# Is there difference of quality between Mozart and Süssmayr's sections in the Requeim?



## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

I think the whole thing sounds wonderful and would never have guessed that it was composed by two different composers with vastly different skill levels. Are those of you more attuned to the finer details in music able to notice the contrast between the composers?

Bonus question: Is there a recording of the Requiem that is on the slower side? Something akin to Klemperer's Matthew Passion (and does it use modern instruments?)


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

All I know is that after listening to Dvorak's and Verdi's requiems, Mozart's one can be flushed down the toilet.


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## vmartell (Feb 9, 2017)

level82rat said:


> I think the whole thing sounds wonderful and would never have guessed that it was composed by two different composers with vastly different skill levels. Are those of you more attuned to the finer details in music able to notice the contrast between the composers?
> 
> Bonus question: Is there a recording of the Requiem that is on the slower side? Something akin to Klemperer's Matthew Passion (and does it use modern instruments?)


That is a great question - haven't really thought about it. Top of my head, not even sure what parts are Suessmayr's and which ones are Mozart - vaguely remember that the last few sections are the additions, but not 100% sure...

But the thing is that the piece as I known and loved it for years is the Suessmayr completion; have imprinted on that and is fine. A beloved piece in its form. Haven't heard the Levine completion (? - pls correct me if I am wrong ) or a Mozart only edition... nor have I felt the need to do so.

I also do tend to keep away from HIP versions - it is something I have found out I do - not on purpose but the only HIP version in my posession of this particular piece is Harnoncourt's. My preferred version is not HIP, but quite lively compared to others - Karl Bohm's on DG. Runner up, Bruno Walter's.

v


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

aioriacont said:


> All I know is that after listening to Dvorak's and Verdi's requiems, Mozart's one can be flushed down the toilet.





aioriacont said:


> Some text comprehension or even basic logic thinking lessons can be useful too, as it can be matter of lack of overall cognitive capacity other than manners - or both.


Says someone who accuses others as "lacking cognitive capacity" for not caring for Schubert's "unsalted/unspiced meat". =) Well, to each his own. =) Dvorak's, Berlioz's are two requiems I can't stand for their long-windedness. (Verdi's and Faure's are better though) I would happily trade them for J.C. Bach's Dies irae or M. Haydn's Requiem or Hasse's Misereres.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

level82rat said:


> I think the whole thing sounds wonderful and would never have guessed that it was composed by two different composers with vastly different skill levels. Are those of you more attuned to the finer details in music able to notice the contrast between the composers?


This is because the parts later finished by other composers (Mozart finished up to the first 8 bars of the lacrimosa, and vocal parts of the offertory) are pretty much "taken from" Mozart's early masses. For example, compare:

spatzenmesse K.220 (1775): qui tollis
dominicusmesse K.66 (1769): qui tollis 
requiem K.626 (1792): agnus dei

spatzenmesse K.220 (1775): crucifixus
requiem K.626 (1792): lacrimosa

misericordias domini K.222 (1775): 3:28
requiem K.626 (Levin completion): amen
also the benedictus movement of the requiem is written in the style of those of Mozart's Salzburg masses and K.427.

But I find that the way to finish them too awkward to be something Mozart would have done. If you look at the way he went about doing things in the missae breves or the more large-scale missae of his Salzburg period, you'll see he always 
1. wrote concluding fugues "proportioned" with the length of the mass. (K.192, K.194, which take 18~20 minutes for full performance, have shorter concluding fugues in their movements. Whereas K.167, K.262, which take 30 minutes, have longer concluding fugues.)
2. wrote in the more contemporary "symphonic style" (ie. K.220, K.257, K.258, K.317) while omitting concluding fugues. (This was because, as Mozart described in his letter to padre Martini; there was "no time for them". Archbishop Colloredo limited the duration of a mass service to be "3/4 of an hour", and so, time for playing music was even less than that. A homophonic text setting generally covers more lyrics in a given amount of time in performance than a polyphonic one).
3. wrote a quick fugato, "integrated" into the whole movement, without a double bar or a "pause" in between them, to end the movement (ie. magnificat from vesper K.321).

Regardless of the quality of Sussmayr's completion, I find his way to end the sanctus and benedictus a bit too awkward to be something Mozart would have done. It's too long to be "case 3" and too short to be "case 1". This is one of the reasons why I prefer Levin's completion. He seems to know better what Mozart would have done. And I agree with Levin's argument that each "group of movements" (introitus - sequentia - offertory - sanctus - communion) should conclude with a fugue, and that was Mozart's intention. There was no reason for Mozart in 1791 to adopt "case 2"; that is, to just end the sequentia with an amen cadence. It wasn't a "missa brevis". (this makes sense if you look at the layout of another large-scale mass by Mozart, K.427, and the fact that the D minor amen fugue, which Mozart sketched separately, uses one of the requiem's principal motifs "d-c#-d-e-f" by inverting it both "horizontally" and "vertically".) Sussmayr's completion doesn't fall into any of the cases described above; 1,2,3.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I hear a difference and it is tragic as the Mozart composed part is so amazing and then it all goes a little ordinary. I have not heard an alternative that works any better but maybe I have missed something. The best performances for me are those that somehow make the transition less obvious. Jacobs does very well in presenting a work that is wonderful to the end.


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> Says someone who accuses others as "lacking cognitive capacity" for not caring for Schubert's "unsalted/unspiced meat". =) Well, to each his own. =) Dvorak's, Berlioz's are two requiems I can't stand for their long-windedness. (Verdi's and Faure's are better though) I would happily trade them for J.C. Bach's Dies irae or M. Haydn's Requiem or Hasse's Misereres.


woow man, check at around 6:15 from the video below, that's as heavenly music as Bach can get in his passions:






Dvorak devours Mozart!


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

ahh Faure's requiem, how could I forget!

But we all know Brahms trumps them all with his Deutsche R.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

aioriacont said:


> Dvorak devours Mozart!


Sorry, the most memorable I found in it was Confutatis, which I find to be rather a "half-baked pastiche" of Mozart. And btw, I'll remind you this is not a thread about requiems by composers other than Mozart.


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> Sorry, the most memorable I found in it was Confutatis, which I find to be rather a "half-baked pastiche" of Mozart. And btw, I'll remind you this is not a thread about requiems by composers other than Mozart.


sadly, sorry for kicking your sand castle, but the best of Mozart's requiem is not even Mozart himself. Especially its best part, which is from the other guy from the thread title. 
Mozart's around 30 minutes of composed requiem are as bland as his piano sonatas, 70 % of his symphonies, and his cold in general church muzak.

However, not everything is lost for Wolfy. Mozart would probably be an awesome composer of the soundtrack to the Mario Bros series, were he alive these days.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

How lucky for us that we have all of these, and more, fine requiems to appreciate. Knocking one does not improve the status of the others. It isn't a "Survivor" kind of elimination competition.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

aioriacont said:


> sadly, sorry for kicking your sand castle, but the best of Mozart's requiem is not even Mozart himself. Especially its best part, which is from the other guy from the thread title.
> Mozart's around 30 minutes of composed requiem are as bland as his piano sonatas, 70 % of his symphonies, and his cold in general church muzak.
> However, not everything is lost for Wolfy. Mozart would probably be an awesome composer of the soundtrack to the Mario Bros series, were he alive these days.


O come on, Mr. aioriacont, stop joking. =) You perfectly know Mozart isn't that bad as you describe. If he was that bad, how would he have been so influential? I think you're being salty about the way I described Schubert in your thread, "Bach and Schubert, the summit of all music". I still consider Schubert a fine artist who deserves respect -Just because I don't appreciate Schubert's aesthetics, it doesn't make him "objectively bad", he moved other people with his own way of expression. The same can be said of Dvorak and Berlioz's requiems.






"Wagner's life-long admiration included an encounter in the mid-to late 1820s that 'formed the starting point of my enthusiastic absorption in the works of that master [Mozart]' and contemplations of it late in life as well; Anton Rubinstein, Mahler Richard Strauss, Stanford and Rimsky-Korsakov all conducted it, Rimsky-Korsakov also quoting extensively from the Introit in the final section of Mozart and Salieri. Described in 1902 as one of Mozart's works that 'speaks persuadingly to every generation . . . [through which] Mozart's influence still persists and must be reckoned with as a factor in the complexus of forces which is moulding the music of the new century', it had similar exposure among twentieth century composers. Bartok used examples from the Requiem in his teaching; Szymanowski wrote of its 'divine grief', the most powerful 'eruption' of the 'grim, powerful call from a world beyond ours' in Mozart's late music; Janecek conducted a highly successful performance of it in Brno in the late 1870s and another in the memory of Smetana in Prague in 1916; the fifteen-year-old Walton sang a solo part in a performance at Christ Church, Oxford, in December 1917; Britten considered it an important historical precedent for the modern-day composer in writing his own War Requiem (1961-2), subsequently reacting profoundly to conducting Mozart's work (1971)."
(Mozart's Requiem: Reception, Work, Completion, By Simon P. Keefe, Page 6)

An awesome comment by you:



aioriacont said:


> I strongly recommend to anyone I know who thinks Mozart is trivial and not deep, to give our dear genius more chances.
> I once was like this, I really underestimated this amazing composer who is currently my top third one, right before Bach and Schubert. Until last year, I considered him trivial music, how wrong I was! He is actually very deep. And he can be much more inaccessible than one thinks. He is actually a grower.
> The more one listens to Mozart, the more they will realise how much a genius he is, and how many of his works are actually underrated (for example, his Masses and various other vocal works apart from the well known operas).
> For me, Bach, Schubert and Mozart are the amazing triad of all music. And Beethoven comes close!


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> O come on, Mr. aioriacont, stop joking. =) You perfectly know Mozart isn't that bad as you describe. If he was that bad, how would he have been so influential? I think you're being salty about the way I described Schubert in your thread, "Bach and Schubert, the summit of all music". I still consider Schubert an artist to be respected -Just because I don't appreciate Schubert's aesthetics, it doesn't make him "objectively bad", he moved other people with his own way of expression. The same can be said of Dvorak and Berlioz's requiems.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


No, i never said that. It is all your imagination, seek help please!

Kidding man...haha you caught me! I was already going to tell it was all a joke.

I was cosplaying your Beethoven's comments...I needed some fun after 10 hours simulating fluid mechanics models.

But Dvorak's is better...

:lol:


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## Music Snob (Nov 14, 2018)

This subject is dear to me.

I recommend this book for anyone interested. The author dissects the score and one may be surprised that compositional evidence may point to Mozart's influence being more present in Sussmayr's parts than previously recognized.









Briefly, from what I remember, the bass line to the Agnus Dei is the main Requiem theme. Also, the Sanctus is the D major version of the D minor Dies Irae. Sussmayr certainly didn't know how to handle the fugues and botched the key of the fugue in the Sanctus. 
Famously, Constanze told of giving scraps of paper to Sussmayr in order to finish the Requiem. Not many people believed that story because Mozart didn't sketch out his ideas very often. Miraculously a surging sketch appeared in 1962 of an Amen fugue that would've concluded the Lacrymosa. We know it is for the Requiem because it is the main theme of the Requiem but inverted. The sketch is also underneath a sketch for a part from Zauberflote.

This Amen fugue can be heard I'm all of its 16 bar glory on this recording:









This particular recording has the entire Sussmayr version as well as a Mozart only version.

The Requiem left to us by Mozart without anyone else's hand provides for us a window into how he composed from the ground up.

I hope this post was helpful- I cannot recommend this book enough.


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## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> or M. Haydn's Requiem


Such a wonderful Requiem. I may even put it above Mozart's. What are your thoughts on Salieri's?


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

aioriacont said:


> All I know is that after listening to Dvorak's and Verdi's requiems, Mozart's one can be flushed down the toilet.


Disagree with the crassness of phrasing but yes I love Verdi and Dvořák Requiems way more too


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

aioriacont said:


> sadly, sorry for kicking your sand castle, but the best of Mozart's requiem is not even Mozart himself. Especially its best part, which is from the other guy from the thread title.
> Mozart's around 30 minutes of composed requiem are as bland as his piano sonatas, 70 % of his symphonies, and his cold in general church muzak.
> 
> However, not everything is lost for Wolfy. Mozart would probably be an awesome composer of the soundtrack to the Mario Bros series, were he alive these days.


I guess you think you're really smart despising Mozart and managing to do it so unpleasantly. It must be too simple for you.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

level82rat said:


> Such a wonderful Requiem. I may even put it above Mozart's. What are your thoughts on Salieri's?


It's usually the German late-baroque/classical ones that I find appealing (except I do like Pergolesi's Stabat mater), Salieri tends to have much emphasis on melody over harmony/orchestration, a style that dominates his emperor mass and other works.


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

Enthusiast said:


> I guess you think you're really smart despising Mozart and managing to do it so unpleasantly. It must be too simple for you.


Mozart is awesome!


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## Music Snob (Nov 14, 2018)

The Spering Requiem is HIP and very slow... which if I had to chose I would prefer slower for this composition.

I may be alone in this thought but my favorite is the 1960 Karajan.


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## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

Music Snob said:


> and botched the key of the fugue in the Sanctus.


Really? How so?


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## Music Snob (Nov 14, 2018)

According to what I learned and remember the fugue at the end of both the Sanctus and Benedictus should be in the key of D major (The major of the main key). While the fugues at the end of both are not developed enough, Sussmayr did get the key right for the Benedictus. For the Sanctus he us B major for some inexplicable reason.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

This thread concerns Mozart's Requiem. Please don't divert the focus by discussing other issues.


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## Bigbang (Jun 2, 2019)

Of course style and period count for something so why compare? Not everything composed by a composer has to be compared to another composer who has a work that has "requiem" in the title.


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## StevenOBrien (Jun 27, 2011)

Regarding a slow version, I've always loved this version by Bernstein:






As is well documented, there is a huge difference in quality between what Sussmayr wrote and what Mozart wrote, but I think Sussmayr is treated very unfairly by history.

Imagine yourself in his shoes: You're a young composer with inadequate training. You make your living by writing trivial pieces and operettas, and you've never attempted to write an extensive piece of religious music in your life. Suddenly, you're handed an incomplete manuscript of a masterpiece by one of the world's greatest composers (a man who had little respect for you and would constantly make you the butt of his jokes). His widow is destitute and desperately needs money which can only be secured by this work's completion. You have a month to finish this, and you're not going to be paid for it. Two other far more accomplished and skilled composers than you have attempted to finish it, and gave up. If you don't finish this piece, it might never be performed and could fall into obscurity. Get going! No pressure!

Barring egregious things like the bare parallel fifths in the Sanctus, I haven't heard a completion I prefer more than Sussmayr's. His completion is very respectful to Mozart, and I feel like Sussmayr better understood what Mozart was trying to do than most modern completions do.

You have people like Robert Levin (who I generally have a lot of respect for) eviscerating Sussmayr's work on the Sanctus for bad counterpoint, and then going off and writing an upbeat Sanctus with joyful string flourishes which bears little resemblance to any Sanctus Mozart ever wrote and sounds far too lighthearted for the work that it's in (though credit where it's due: Levin's extended fugue is nice). I will take the very emotional and pius Mozart/Sussmayr version, parallel fifths and all, over a trifling completion any day.

I also think the non-Sussmayr completions have very weird views about what constitutes "correct" orchestration. For instance, why does every non-Sussmayr completion seem to be intent on removing the string flourish before the "Rex Gloriae" in the Domine Jesu? It sounds so bare and wrong without it. Why does every non-Sussmayr completion seem to be convinced that Mozart would put dotted rhythms in the trumpets/drums in the Dies Irae? For me, it kills the gravity and seriousness of the movement when you do that, and Sussmayr's reversion to straight rhythms there sounds 100% correct to me.

Regarding the latter part of the Lacrimosa, the Benedictus and the Agnus Dei (and the Sanctus), while it's often said that these sections are entirely by Sussmayr, there are portions of them that are so sublime and skillfully written that I find it difficult to believe that these aren't by Mozart. I think that Sussmayr must have based these movements off of (now lost) sketches left by Mozart, but didn't have the skill or the understanding to assemble them properly, so they constitute a muddled, taped-together version of what the final Requiem might have sounded like. I think removing these sections (as many completions do) is a travesty.

In short: Be nicer to Sussmayr. I think Mozart would be happy that his student stepped up to the plate to help his family when other composers wouldn't.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

StevenOBrien said:


> going off and writing an upbeat Sanctus with joyful string flourishes which bears little resemblance to any Sanctus Mozart ever wrote and sounds far too lighthearted for the work that it's in (though credit where it's due: Levin's extended fugue is nice). I will take the very emotional and pius Mozart/Sussmayr version, parallel fifths and all, over a trifling completion any day.
> In short: Be nicer to Sussmayr. I think Mozart would be happy that his student stepped up to the plate to help his family when other composers wouldn't.


I think the fugue of the Sanctus and Benedictus is supposed to be "light-hearted" in a way, it is pretty much one section of the work that is dedicated to "Christ's triumph over death and his ascension". To answer the OP further, I want to point out Sussmayr completion feels "static", especially towards the end of the Agnus dei. It is as if he used K.220 as the template but wasn't sure what to do, (compare with a part Mozart actually wrote, like Hostias). Overall, it doesn't top the benedictus of K.257 (the glorious vocal quartet that just "keeps driving forward") or the agnus dei of K.275, dona nobis pacem of K.258 in quality.

*[ 14:59 ]*





*[ 13:13 ]*





*[ 14:35 ]*


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

Perhaps the Sussmayr portion is better, considering that _he_ composed most of the _Lacrimosa_ and that this is the most famous portion of the "Mozart" Requiem (appeared in the movie Amadeus and all).


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

I consider Mozart's Requiem, one of those mysterious, miraculous works kind of like Bruckner's unfinished 9th, where the composer has reached profound new heights as they approach their own death. I like Sussmayr's completion and have never had a problem with it. As Steven OBrien alluded to I suspect that Sussmayr was working with more of Mozart's own ideas than what is generally believed, on scraps of paper that have since been lost. I believe it was Beethoven who said upon hearing this work that whoever completed it must have been a near Mozart level composer. The works enduring popularity and impact I think is a testament to the fact that the piece just works, and in reality there is no drastic fall off in quality. As I said I consider it a miraculous work, for me it is up there with Bach's B minor mass. 

As far as Dvorak's Requiem it has some nice moments, I listened to it once years ago and have never felt the need to revisit it.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Allerius said:


> Perhaps the Sussmayr portion is better, considering that _he_ composed most of the _Lacrimosa_ and that this is the most famous part of the Requiem (appeared in the movie Amadeus and all).


"Sussmayr composed" might not be the right expression. Take a look at one of my earlier posts, #5
"Another controversy is the suggestion (originating from a letter written by Constanze) that Mozart left explicit instructions for the completion of the Requiem on "a few scraps of paper with music on them... found on Mozart's desk after his death." The extent to which Süssmayr's work may have been influenced by these "scraps" if they existed at all remains a subject of speculation amongst musicologists to this day."


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> "Sussmayr composed" might not be the right expression. Take a look at one of my earlier posts, #5
> "Another controversy is the suggestion (originating from a letter written by Constanze) that Mozart left explicit instructions for the completion of the Requiem on "a few scraps of paper with music on them... found on Mozart's desk after his death." The extent to which Süssmayr's work may have been influenced by these "scraps" if they existed at all remains a subject of speculation amongst musicologists to this day."


"The autograph manuscript shows the finished and orchestrated Introit in Mozart's hand, and detailed drafts of the Kyrie and the sequence Dies irae *as far as the first eight bars of the Lacrymosa movement*, and the Offertory. It cannot be shown to what extent Süssmayr may have depended on now lost "scraps of paper" for the remainder; he later claimed the Sanctus and Benedictus and the Agnus Dei as his own."

"The chords begin piano on a rocking rhythm in 12/8, intercut with quarter rests, which will be reprised by the choir after two measures, on Lacrymosa dies illa ("This tearful day"). Then, after two measures, the sopranos begin a diatonic progression, in disjointed eighth-notes on the text resurget ("will be reborn"), then legato and chromatic on a powerful crescendo. *The choir is forte by m. 8, at which point Mozart's contribution to the movement is interrupted by his death.*

Süssmayr brings the choir to a reference of the Introit and ends on an Amen cadence. Discovery of a fragmentary Amen fugue in Mozart's hand has led to speculation that it may have been intended for the Requiem. Indeed, many modern completions (such as Levin's) complete Mozart's fragment. Some sections of this movement are quoted in the Requiem mass of Franz von Suppé, who was a great admirer of Mozart. Ray Robinson, the music scholar and president (from 1969 to 1987) of the Westminster Choir College, suggests that Süssmayr used materials from Credo of one of Mozart's earlier masses, Mass in C major, K. 220 "Sparrow" in completing this movement."

*The source is wikipedia.*


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Allerius said:


> *The choir is forte by m. 8, at which point Mozart's contribution to the movement is interrupted by his death.*


I don't know why you're so unusually worked up on this, =) using all these large font bold letters. (I'm vaguely reminded of the time we discussed the "vocal canon that might been written by either Beethoven or Schindler".) 
I already know all the facts you mentioned in your post, but I still think there's a difference between "a composer completing another composer's work by using the latter's "scraps of paper" and early works" and "a composer writing his own works". That's what I meant. 
And I don't agree with your argument that the most well-known works are the best. Because by that logic, the Air on G String, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Fur Elise would be the best stuff written by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

I'm in my second attempt over the years of listening to the Verdi Requiem, I've never made it to the end of this work. I like some parts of it, but I start to lose interest.


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't know why you're so unusually worked up on this, =) using all these large font bold letters. (I'm vaguely reminded of the time we discussed the "*vocal canon** that might been written by either Beethoven or Schindler"*.)


And why do you use "=)" everywhere? =)

"Probably a forgery of Anton Schindler, *which was not written down before 1843*.

For a long time, it was believed that Beethoven wrote the famous Mälzel canon, in which the theme of the 2nd movement of his 8th symphony is written, for his friend, the inventor Johann Nepomuk Mälzel, in 1812 and thus commemorated the inventor of the metronome. Today we know better: the canon is not at all from Beethoven's pen, WoO 162 is one of Anton Schindler's many inventions, which he later pushed on to the composer.

Schindler was his unpaid secretary and nurse in Beethoven's last months. From this contact with the composer, after Beethoven's death, he derived absolute authority in all questions regarding the biography of the master. With regard to the interpretation of Beethoven's works, Schindler also appointed himself the trustee of Beethoven's legacy. One of the central issues for Schindler was the tempo question, because in his opinion, a wrong tempo during the performance could distort the original character of the composition (or what Schindler thought was the original character). In this discussion, however, confusion created Beethoven's own metronome statements, which were not always feasible or contradict Schindler's perceptions of tempo. Schindler particularly complained that he thought that his contemporaries' tempos were much too fast, above all Felix Mendelssohn. To support his view of slow tempos, Schindler published the so-called Mälzel canon in Hirschbach's "Musical Repertory" in February 1844. The theme of the canon comes from the 2nd movement of Beethoven's 8th Symphony, and the text makes the reference to Mälzel's metronome clear. Authentic handwritten sources do not exist for the composition. Schindler also provided the history of the event and the occasion (but reported them differently in different publications and with different dates, which caused irritation even among contemporaries). To underpin the authenticity of the canon, Schindler added fake entries in Beethoven's conversation books," - *Source here*

It wasn't composed before 1843, so it's not by Beethoven. =)



hammeredklavier said:


> I already know all the facts you mentioned in your post, but I still think there's a difference between "a composer completing another composer's work by using the latter's "scraps of paper" and early works" and "a composer writing his own works". That's what I meant.


Scraps of paper are too vague. Sussmayr had to compose what Mozart left unfinished. =)



hammeredklavier said:


> And I don't agree with your argument that the most well-known works are the best. Because by that logic, the Air on G String, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Fur Elise would be the best stuff written by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven.


Great but *if you feel free to attack Beethoven* you can't blame others for doing the same with Mozart. =)


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Allerius said:


> Scraps of paper are too vague. Sussmayr had to compose what Mozart left unfinished.


The whole concept of 'unknown how much he relied on scraps of paper' means we do not know precisely how much Mozart left unfinished. What we can say for certain is the work has held up very well over time, is widely considered a masterpiece and was respected and influential on Beethoven and many others.


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

tdc said:


> The whole concept of 'unknown how much he relied on scraps of paper' means we do not know precisely how much Mozart left unfinished.


"Those conversations with the publisher sparked a great controversy surrounding the Requiem. Süssmayr, who had kept his silence for eight years, wrote the publishers stating that the Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei were entirely his own composition. Abbé Maxmillian Stadler, one of Mozart's close associates who may have helped complete the Requiem himself, carefully marked Count Walsegg's score to indicate which handwriting was Mozart's and which was Süssmayr's. Still, Breitkopf & Härtel published the first work not worthy of Mozart, noting many errors in voice leading and also recognizing melodic material borrowed from Handel and Bach. Controversy as to the merits of the Requiem raged within the musical community for decades. In 1826, 23 years after Süssmayr's death, André of Offenbach finally published an edition giving Süssmayr credit for his completion.

Half a century later, Johannes Brahms published a new edition of the Requiem in which he declined to fix any of Süssmayr's errors. History, it seemed, had decided to accept the version delivered to Count Walsegg as definitive. Then, in 1960, musicologist Wolfgang Plath discovered previously unknown sketches for the Requiem in a collection of Mozart manuscripts at the Berlin Staatsbibliothek. *These were clearly among the "scraps of paper" given Süssmayr by Constanze, which he had disregarded in his haste to meet the February deadline. The most important sketch indicated that Mozart intended the Lacrimosa to end in a fugue on the text "Amen."* He subsequently published a new version of the Requiem by completing many of Mozart's fragments and correcting some Süssmayr errors. There are also several other versions in print." - *Source here*.

True, but we know that Süssmayr composed the Sanctus, the Benedictus, the Agnus Dei and parts of the Lacrimosa, and that for this latter he even ignored Mozart instructions. The famous version of the Requiem's Lacrimosa is partly by Süssmayr.



tdc said:


> What we can say for certain is the work has held up very well over time, is widely considered a masterpiece and was respected and influential on Beethoven and many others.


Absolutely true. I'm not disputing the greatness of the Süssmayr/Mozart Requiem.


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## Music Snob (Nov 14, 2018)

As I said before everyone interested in this topic should read the book written by Christoph Wolfe:









We know that the Lacrymosa would have never of ended on a half cadence but with a fugue. My hat goes off to Sussmayr for the effort though- not an easy endeavor.

The Sanctus is the D Major version of the Dies Irae. While not greatly composed it seems to have been instructed to Sussmayr in someway a basic idea of how the Sanctus should be written. The fugue at the end of the Sanctus is in the key of Bb major, not the proper key of D major. Also, it is too short.

The Benedictus starts of with the instruments playing the theme before the singers start with the same theme. Mozart would've never had done this. Mozart would've had the intro be a musical idea that led into the melodic theme but not the theme itself. Interestingly, the theme of the Benedictus was written by Mozart in a notebook for Barbara Ployer years earlier. Whether or not Sussmayr knew and used this we will never know.

The Agnus Dei has the requiem theme in the bass which may be a clue as to whether or not Sussmayr has any instruction on that particular piece. In the aforementioned book the author extrapolates on the part writing for all of Sussmayr's contributions to try to figure out if there are hints of Mozart or not. I would be able to be more specific but my book is in storage as I am in the middle of moving.

We should keep in mind that Sussmayr was not the first approached to complete the requiem. Josef Eybler has a shot at it before Sussmayr and walked away from the project. Some of Eybler's contributions are still in the orchestration, I think.

As for the scraps of paper, one such did appear in the early 1960's which lends credence to Constanze's claim. The fugue which would've ended the Lacrymosa is sketched out underneath a sketch for a complex part of Zauberflote. It is the requiem theme inverted:


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Music Snob said:


> The Agnus Dei has the requiem theme in the bass which may be a clue as to whether or not Sussmayr has any instruction on that particular piece. In the aforementioned book the author extrapolates on the part writing for all of Sussmayr's contributions to try to figure out if there are hints of Mozart or not. I would be able to be more specific but my book is in storage as I am in the middle of moving.


As I said, the parts of Agnus dei (requiem) and Lacrimosa completed by Sussmayr are pretty much "copies" of the Qui tollis and Et incarnatus est from K.220 and K.66:
*[ 2:50 ]
[ 6:00 ]*





The Lacrimosa is melodically-inspired, but after listening to Mozart's other catholic music, I find the parts completed by Sussmayr a bit "melodramatic", slightly devoid of the restrained, intricate chromatic part-writing that is characteristic of Mozart's graver passages (ie. Agnus deis from K.275 and K.192). 







I think Mozart would have done it better than Sussmayr if he lived long enough to finish it. And the 8 bars Mozart finished make up almost 1/3 of the movement in duration, except the long lead-in to the amen-cadence and the cadence itself. And there are reprises of Mozart's material towards the ending. 
He has better stuff that's neglected by the general public today:





*[ 9:47 ~ 11: 47 ]*


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