The True Story Behind Mozart’s Requiem

Mozart working on the Requiem on his deathbed

It’s one of the greatest pieces of music ever written, but the story behind Mozart’s Requiem is one of the strangest chapters in history

In 1791 Mozart was at his desk working on the music for what would become The Magic Flute.

He’s interrupted by a knock at the door.

When he opens the door, he’s met by a man dressed all in black. The man’s face is covered by a mask.

He tells the composer he’s here to commission a piece for his master. But there’s a condition: Mozart can never ask who his master is, and never try to find out.

Mozart accepts the commission – when he hears what the fee is he is unconcerned by the cloak-and-dagger small print.

But little did Mozart know that this Requiem would be the last thing he ever wrote.

Before the year was out, Mozart would be dead at the age of just 35. And the Requiem – the work that arguably brought about that death – would be left unfinished.

For many years it was believed that Mozart was poisoned.  These rumors started as early as New Year’s Eve, 1791.  An obituary in the Berlin’s Musikalische Wochenblatt reported Mozart is—dead.  He was sickly when he returned home from Prague and remained ailing since then . . . Because his body swelled up after his death, it is even believed that he was poisoned.

At times Mozart even believed this.  When he was working on the Requiem he told his wife,  “I feel it very acutely.  It won’t be long now: I’ve surely been given poison!  I can’t let go of that thought.” Constanze never believed it.

The story strengthened when Salieri “confessed” that he poisoned Mozart. Salieri was delusional in the last years of his life.  But few of the people who heard his “confession” believed him.  Shortly before his death, Salieri put the record straight.  He said, although this is my last illness, I can assure you on my word of honor that there is no truth to that absurd rumor; you know that I am supposed to have poisoned Mozart.

The Russian dramatist Aleksander Pushkin must have believed the rumors.  In 1830, he wrote a short play in which Salieri does poison Mozart. It is aptly titled “Mozart and Salieri.”

If Mozart was not poisoned, then how did he die?  The cause of death was first thought to be  “feverish prickly heat.” Later it was thought to be a “liver condition with terminal uremia.”  Currently two theories exist.  A 1972 report suggests rheumatic fever.  A more recent study proposes that Mozart had the following sequence of illnesses in his final three weeks: streptococcal infection, Schönlein-Henoch Syndrome, renal failure, venesection(s), cerebral hemorrhage, terminal broncho-pneumonia.

Finally, let’s look at the Requiem.  Was the commission conceived by Salieri as a way to drive Mozart mad?  No.  Was it some malicious plot to make Mozart believe he was writing a requiem for himself?  No.  Was it commissioned by an anonymous messenger?  Yes, and that is where we need to begin.

Did Salieri plot Mozart's demise to the point of actually poisoning him? Or is it just as fanciful as all those serpents and magic bells in the younger composer's opera The Magic Flute?

Antonio Salieri was a hugely influential composer of opera and a much in-demand teacher who taught Schubert, Beethoven and Liszt. The chances are, however, that you've only ever heard of Salieri because he happened to be the arch-rival of the irrepressible Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Or was he?

The rise of the poisoning tale

Vasiliy Shkafer as Mozart and Fyodor Shalyapin as Salieri
(Russian Private Opera, 1898)

The rumor was immortalized in art when, six years after Salieri’s 1825 death, revered Russian poet Alexander Pushkin wrote a verse drama Mozart and Salieri that posited Salieri as the bitterly jealous poisoner of the greater man. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov set the play to music in the opera Mozart and Salieri, and playwright Peter Shaffer based his 1979 play Amadeus on Pushkin’s drama. That in turn was adapted for film in the Oscar-winning movie of the same name directed by Miloš Forman. So now when people think of Mozart and Salieri they think of a rivalry unto the death, when in fact the two men were on quite good terms.

Mozart had been suffering from rheumatism since childhood and his health was deteriorating. He suffered from loneliness and depression. This may have been the reason why he interpreted the mysterious commission for a requiem as a sign of impending doom. His deteriorating health convinced him that he was slowly being poisoned. “I know I have to die… I write (the requiem) for myself.”

To distract his mind from his delusions and fear of death for even a short period of time, Mozart composed the “Kleine Freimaurerkantate” – the “Freemasons Cantata”. The cantata premiered at the inauguration of a new masonic temple, with Mozart himself conducting. It was his last complete work.

Deception

Count Franz Walsegg-Stuppach was a music lover and wealthy landowner from Lower Austria.  Every Tuesday and Thursday Walsegg hosted concerts at Schloss Stuppach in which he and his musicians performed for his many friends . And this is where the strange, almost pathetic side of Walsegg emerges. For whatever reason, Walsegg would commission fresh compositions and pass them off as his own.

This harmless deception continued for years. At the conclusion of his soirees, he would challenge his guests to identify the composer of the piece they had just heard. Unknown to Walsegg, his friends were well aware of his artifice and calmly played along eventually naming the Count as the composer. As Herzog put it, "We were all young folk and considered that we were giving our master an innocent pleasure."

On February 14, 1791, his young wife died.  He came up an idea. Deeply affected by his loss, the Count resolved to honor her memory in two ways. He would build a magnificent memorial for her remains and he would commission a requiem mass to be performed every year on the anniversary of her passing. To this end, he charged his attorney, Dr. Johann Sortschan, with making the necessary arrangements stipulating that Mozart should provide the requiem. As usual, Walsegg intended to claim the requiem as his own.

Spooked by the commission, Mozart threw himself obsessively into the work. But it was all too much. He was only able to complete the Requiem and Kyrie movements, and managed to sketch the voice parts and bass lines for the Dies irae through  to the Hostias.

The composer had given detailed instructions about finishing it to his pupil Süssmayer. Süssmayer copied the entire completed score in his own hand - making it virtually impossible to determine who wrote what - and gave it to the stranger.

Even after Mozart’s death, the Walsegg-Stuppach persisted with his deception. He copied the music (which had been completed by Mozart’s students) into his own handwriting.  On December 11, 1793, he conducted it. It was entitled, “Requiem, composto del Conte Walsegg”!

Sources:

[1] http://www.classicfm.com/composers/mozart/guides/mozart-requiem-full-works-concert-highlight-week/

[2] http://www.classicfm.com/composers/mozart/case-notes-requiem/

[3] http://www.classical-music.com/article/story-behind-mozarts-reqiuem

[4] http://inmozartsfootsteps.com/380/the-real-story-of-mozart-salieri-and-amadeus-2/

[5]  http://www.mozart.com/en/timeline/life/la-clemenza-di-tito-magic-flute/