MOZART IN HIS TENTH YEAR.
Painted by Dominicus van der Smissen, 1766. The original in possession of Mr. R. Hörner, in Ulm.
The noble families of the town vied with each other in their attentions. The children were given money, court dresses, and tokens of genuine affection, and the first portrait of Wolfgang was painted then in Vienna, in which he has powdered hair, and he carries a sword. The boy was seized with scarlet fever in October, and in the beginning of 1763 Leopold went back to Salzburg. But the 9th of June of the same year, with his wife and children, he set out for Paris, having letters of credit from his good friend Haguenauer. They had adventures, and they gave concerts on the way. They arrived at Ludwigsburg, the Versailles of Stuttgart, where Jomelli, with his carriages and horses, houses and yearly salary of four thousand florins, brought to Leopold's mind his own modest condition, and provoked him to bitter remarks. Frankfort, Bonn and Brussels were seen, and finally the family arrived in Paris the 18th of November. The story of this visit, as well as the visit of 1778, has been most entertainingly told by Jullien in the brochure "Mozart à Paris," to which the reader is referred for interesting details. The letters of Leopold contain much curious information about the musical condition of the city. Frederick Melchior Grimm, who was regarded as an authority, exerted himself most actively in the behalf of his compatriots. They were presented at Court; they were celebrated in prose and in verse; their portraits were painted; and four sonatas "pour le clavecin" were engraved and published. In April, 1764, Leopold left Paris for London, by Calais, Dover, and he took with him the opinion that French music and French morals were detestable. In England the family were received most kindly by the King and the Queen, who, as is well known, were passionate amateurs of music. The curiosity of the Londoners to hear the children was great; the learned Daines Barrington proved the genius of Wolfgang in many ways, and then made it the subject of a letter preserved in the annals of the "Philosophical Transactions" of the year 1770; and guineas chinked pleasantly together in Leopold's pocket. Here Wolfgang wrote three symphonies, four according to Jahn and Koechel, but Wilder gives good reasons for doubting the date of the one in B-flat major. He also dedicated six sonatas for pianoforte and violin or flute to the Queen. His London visit benefited his education. Pohl in his interesting and valuable "Mozart in London" gives a full account of the condition of music at the time. Wolfgang had an opportunity of hearing Handel's oratorios and Italian opera; he became intimate with Christian Bach; he heard the castrate Tenducci, the master of cantabile; he took singing lessons of the famous male soprano Manzuoli. In July 1765 Leopold and the children started for the Hague; at Lille, Wolfgang was seriously ill, and at the Hague the sister was attacked by a violent fever. Wolfgang wrote while in Holland six sonatas and other pieces. After passing through Paris and Swiss towns, the family arrived at Salzburg in November, 1766. Wolfgang was pleased at seeing again his favorite cat, and then under his father's direction he began the study of the "Gradus" of Fux. In 1767 he learned Latin and set to Latin words a comedy, "Apollo et Hyacinthus," at the instigation of the Archbishop, who had hitherto played the part of doubting Thomas. He also wrote four pianoforte concertos for his own use in concerts.
MOZART IN HIS FOURTEENTH YEAR.
Painted in Verona, Jan. 6 and 7, 1770. Painter unknown.
Leopold was not blind to the fact that Italy was the home of great composers and illustrious singers; that its atmosphere was stimulating to musical thought; that its very name was synonymous with music. Under pretext of a short visit to Vienna, he made his excuses to the Archbishop and started, in September, 1767, with his family on a longer journey. In Vienna, the children were seized with small-pox, and it was not until January, 1768, that they were able to enter into the musical life of the town. They heard Gluck's "Alceste," and Leopold preferred to it Hasse's "Partenope." Joseph II., a man of frugal mind, demanded of Wolfgang an opera for his theatre, and the boy wrote "La Finta Simplice," an opera-buffa in three acts. It won the unqualified praise of the singers and such composers as Hasse, but the cabal against Wolfgang was too strong, and the opera was not given. "Bastien und Bastienne," an opera in one act, was written immediately after, and produced with great applause in the house of a Vienna doctor. (The pastoral theme of the instrumental introduction, the intrada, anticipates in a singular manner the opening of Beethoven's Third Symphony.) Wolfgang's first mass was given in public, and he himself directed. The Archbishop of Salzburg sent word to Leopold that his pay would continue only while he was actually in Salzburg, and so the family returned home. But the Italian journey was still in Leopold's head, and hoping to pay the expenses of the trip by giving concerts, he started out with Wolfgang in December, 1769. At Roveredo and Verona, the enthusiasm of the people was unbounded; at Milan they met the generous Von Firmian, who was the means of procuring a contract for Wolfgang to write an opera for the Christmas holidays; at Bologna they became acquainted with Father Martini and Farinelli; at Florence, Wolfgang met his friend Manzuoli and Thomas Linley, the English violinist of his own age; and in Holy Week they were at Rome, and they heard the Allegri Miserere. The story of the boy memorizing this famous composition at a hearing, writing it out, and correcting it after a second hearing, is familiar to all. The feat provoked the wildest curiosity to see him, and he was looked at superstitiously, just as, soon after, at Naples his virtuosoship was attributed to a ring worn upon a finger of the left hand. The concerts in these towns refilled the drained purse; in 1770, the pope ennobled the boy, giving him the cross of the Golden Spur; and he was received into the famous accademia filarmonica of Bologna. Meanwhile Wolfgang was considering the opera promised for Milan, and the 26th of December, 1770, "Mitridate, re di Ponto" was produced and received with unbounded enthusiasm. It was given twenty times, and the impresario hastened to make a new contract with the cavaliere filarmonico, as the Milanese called him. Father and son then visited Turin and Venice, and about this time Wolfgang probably wrote the oratorio "Betulia liberata." In the spring of 1771 they returned to Salzburg, where they found a letter from Count Firmian asking for a pastorale to celebrate the wedding of the Archduke Ferdinand with the Princess Beatrice of Modena. And now the boy fell in love with a woman ten years his elder. She was betrothed to another, and her marriage and Wolfgang's return to Milan in August ended the affair. Although in the house where he lodged, violinists, a singing teacher, and an oboe player plied assiduously their business, Wolfgang finished the promised composition, "Ascanio in Alba" in twelve days. It was first heard October 17. Its success was so great that Hasse's opera "Ruggiero" was neglected; and the kindly veteran simply said, "This young rascal will cause us all to be forgotten."
HOUSE IN SALZBURG WHERE MOZART WAS BORN.
No. 9 Getreidegasse.