# W. A. Mozart - KV C 01.13 (Anh. 235e) - Mass after Cosi fan tutte in C major



## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

This goes to prove how closely related the two genres, religious music and opera, were in the 18th century.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Così_fan_tutte_pasticcio_Coronation_Mass

The Coronation Mass in C major, K. Deest is a parody mass based on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera Così fan tutte that was offered to Simrock by Carl Zulehner who had also sold the manuscript of the Mass in G major, K. Anh. 232 to the music publisher, with the claim that it was a Mozart "Coronation Mass".

According to von Seyfried's article on the Mass in G major, K. Anh. 232, which is cited by the writer of the music column in The Australasian, Zulehner offered the mass for sale with the claim that it was a "Coronation Mass" by Mozart, but that it was specifically rejected because the prospective purchaser recognised the material used in the setting as coming from Così fan tutte.

Pajot, citing Jahn, states that the manuscript was still in Zulehner's possession when Jahn visited him during the course of writing his biography of Mozart. Jahn noted that Zulehner stated the mass was composed by Mozart some time before he wrote Così fan tutte, but that he believed that it had been created after the publication of that opera by a church musician.


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## vtpoet (Jan 17, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> This goes to prove how closely related the two genres, religious music and opera, were in the 18th century.


This is really cool. Never even heard of this until today.

Not sure it necessarily proves your thesis, _but it's complicated_. I keep wondering what I would think of the piece if I had never heard of or known of Cosi fan tutte. It would sound... beautiful... but decidedly... _off_. Easier to imagine what music historians would have said. I think they would have questioned its provenance. The bridges between the movements are noticeably un-Mozartean. They probably would have compared it to K 297b-a work that is _probably_ by Mozart but filtered through someone else's revisions. It's also so unlike his other liturgical works that either they would conclude that it's a fake (which somewhat argues against your thesis) or would have marked it as a dramatic turning point in Mozart's conception of Liturgical Music (which also somewhat argues against your thesis). But that Mozart infused his Liturgical Music with what he learned from writing opera is undoubtedly true. On the other hand, all of the various genre's in which Mozart worked are also infused by what he learned in other genres. An example of this would be "Ch'io mi scordi di te?"






In this case, you will repeatedly read that this illustrates how closely related the genres of the opera and the piano concerto were _to Mozart_. Does this prove that the 18th century thought of piano concertos and opera as closely related genres? That said, whoever composed the parody evidently thought that Mozart's opera could be arranged as a Mass, so that favors your thesis. But, on the other hand (again filing this under _but it's complicated_) many church authorities (including Colloredo according to some) explicitly discouraged and/or disallowed operatic gestures in liturgical works. So, that again works against your thesis. The two genres, as far as the conservative tastes among _some_ in the church went, were distinctly different. And on the other hand, the very fact that they were explicit in wishing to keep these two genres separate, suggests that composer saw or wanted to exploit the innovations of the opera in their liturgical music.

So, did 18th century auditors expect from liturgical composition what they expected from opera? No. Is this what they increasingly got? Yes.


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