table was held in the great Redoutensaal, and a concert performed in the gallery under Salieri's direction, in which Cavalieri and Calvesi and the brothers Stadler took part, and a symphony by Haydn was performed which the King knew by heart, and sang out loud as it was played; Haydn was introduced to him, invited to Naples, and honoured with commands for compositions;[ 8 ] and all this time Mozart remained unnoticed, and was not even summoned to play before the King of Naples, a neglect which wounded him deeply. His condition was painful in the extreme; his wife's delicate health showed no signs of improving; and as his expenses increased his income gradually diminished. In May he had only two pupils, and was obliged to appeal to his friends to assist him in raising the number to eight. His continual and pressing embarrassments exhausted even the resources of his ever-generous friend Puchberg, and he was obliged to apply to money-lenders, and to embark in speculations which did but hasten his financial ruin (Vol. II., p. 301). The weight of these cares crippled his energies for work, as he himself complains, and no period of his life is so poor in artistic production as this year. His own catalogue contains, after the completion of "Cosi fan Tutte" in January, 1790, only:—
May. Quartet for two violins, viola and violoncello in B flat major (589 K.).
June. Quartet in F major (590 K.).
July. Handel's "Cecilia" and "Alexander's Feast," arranged (591, 592 K.).
EXPEDITION TO FRANKFORT, 1790.
In the hope of improving his circumstances, Mozart resumed his plan of taking a professional tour; the coronation of Leopold II. in Frankfort, on October 9, attracted a large number of strangers to that city, and seemed to render it a favourable place for the experiment. Salieri, as court kapellmeister,[ 9 ] Ign. Umlauf as his deputy, and fifteen chamber musicians, were sent to Frankfort among the retinue of the Emperor.[ 10 ] Mozart was not included among the number, and thus was deprived of the advantage of the imperial patronage. On September 23 he set off, after pawning his silver plate to defray the expenses of his journey (Vol. II., p. 301) in company with his brother-in-law, the violinist Hofer, whom he took with him out of compassion, and with the intention of sharing the expected profits together; they travelled in their own carriage, and, arriving in Frankfort on the 23rd, had considerable difficulty in finding a lodging, owing to the overflow of strangers into the town. On October 14, at noon, Mozart gave a concert in the Stadt-theater.[ 11 ] The contrabassist Ludwig, long since dead, who took part in the concert, used to tell how the piano stood upon the stage, and how during the rehearsal the restless, agile little man was continually leaping over the prompter's box into the orchestra to chat in a friendly way with the various performers, and then climb back again on to the stage. Mozart's own compositions were exclusively performed at this concert; he played the concertos in F major (459 K.) and D major (537 K.). Margarethe Hamel, afterwards Frau Schick, was the vocalist, and so charmed Mozart by her voice and delivery that he is said to have exclaimed repeatedly: "I never wish to hear any other singing LABOUR AND POVERTY. than this."[ 12 ] It is also said that he played a pianoforte concerto as a duet with old "Papa Beecké" (Vol. I., pp. 151,368), whom he met again here.[ 13 ] He acquaints his wife with the friendly reception accorded him, and tradition has it that he struck up a friendship with the concertmeister Hoffmann, and generally spent the evening with him at Gran's tavern in the Bleidenstrasse. Hesse became acquainted in Frankfort, as he tells us,[ 14 ] with an old superannuated organist of the Katharinenkirche, who in 1790 had been the pupil of his predecessor; the old man said:—
One Sunday, after service, Mozart came into the choir at St Katharine's, and begged the old organist to allow him to play something. He seated himself on the stool and gave the reins to his fancy, when the organist suddenly pushed him off the stool in the rudest manner, and said to the pupil standing by: "Mark that last modulation which Herr Mozart made; how can he profess to be a musician and commit such grave offences against correct composition?"
The pupil had remembered the modulation, and Hesse thought it a fine one, and not even unusual.
From Frankfort Mozart proceeded to Mayence. Here rumour assigned him a touching love intrigue, which was supposed to have suggested the song "Io ti lascio," the said song having been in reality composed by Gottfried von Jacquin in Vienna, and not by Mozart at all (Vol. II., p. 361). On his way back to Frankfort, Mozart stayed at Mannheim, and renewed the memory of former days with as many of the old friends as still survived. He arrived just in time for the first performance of his "Figaro," which took place on October 24. The actor Backhaus notes in his Tagebuch der Mann-heimer Schaubühne: "I got into great disgrace with Mozart. I was standing at the door while our rehearsal was going on. He came and asked me about it, and whether he might hear it. I took him for a little journeyman tailor, and refused to let him in. 'You will surely allow Kapellmeister Mozart to hear the rehearsal?' So I was in a scrape most decidedly."[ 15 ]
