Is there a figure from music history better known than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart? Though Beethoven may have cast a greater shadow over the music and musicians who followed him, Beethoven outlived Mozart by 21 years—an eternity, when you consider the amount of music Mozart produced in his 35 years on this earth. Yet when we think child prodigy, it is Mozart whom we immediately consider, and almost no one has been able to meet the standard set by him as a youth. When we think of natural compositional talent, it is Mozart who first enters our minds, as musical composition seemed to come so easily to him, no matter how complicated the work. (The idea that everything he composed flowed from him mind to paper without revision is false, though perhaps no one found such ease in composition as he.)

Mozart was born in Salzburg, Austria, in January, 1756. Read about his life and career highlights here. By that time, Bach was dead; Bach’s sons (especially Johann Christian and Philip Emanuel), Domenico Scarlatti, and Joseph Haydn (in his earliest works) had already propelled musical style forward towards a more elegant style, known as the Galant, rococo, Empfindsamkeit, or pre-Classical. This new style was a strong reaction to the perceived grotesque ornateness of the high Baroque style, so strongly in evidence in the works of the senior Bach. This music was marked by:

• Clear, simple, homophonic textures
• A preponderance of triple meter (especially 3/4 and 3/8)
• An emphasis on miniature works (such as minutes and single-movement solo sonatas)
• Limited but tasteful ornaments, in particular short trills or mordents
• Use of inverted dotted rhythms (where the short note comes first and the dotted note second)
• An overall feeling of lightness and elegance
• Regular, periodic phrasing (usually in groups of 4 measures or 8 measures)
• Clear, regular cadences, especially using the chord progression ii (first inversion) — I (second inversion) — V (or V7, in root position) — I (root position)
• The predominance of instrumental works, especially "absolute music," which is music for music’s sake

Following the emergence of this style (which is most prominent in the 1750s and 1760s), another new musical style emerges. This is the Sturm und Drang (literally, storm and stress). This style is confined to the decade of the 1770s, and is most prominent in the works of Haydn and C.P.E. Bach from this time, though there are some early works by Mozart which fit this style. The Sturm und Drang was so-named after a Maximillian Klinger play, written in 1776, about the American Revolution. This style is another reaction to what came before: while the Galant reacts against the complicated, ornate style of the Baroque, the Sturm und Drang reacts against the predictability and emotionally-detached music of the Galant. The Sturm und Drang, then, is marked by the following characteristics:

• A significant amount of program music (instrumental music which attempts to tell a story or portray a scene without the use of words) and theatrical music
• A highly emotional feel
• Frequent, sudden changes in texture, dynamics, articulation, instrumentation–any sudden changes which can occur in the music
• Harsh accents and articulations
• Strong use of dissonance, even on strong beats
• Frequent large leaps
• Lots of syncopation
• Agitated accompaniments
• More than anything, the unexpected rules

Why this lesson in mid-18^th century musical style? Because these two styles–the Galant and the Sturm und Drang–are the seeds for the Viennese Classical style of the 1780s and 1790s, the style in which Mozart’s C Minor Mass was written, and which Mozart’s works come to represent.

The Viennese Classical Style takes the best elements of the preceding styles (thus, it is sometimes referred to as the Viennese modern ‘synthesis’), among which are the following:

• Regular, periodic phrasing is the norm
• Instrumental music is generally "music for music’s sake," rather than being program music
• A wider range of expression than exists in either the Baroque (which was governed by the principle of the Doctrine of Affections) or the Galant, which was essentially unemotional
• The music is overwhelmingly homophonic
• Contrasting first and second melodies (more variety than in the Galant)
• Form articulated by tonality, with the dominant area considered unstable compared to the tonic
• Restrained and limited ornamentation

Mozart’s Sacred Music

Though we generally do not speak much of Mozart’s spirituality, Mozart himself offered the following thoughts in a letter to his father in 1777:

"God is ever before my eyes. I realize His omnipotence and I fear His anger, but I also recognize His love, His compassion and His tenderness toward His creatures. He will never forsake His own. If it is according to His will, so let it be according to mine. Thus all will be well, and I must be happy and contented."

Mozart’s sacred works number about 60; almost all (except the Mass in C minor) were commissioned works. In his positions in the service of the Archbishop of Salzburg, Mozart composed many sacred works; the Archbishop, however, insisted that Mass settings be limited to 45 minutes in time, and preferred the smaller scale of the missa brevis (which usually omits the Agnus Dei).

Sixteen complete settings of the Ordinary of the Mass have been attributed to Mozart, as well as several settings of individual Mass movements and other sacred pieces. His two largest works, the Mass in C minor and Requiem, are both incomplete. While in Salzburg, Mozart held a position in the service of the Archbishop, which is why much of his sacred music dates from that period; but in Vienna, his appointment had nothing to do with the church. The Mass in C minor appears, in fact, to have been an offering of thanks from Mozart to his father for allowing, if begrudgingly, Mozart to marry Constanze Weber. The condition of the movements is summarized below:

Though the Mass in C minor was never completed, it is generally held with Bach’s B Minor Mass and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis as one of the greatest settings of the Ordinary ever composed. There are obvious connections between Mozart’s work and Bach’s in particular, especially in the use of fugues. Was Mozart trying to emulate Bach’s mastery of the fugue? Or was it just that this was the form preferred most by his new bride, and, since this work was written in response to their marriage, Mozart was just trying to please her?

Typical of Mozart (as well as Bach), this music is densely packed with so many items of interests to performing musicians, scholars, and concert-goers alike. Thus, what follows is essentially a simple listening guide–what to listen for in the Mass in C minor.