Marie Antoinette Read Online Free PDF Page B

Laxenburg and elsewhere, festivities, both outdoors and indoors, punctuated the lives of the imperial family. The heavy Austrian winters offered unrivalled opportunities for sledging and sledging parties. (Memories of such jollities meant that Marie Antoinette would get excited all her life at the sight of any serious snowfall.) One traveller evoked a glamorous vision of the Archduchesses in fur-trimmed velvet and diamonds, gliding by in gilded sledges in the shape of swans; the Archdukes Ferdinand and Max acted as drivers and the whole scene—at Schönbrunn—took place by torchlight. There were cavalry tournaments known as carousels to be watched, and elaborate equestrian displays. Riding and hunting were considered normal occupations for young women.
    The court fêtes in theatres, big and small, were dominated by the strong taste for music in the imperial family and its supporting aristocracy, something that was taken for granted and viewed with pleasure, much like the heavy snows. Nor was this appreciation and talent confined to the aristocracy: Dr. Charles Burney, the English musicologist who journeyed throughout Europe for his general history of music of the mid-1770s, was struck by the level of musical education not only at court but also among the villagers. “It has been said by travellers that the nobility keep musicians in their houses,” he noted, “but in keeping servants, it is impossible to do otherwise.” This was not a new thing. Joseph Haydn, for whose music Marie Antoinette would later display enthusiasm, was born in eastern Austria in 1732, the son of a wheelwright. For nearly thirty years, off and on, he was employed at the court of the great Esterhazy family. Gluck, nearly twenty years his senior, who was at one point singing-master to the young Archduchess and would enjoy a long-lasting and valued connection to her, was the son of the chief forester of Count Kinsky.
    In the case of Madame Antoine, the enjoyment of music was from childhood central to her life. It is true that she can hardly have taken an important part in the earliest fête that centred round her. This was the celebration held on 1 November 1756, the eve of her first birthday. However, from an early age she took part in the celebration on her name-day, 13 June, the Feast of St. Antony. In the morning her parents would drive to a solemn High Mass at the Church of the Minorities, followed by a gala in honour of the youngest Archduchess.
    In 1759, shortly before her fourth birthday, Antoine sang “a French Vaudeville song” at the celebrations for the name-day of her father, the feast of St. Francis, whilst her elder brothers and sisters sang Italian arias. The Empress’s own name-day came shortly afterwards, when the Emperor organized an impromptu musical party for his wife, once again with the children singing and performing; the Archduke Ferdinand played an overture on the kettledrum.
    The imperial children acted as audience too. On 13 October 1762 “the little child from Salzburg”—Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart—came with his father and sister Nannerl to Schönbrunn. He played the harpsichord in the presence of the Empress, the Emperor, the court composer Georg Christoph Wagenseil and various of Maria Teresa’s offspring, including Antoine who was three months older than the prodigy. The child played “marvellously,” was the verdict, and he was rewarded with an honorarium of 100 ducats and presents from other nobles. He was also presented with a fine outfit that had belonged to the Archduke Max, a coat of lilac colour and a moiré waistcoat, all trimmed with gold braid. The concert was repeated, again at Schönbrunn, a week later.
    Perhaps it is not true that the young Mozart flung himself at the young Marie Antoinette and declared that he would marry her when he grew up (an apocryphal story which, if it had in some amazing way come true, would certainly have altered the course of history). But his impetuosity was certainly in