But instead I’m going to talk about Mozart’s starling. Because no one else will.
In 1784, Mozart bought a pet starling. He recorded the purchase in a diary of expenses. He also wrote a transcription of the bird’s song, a near-perfect rendition of a theme in the last movement of Mozart’s Piano Concerto in G Major, K. 453.
Illustration from M. J. West, A. P. King, “Mozart’s Starling” American Scientist, March-April 1990 p 112. Starling’s song at top.
Picture Mozart visiting the pet shop, whistling the tune (which had been composed not long before), and having the bird learn it and chirp it back to him!
Of course he brought it home. It lived with him for three years. When it died, he gave it a grandiose funeral and recited a poem he had written in the starling’s memory. It can be found (in English and German) in the American Scientist article cited below.
Photo of the Czech Museum of Music Library, Prague, published in the Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung. The original caption indicates that Salieri’s portion ends at the top of the page and is followed by Mozart’s contribution to the piece.
Timo Jouko Herrmann, music researcher and expert on the works of Antonio Salieri, has made a startling discovery: he has found the text and music for a lost solo cantata Mozart and Salieri wrote together in 1785.
So much for the Amadeus movie and any conspiracy theories that may have been floating around.
Herrmann was doing research on the holdings of the Czech Museum of Music Library in Prague when he found the text, and then the music, for a solo cantata written for soprano Nancy Storace. The piece was called Per la ricuperata salute di Ofelia [Onthe Recovery of the Health of Ofelia].
Salieri wrote the role of Ofelia in his opera La Grotta di Trofonio [Trofonio’s Cave] specifically for Storace. However, she had to miss the opening because she lost her voice. Her recovery took four months. Mozart wrote the role of Susanna in Le Nozze di Figaro [The Marriage of Figaro] for her after she regained her voice.
In 1785 many newspapers contained stories about the piece, which was given the Köchel number KV477a (each of Mozart’s compositions has its own number). But it was considered lost. It was known that Mozart and Salieri had collaborated on the piece.
The text is drawn from a 30-stanza poem written by Lorenzo da Ponte. Only four stanzas were set in the solo cantata. Mozart wrote the middle of the piece. The beginning was written by Salieri, the final portion by someone named Cornetti, whose identity remains unclear.
The title of the work was recorded accurately in the library’s online catalog. Amazingly, no one realized that it referred to the lost work.
In an interview, Hermann noted that he had planned to go through the library’s online libretto catalog in search of a title by one of Salieri’s students, Antonio Cartellieri. He was surprised and delighted to come upon the text. But when he found not only the text but the notes that went with it, Hermann said, “I could hardly believe my luck.”
Herrmann has submitted an early publication to the Leipziger Hofmeister Verlag to inform musicians where the composition can be found.
Plans are being made by the Mozarteum in Salzburg to stage a public performance of the piece in late February.
What can stay my thoughts?
Shall I straight yield to despair
Wherein I suffer?
Never may my woes
Be relieved, pity is fled,
Exiled forever.
Poor souls sigh and weep.
Who giveth all hath nothing;
My fortune is thrown.
Should I aggrieved then
In deadly pain and mis’ry
Still on sorrow feed?
Of all joys deprived,
Gone are all my joys at once.
Let me live forlorn.
Woeful wretched wight!
Love and I shall die together.
Let me living die.
Following upon Monday’s musical mash-up, I present today’s haiku cut-up. To craft today’s haiku, I printed out lines of John Dowland’s songs that have 5 or 7 syllables and cut them up so that I could rearrange them. [1]
Want to play along? I’ve set up a page with 5-syllable (plain) and 7-syllable (Italic) lines that you can cut out to make your own sigh-swoll’n despairful haiku. You can find it by hovering over the words More Useful Stuff at the top of the web page. Feel free to share your creations as a comment!
One could hardly call John Dowland a cut-up, or comedian, judging by his music. In fact his personal motto was Semper Dowland semper dolens [always Dowland, always Doleful]. His songs tend to be mournful affairs of love gone wrong or unrequited. And they’re wonderful.
My favorite recording of John Dowland’s songs is by British tenor Mark Padmore and Elizabeth Kenny (lute). The disk also includes Benjamin Britten’s Nocturnal after John Dowland performed by Craig Ogden (guitar). Here is an article Padmore wrote on Dowland’s music.
Many artists have recorded Dowland songs, including, surprisingly, Sting and Elvis Costello.
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Footnote
1. This isn’t my first mash-up. Back in high school I recombined lines from the poetry of John Donne to retell the story of Hamlet from Hamlet’s perspective….hey, it was a small town, not much to do!
A quodlibet is a piece of music that features a combination of melodies, for example, popular tunes. They are typically combined in a surprising way that makes them funny (especially if you know the typically non-funny intent of the original tunes).
A mashup combines two or more pieces of music, sometimes superimposing the vocal track of one song over the instrumental track of another.
Either may consist entirely of other people’s music. The art is in the blending.
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra will present a free webcast of Mozart’s “Prague” Symphony on January 16, 2016 at 8:00 PM EST. The program will also include works by Dvorak, Elgar, and Mohammed Fairouz. Here’s the program:
Dvorak Serenade for Winds
Elgar Serenade for Strings
Mozart Symphony No 38, “Prague”
Mohammed Fairouz Concerto for Cello and Orchestra
The program will feature Israeli-born cellist Maya Beiser performing the world premiere of the concerto by Mohammed Fairouz titled “Desert Sorrows.”
