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K. 167

Missa in C, "Trinitatis"

Count Hieronymus Colloredo, who became Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg in 1772, had definite ideas about the role of music in his court and church.

On Dec. 16, 1771, Prince-Archbishop Sigismund, Count Schrattenbach, died in Salzburg. As archbishop, at least when it came to the Mozart family, Schrattenbach had been a lenient taskmaster. He had allowed Leopold, his vice-Kapellmeister, to be absent from the court for years at a time in order to travel all over Europe with his two child prodigies. He had developed a special fondness for Wolfgang and had even sponsored a hometown production of Mozart's first opera buffa, La finta semplice (K. 51), after plans to stage it in Vienna failed.

Schrattenbach was succeeded in March 1772 by Count Hieronymus Colloredo, who was somewhat less lenient to begin with and who had definite ideas about music and its place in his court and church. Henceforth, all extravagance was to be suppressed. There was to be no room for polytexture, still less for "operatic" displays by soloists. Most important of all, the music was to be brief.

Sometime later, Mozart was to write to Padre Martini, his onetime teacher in Bologna: "Our church music is very different from that of Italy, since a mass with the whole Kyrie, the Gloria, the Credo, the Epistle sonata, the Offertory or Motet, the Sanctus and the Agnus Dei must not last longer than three quarters of an hour. This applies even to the most Solemn Mass said by the Archbishop himself. So you see that a special study is required for this kind of composition. At the same time, the mass must have all the instruments -- trumpets, drums and so forth."

This particular Mass, which Mozart wrote in honor of the Holy Trinity, was perhaps the first composition to require such "a special study." It is indeed brief: The entire work, including Epistle sonata and the Offertory, lasts no longer than three quarters of an hour.

Mozart compressed the Gloria and Credo -- which traditionally had been allotted multiple, contrasting sections -- into single, "symphonic" movements. There are no soloists, though there are plenty of trumpets: four, in fact. The Mass' brevity and the use of "all the instruments" should have pleased Colloredo. But Mozart allowed himself one bit of showmanship that may have not. According to Alfred Einstein: "Only in the Et vitam venturi does Mozart permit himself once more to write a contrapuntal display-piece, a fugue that perhaps overstepped the bounds decreed by Colloredo and to which that gentleman must have listened with impatience and displeasure."

Mozart must have enjoyed tweaking the nose of the man who would eventually become such a hated figure, who, in the Mozart family correspondence, would be referred to as the "arch-booby." The surprising thing is that it would take the young composer eight years to work up enough nerve to commit a more substantial and fateful act of rebellion.

Recommended recordings:

• Mozart: Masses KV 66 & KV 167, EMI CDC 7 49882 2

References:

• Anderson, Emily, ed. The Letters of Mozart and His Family. New York, 1985.
• Einstein, Alfred. Mozart, His Character, His Work. New York, 1962.
• Giegling, Weinmann and Sievers, eds. Chronologisch-thematisches Verzeichnis samtlicher Tonwerke Wolfgang Amadé Mozarts. 6th edition. Wiesbaden, 1964.
• Sadie, Stanley. The New Grove Mozart. New York, 1983.
• Zaslaw, Neal, and Cowdery, William, eds. The Compleat Mozart. New York, 1990.