Marrying Mozart Read Online Free PDF
Author: Stephanie Cowell
mind and now lay in cramped, rapid penmanship on the music staves before him. How many hours had he worked? He never remembered. If only I could finish it all tonight, he thought. The whole commission, second quartet, both concerti. If only my hand and eyes weren’t tired. He slumped slightly, one hand on the side of the newly dried ink markings, listening to the sound of late carriages and merrymakers rising up from the street.
After a time he drank some ale and began to gather the music pages. In the rooms below a girl was laughing. He recognized the strange quiet inside himself that always came after working for some hours.
In the next room, also by one candle, Frau Mozart sat up in bed with a portable desk across her knees; she looked up from her writing, her small eyes blinking. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, lips moving in relief, and returned to her letter home to Salzburg.
Dear Husband,
Last evening we went on your recommendation to that music copyist. Listen. Weber is a good man but hasn’t two pennies, and I can’t trust his wife; she is interested only in her own opportunities. The two older girls sing not badly. Our evening there was not unpleasant, but I suppose there must be more important people in Mannheim to know than this. There was certainly no one there last night to further our son’s career. Strangely, here as in Augsburg, everyone seems to have forgotten the prodigy he was, how all of Europe clustered about him. It is as if that never happened.
I wish you had come with us and did not have to remain in your wretched work for the Archbishop.
Wolferl worked several hours tonight on the Dutchman’s commission, after two days of complaining how he dislikes writing for flute, particularly when it will be destroyed by the playing of an amateur like DeJean. However, three days ago he completed the first quartet and has promised to make a copy to send you; he wishes me to mention particularly the middle movement with the flute set against pizzicato strings. Two hundred silver florins for the commission when complete, husband! I thank God for our good fortune; this will pay for much.
Tomorrow we go to a private gathering of the best people, where Wolferl is to play for the dancing. We do not know if we will be paid. I still believe something will occur here to forward his talents. I hope he will get a commission for an opera, for a successful opera of all things will truly establish his name, or, if not, at least obtain the position of vice kapellmeister at the court. (The present one, they say, is not long for this world.) Meanwhile, we try to save money and dine out at others’ expense when we possibly can, and only have a fire while dressing.
Above all things I intend to keep him away from Augsburg. I still feel half sick to think of what might have occurred if I had not come suddenly upon your son and that wicked girl, her petticoats entirely raised above her thighs ...
The rest of the sentence she wrote with the page half covered by her free hand, so that for a few days following her little finger was edged with ink. She finished the letter then and signed it,
Your loving and devoted Wife, who trusts in God’s mercy.
Maria Anna Mozart
M any feet below the houses of the city lay one of the city’s beer cellars, which offered the local beer and plenty of it, in addition to plates of greasy chops so thick you could just fit your jaws around them, a sort of porridge, rich veined cheeses, large hocks of ham with knives stuck deeply in them to encourage the appetite, dishes of mustard and cabbage, and so on. It was a place where the hour and day were forgotten, for no light penetrated the vaulted, subterranean chambers that were inadequately lit by too few candles, enough to make a shapely buxom shadow of the hostess, and a lean knifelike shadow of the host. These shadows, and that of the resentful beer house boy, dipped and danced with their trays against the stone walls. The
After a time he drank some ale and began to gather the music pages. In the rooms below a girl was laughing. He recognized the strange quiet inside himself that always came after working for some hours.
In the next room, also by one candle, Frau Mozart sat up in bed with a portable desk across her knees; she looked up from her writing, her small eyes blinking. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, lips moving in relief, and returned to her letter home to Salzburg.
Dear Husband,
Last evening we went on your recommendation to that music copyist. Listen. Weber is a good man but hasn’t two pennies, and I can’t trust his wife; she is interested only in her own opportunities. The two older girls sing not badly. Our evening there was not unpleasant, but I suppose there must be more important people in Mannheim to know than this. There was certainly no one there last night to further our son’s career. Strangely, here as in Augsburg, everyone seems to have forgotten the prodigy he was, how all of Europe clustered about him. It is as if that never happened.
I wish you had come with us and did not have to remain in your wretched work for the Archbishop.
Wolferl worked several hours tonight on the Dutchman’s commission, after two days of complaining how he dislikes writing for flute, particularly when it will be destroyed by the playing of an amateur like DeJean. However, three days ago he completed the first quartet and has promised to make a copy to send you; he wishes me to mention particularly the middle movement with the flute set against pizzicato strings. Two hundred silver florins for the commission when complete, husband! I thank God for our good fortune; this will pay for much.
Tomorrow we go to a private gathering of the best people, where Wolferl is to play for the dancing. We do not know if we will be paid. I still believe something will occur here to forward his talents. I hope he will get a commission for an opera, for a successful opera of all things will truly establish his name, or, if not, at least obtain the position of vice kapellmeister at the court. (The present one, they say, is not long for this world.) Meanwhile, we try to save money and dine out at others’ expense when we possibly can, and only have a fire while dressing.
Above all things I intend to keep him away from Augsburg. I still feel half sick to think of what might have occurred if I had not come suddenly upon your son and that wicked girl, her petticoats entirely raised above her thighs ...
The rest of the sentence she wrote with the page half covered by her free hand, so that for a few days following her little finger was edged with ink. She finished the letter then and signed it,
Your loving and devoted Wife, who trusts in God’s mercy.
Maria Anna Mozart
M any feet below the houses of the city lay one of the city’s beer cellars, which offered the local beer and plenty of it, in addition to plates of greasy chops so thick you could just fit your jaws around them, a sort of porridge, rich veined cheeses, large hocks of ham with knives stuck deeply in them to encourage the appetite, dishes of mustard and cabbage, and so on. It was a place where the hour and day were forgotten, for no light penetrated the vaulted, subterranean chambers that were inadequately lit by too few candles, enough to make a shapely buxom shadow of the hostess, and a lean knifelike shadow of the host. These shadows, and that of the resentful beer house boy, dipped and danced with their trays against the stone walls. The