Mozart in English

[Musicology]

Yanni, believe it or not there are many people who do NOT know that the manufactured career of W.A. Mozart is a plain, verifiable fact. And since they require more than games with multiple personalities and aliases that is what is the priority. But you are free to make a thread of your own on that subject. At any time. This thread is on Mozart, and it is dealing with the music that is attributed to him from the time of his first tour to Italy. On which you (and anyone else) can see documentary and other evidence.

If you wish to provide us with evidence of multiple aliases please do so. Nobody has ever stopped you.

I am well aware of Cowper's relationship to Britain and to the Holy Roman Empire. More than you may realise. (He became an aristocrat of the Holy Roman Empire himself and almost never visited England after his arrival in Italy). And I am well aware of Walpole's correspondence with Horace Mann.

If you wish to tell us about H. Walpole's letter to Horace Mann of 29th May 1786 please do so. Especially if it relates to Mozart and 1770.

What I wish to know is why you don't tell us ? So that we can all see it for ourselves.

[yanni]

Here are the most revealing parts of Horace Walpole's letter of May 29, 1786:

....to see an English Earl who has passed thirty years in Florence and is more proud of a Pinchbeck principality and a paltry order from Wirtenberg than he was of being a peer of Great Britain when Britain was something....

He answered very well to my idea, for I should have taken his Highness for a Doge of Genoa;he has the awkward dignity of a temporary representative of temporal powers.

What is Walpole writing about?

Did 'your Cowper' ever receive his orders from Wirtenberg, pretend to be a Doge of Genoa or temporarily represented a temporal power?

'Mine' did!

Ta-ta!

PS As for Cowper's 'principality', I'll leave it for later.

I am well aware of Cowper's relationship to Britain and to the Holy Roman Empire. More than you may realise. (He became an aristocrat of the Holy Roman Empire himself and almost never visited England after his arrival in Italy). And I am well aware of Walpole's correspondence with Horace Mann.

If you wish to tell us about H. Walpole's letter to Horace Mann of 29th May 1786 please do so. Especially if it relates to Mozart and 1770.

What I wish to know is why you don't tell us ? So that we can all see it for ourselves.

[Musicology]

Yanni wrote this in his previous post -

''Such is the case with 'Cowper' and H.Walpole's letter to Horace Mann, May 29, 1786, which, believe it or not, is very much related to 1770 and the Mozarts''

Great ! Please tell us the details of the relationship between this letter of May 29th 1786 and Mozart's visit to Italy of 1770 !! We are STILL waiting. This is request number 3.

I think you are becoming an obscurantist, once again. Try walking in the sunshine.

And now we see how wise it is to stay on our subject of Mozart. Since your letter does NOT 'very much' relate to Mozart and 1770. Does it ? You have showed no such relationship. As everyone can see. Do some homework please !

If we cannot deal with simple things, how can we deal with harder ones ? I stay with what is already being done - the early tours on Mozart. Which lead, step by step in to areas which cannot be (and were not) by Mozart.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfdI6...eature=related

'And who would credit that ? None. One works. And I have already. And yet you will hear them always '

(Maria Theresia von Paradis)
1759-1824

[yanni]

You skipped answering my previous post by referring to the one before.

I repeat:

Did 'your Cowper' ever receive his orders from Wirtenberg, pretend to be a Doge of Genoa or temporarily represented a temporal power?

If you have difficulty answering, ie Walpole's- 'pearl' of a- letter is 'all greek to you', why don't you just admit it?

Ta-ta!

Yanni wrote this in his previous post -

''Such is the case with 'Cowper' and H.Walpole's letter to Horace Mann, May 29, 1786, which, believe it or not, is very much related to 1770 and the Mozarts''

Great ! Please tell us the details of the relationship between this letter of May 29th 1786 and Mozart's visit to Italy of 1770 !! We are STILL waiting. This is request number 3.

I think you are becoming an obscurantist, once again. Try walking in the sunshine.

And now we see how wise it is to stay on our subject of Mozart. Since your letter does NOT 'very much' relate to Mozart and 1770. Does it ? You have showed no such relationship. As everyone can see. Do some homework please !

If we cannot deal with simple things, how can we deal with harder ones ? I stay with what is already being done - the early tours on Mozart. Which lead, step by step in to areas which cannot be (and were not) by Mozart.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfdI6...eature=related

'And who would credit that ? None. One works. And I have already. And yet you will hear them always '

(Maria Theresia von Paradis)
1759-1824

[Musicology]

You are talking of Cowper and a letter he received in 1786. But this thread is talking about Mozart of 1770 in Italy and subjects related to it. Isn't it ? And you are going to show us connections between these two different things, aren't you ? That is what you have told us here on this thread. In fact, you have repeated it over and over. So here is request number 4. Please show us the connections. Can you do it ? Or is it yet another example of you talking in riddles ?

I have better things to do than be diverted from the actual subject of this thread by endless obscurantism that leads nowhere. We deserve better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALeCjl70m58

You skipped answering my previous post by referring to the one before.

I repeat:

Did 'your Cowper' ever receive his orders from Wirtenberg, pretend to be a Doge of Genoa or temporarily represented a temporal power?

If you have difficulty answering, ie Walpole's- 'pearl' of a- letter is 'all greek to you', why don't you just admit it?

Ta-ta!

And while we wait for Yanni's reply - a little dance music -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ten_1...eature=related

Followed by several more articles on Mozart 1770.

[yanni]

See what you can do then with your "Mozart in Italy, 1770-71"

Here is what Walpole was referring to in May, 1786:

'Doge of Genoa'=Marcello Durazzo* (February 3, 1767 to February 16, 1769)
'orders from Wirtenberg'=Ferdinand Friedrich von Nicolai*(commissioned Wurtemberg's general, 1786)
'temporarily representative'=Marquiss de Chastelux*
'temporal power'=USA
'Pinchbeck principality'=Monaco (under chevalier Antoine de Grimaldi* until 1784).

early 1771 timeline

January 22 Prince Henry of Prussia visits Russia and proposes partition of Poland.

Jean-Frédéric-Henri baron de Cocceji* lieutenant-colonel et adjudant du Roi, nommé envoyé extraordinaire de Prusse à Stockholm le 17 novembre 1763, rappelé le 28 janvier 1771.

9 February 1771 King=s Semiramide Riconosciuta.By Giovan Gualberto Bottarelli (librettist) and Gioacchino Cocchi (composer).Opera.

March 3, 1771 Leopold (51) and Wolfgang Amadeus (15) meet with Count Giacomo Durazzo*,Imperial ambassador to Venice.

March 4-13th Mozart receives a commission for a second Milan opera, to be performed in 1772. It will be Lucio Silla (K. 135). Mozart receives commission for La Betulia liberata (K. 118).


*Alias of Gioachino Cocchi/Saint Germain.

You are talking of Cowper and a letter he received in 1786. But this thread is talking about Mozart of 1770 in Italy and subjects related to it. Isn't it ? And you are going to show us connections between these two different things, aren't you ? That is what you have told us here on this thread. In fact, you have repeated it over and over. So here is request number 4. Please show us the connections. Can you do it ? Or is it yet another example of you talking in riddles ?

I have better things to do than be diverted from the actual subject of this thread by endless obscurantism that leads nowhere. We deserve better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALeCjl70m58

[Musicology]

Here is the real story of still another musical work, the 'Miserere', falsely attributed today to W.A. Mozart from his first tour of Italy in 1770. (Known in the Mozart catalogue as KV 85).

See this article by Luca Bianchini -

''Considerations on the Supposed Musical Teaching of Mozart by Padre Martini of Bologna''

http://www.mediafire.com/?8agr218yx5ae8db

[Pyras]

Thank you,

I've just read the pdf. Yes. It's also an important document that helps me to understand the problematic situation. I wonder how it is possible the considered experts in Mozart not only took ‘Cibavit’ written around 1600 as a piece by Mozart and have even confused the Antifona provided to Mozart by Martini (KV86) with one made by Mozart himself, and confuse music written around 1840 with Martini's music.


About Mozart
I completely agree with Johann Simon Mayr, contemporary of Mozart (I think) (quoted at the very beginning of the pdf) that «Real genius is sacred, not drunken, is educated, not born, is inflamed by sentiment, purified by intellect, endowed by nature and developed by study. That which is rumoured as being blind genius is nothing but a fabulous legend. In Music knowledge gained by musicians has nothing to do with carefree students who are empty of any schooling or art»

Here is the real story of still another musical work, the 'Miserere', falsely attributed today to W.A. Mozart from his first tour of Italy in 1770. (Known in the Mozart catalogue as KV 85).

See this article by Luca Bianchini -

''Considerations on the Supposed Musical Teaching of Mozart by Padre Martini of Bologna''

http://www.mediafire.com/?8agr218yx5ae8db

[Emil Miller]

This charade has been extended beyond endurance. I never thought that Elvis Presley could be useful for anything, except making money out of suckers, but I was wrong.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpzV_0l5ILI

[Musicology]

Thank you Pyras,

In our brief study of the early touring years of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91) we have taken the unusual (unprecedented) step of presenting actual evidence (musical, biographical and other kinds) for readers on a few musical works related to Munich and the first made with his father Leopold to Italy in 1770. Which have been contradicted by nobody. Not even the Austrian Tourist Board ! Providing (in a style intended to survive apathy and scrutiny) information on the documentary and other evidence on which, as we see, gross contradiction, institutionalised falsehood, new levels of exaggeration and downright fabrication have been until now its substitute. And we have sailed fearlessly against a tide of indifference, misinformation, eulogy, and science fiction. In pursuit of a history of music based upon reality.

You are right to ask how the progress of this young musical genius will continue to unfold in a land (Italy) which, of course, has been as speechless of the 'Salzburg phenomenon' as anywhere else. Any errors found in standard textbooks on Mozart (his life and career) are of course merely accidental and understandable on an issue which defies human comprehension and even which defies criticism. We have modestly not yet discussed the details of the famous first concert given by Mozart in Mantua (which is itself part of this folklore) and nor have we yet examined the legendary feats of memory shown by this ''wunderkind'' in Rome, (when he is reputed to have copied from memory an entire church piece of Signor Allegri at the Sistine Chapel). Nor have we covered the presentation to this young prodigy, this Graduate of the Academy of Bologna, of the Order of the Golden Spur with the approval and admiration of the papacy. (Which was a feat in itself). But these facts (it is said) would settle any controversy on the talents and abilities of this young genius. Any suggestion we are being 'led down the garden path' on musical history over the past 200 years should of course be rejected. Since everyone knows 'everything we have heard is true'.

I have the suspicion that another series of articles on the tour of 1770 (including these legendary events mentioned above) will add to our picture in removing from our landscape a megalith of grotesque size which has deliberately obscured the musical sunlight and has made fools of us all. Till now.

Further revelations will continue to unfold on the musical career of the said Mozart in the years 1771, 1772, 1773, 1774, 1775, 1776, 1777, 1778, 1779, 1780 and his entire last decade (1781-1791) on which the findings of equally detailed study shall receive a fair hearing.

You are perfectly right to ask how, if Mozart's first years are so riddled with falsehood he should be automatically attributed with the hundreds of musical masterpieces which we stoically believe he wrote from this time onwards. The answer to which, of course, humbles all of us who have examined it and which reminds that truth is free of charge and is a natural product of musicology. Indeed, the findings of real research are the natural and unwelcome andidote to folklore and institutionalised fiction. As is a necessary criticism of convention itself. The sole controversy being the fact that criticism of this monument to human gullibility has never had a fair hearing of this kind. Till now.

Thank you,

I've just read the pdf. Yes. It's also an important document that helps me to understand the problematic situation. I wonder how it is possible the considered experts in Mozart not only took ‘Cibavit’ written around 1600 as a piece by Mozart and have even confused the Antifona provided to Mozart by Martini (KV86) with one made by Mozart himself, and confuse music written around 1840 with Martini's music.


About Mozart
I completely agree with Johann Simon Mayr, contemporary of Mozart (I think) (quoted at the very beginning of the pdf) that «Real genius is sacred, not drunken, is educated, not born, is inflamed by sentiment, purified by intellect, endowed by nature and developed by study. That which is rumoured as being blind genius is nothing but a fabulous legend. In Music knowledge gained by musicians has nothing to do with carefree students who are empty of any schooling or art»

[yanni]

Thank you Pyras,

And we have sailed fearlessly against a tide of indifference, misinformation, eulogy, and science fiction. In pursuit of a history of music based upon reality.

....the fact that criticism of this monument to human gullibility has never had a fair hearing of this kind. Till now.

When you finally sail past Mozart's diapers, let me know!

[Musicology]

I would not dream of asking when you stopped wearing diapers Yanni. Although it's my duty to point out that Mozart, in 1770, was 14 years old. (Having been born in 1756).

And you believe he was still wearing diapers at that time, don't you ?

When you finally sail past Mozart's diapers, let me know!

[Emil Miller]

Reading this, I've just realised there might be something to this argument after all:

Amadeus Wolfgang Mozart was arguably the world's first rock star and his father was his road manager. His birth name, Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Theophilus, was changed to Amadeus, the Latin translation of Theophilus, and as it sounded quite cool, his wise old dad picked it for his signature or stage name. Eat your heart out Madonna and all you other aliases.
Instead of a rattle, he was given a musical talent at birth. This he played loudly and frequently for the duration of his short life. He was a child protegee, virtually at birth, and beat out masterpieces with his spoon on his bowl of mashed veggies, to the great admiration of his father who set out to make him a star. So great was his old man's resolve and so skillful his marketing ability to promote his son's genius, that Mozart is still with us. He lives on, not only in concert halls, but also on stage and the big screen where we indulge him the odd fart.

[Musicology]

Yes Brian,

Which brings to mind that advertisement for a well known Danish beer ''able to reach parts that others cannot''. Since it's an established fact that the dulcit tones of Wolfgang can increase the IQ of the unborn child, can increase yields for tomato growers, even pacify patients at dental surgeries etc. since it has ingredients which have no genetically modified contents or artificial sweeteners whatsover.

I had been so busy gazing at this subject, and for so long - (one which has the ability to change colour and expand like a bubble floating on the academic and public imagination high above the 18th century musical landscape and transcending it at every honest attempt to pin it down) that I wondered how it first came to assume such a mystical/trascendental glow and could to this day so easily escape from criticism. So that I was faced with a number of options -

1. To think of Mozart as a Proteus, a slippery eel, to whom we must all bend the knee if we are to be musically educated or even cultured. Or, alternatively,

2. To think of Mozart as something else that I and all others must accept if we are prepared to examine the actual evidence.

The only other option being to believe -

3. That Mozart falls in to that category (newly invented at the time of himself) called 'genius', which we must never cross-examine nor question in any meangingful sense if we wish to be invited to garden parties. A paradigm, in fact, and of a specially seductive kind.

And thus, in this bewildered state, when trawling through books and articles that have been published on him and his life for close to 200 years I was drawn to the heretical idea that the facts of the case may have survived all these attempts to suppress or distort them. Though I kept my mind open on that possibility for many years. Discovering only in recent years (and to my great surprise) some highly talented researchers have been doing the very same. With the same results.

None of which alters the fact this body of music (much of it being of wonderful quality) exists. Though nobody has ever doubted that. But from which critical perspective it was possible to consider the manufacture of a virtual pantheon of great composers by patrons, managers and later biographers of whom Mozart (and a handful of others) were deliberately designed to be members - with all the resources of the emerging music industry etc - the net effect of which has been as we see - the silencing of all criticism and the effective hijacking of musicology as we know it. The slopes of the vast and now familiar Mozartean mountain towering upwards to include 'unchallengable' works such as dozens of mature symphonies, masses, operas, concertos and sonatas.

How and why this was done are questions which flow from the above and on which, again, I think we, today, are able to provide some answers. Though it is only a part of the whole process. It must first be established there is a subject worthy of study before we attempt to provide an explanation for it. Here, in early 2011, I am not alone in thinking virtually nothing attributed to W.A. Mozart was actually composed by him. The implications of which differ depending on whom we talk to. The interests of others being a factor in them remaining silent on it.

Examining these early years of Mozart may be compared to being at the shoreline of that great ocean which is 'Mozart study'. Although I have found nothing from his middle and later years which causes me or others to change our considered verdict. I can only suppose that expertise exists (in a biographical or musical sense) which is about to leap unitedly to his defence. Having exhausted its supply of smoke and mirrors.

'They' have literally invented musical history. Most certainly 'they' have.

Regards

Reading this, I've just realised there might be something to this argument after all:

Amadeus Wolfgang Mozart was arguably the world's first rock star and his father was his road manager. His birth name, Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Theophilus, was changed to Amadeus, the Latin translation of Theophilus, and as it sounded quite cool, his wise old dad picked it for his signature or stage name. Eat your heart out Madonna and all you other aliases.
Instead of a rattle, he was given a musical talent at birth. This he played loudly and frequently for the duration of his short life. He was a child protegee, virtually at birth, and beat out masterpieces with his spoon on his bowl of mashed veggies, to the great admiration of his father who set out to make him a star. So great was his old man's resolve and so skillful his marketing ability to promote his son's genius, that Mozart is still with us. He lives on, not only in concert halls, but also on stage and the big screen where we indulge him the odd fart.

[Emil Miller]

I thought I was being ironic but, then again, perhaps you are being so too.
In connection with my post, I thought it appropriate to include a quotation from my novel A Tangled Web which deals, inter alia, with the promotion of pop music.

“Well Mozart wrote background music and the electric guitar is the favoured choice of instrument nowadays. In my day it was the clarinet or the trumpet,” said Mr Silberman.

“Mozart did write Tafelmusik but it was composed and notated, not sung along to an electric guitar. Moreover, he didn’t walk about in a pair of jeans with his knees hanging out like a farm labourer and revel in the vernacular. Of course the electric guitar is the favoured instrument today rather than the clarinet or trumpet, and why? I’ll tell you why, it’s because you can’t strum a reed or a brass instrument, both of which have to be learned,” said Jolyon contemptuously.