There can be no doubt that Emperor Joseph had heard of my success in Prague, for not long after Gluck’s death I was called to court, where I was told that I’d been appointed to an Imperial post. At last, that for which I had been laboring for so long! How much work and how many years had led me to this moment? I was given the title of Imperial Chamber Musician and a quarterly salary, which, disappointingly, barely made my rent. I reminded myself, however, that I’d probably receive regular increases and promotions as time went on. I soon came to realize, however, that my long-awaited responsibilities entailed nothing more than composing dinner and dance music for state banquets and Imperial balls. As word of my fame in Prague began to wend its way back to Viennese ears, the Emperor didn’t want to appear shortsighted where one of his own subjects was concerned. Basta! Vienna was no different than Salzburg, and an Emperor was no better than an Archbishop! I was still an indentured serf to a feudal lord. As the months passed, I grew more and more resentful of the situation, and one afternoon when my pay packet was delivered to my door, I signed the receipt, adding at the bottom,
Da Ponte and I were told that the Emperor wanted Don Giovanni to be performed early in May. We were frantic with work, for the opera needed extensive revision. We added a few new arias to lengthen the piece and removed the “happy ending” to challenge the Viennese, who, although they enjoyed a life of felicity and secret decadence, did not care to be called to account for it. Predictably, the public brought their ears to the theater the night of the premiere but not their hearts, for it was a miserable failure.
To soothe my battered self-esteem, I began a symphony in E-flat and poured myself into it, working feverishly. Desperation clouded my every waking and dreaming thought; Vienna had let me down once again. Working myself into illness time and again, the city I loved never took me seriously as a composer. Yes, my music was always good for feasting, dancing, and gaming, but I was a serious composer and my court commissions demanded nothing of me but a few hours of my time.
We moved again, this time to help little Thresl, who had become seriously ill. I cared for her and hovered over her like never before. I loved her so much that I had even begun to stop at St. Peter’s each day to pray.
The music filled the white and gilt theater, rising from the orchestra and swirling around me like the clouds of powder used on my hair earlier in my bedroom. A blue silk cone covering my face, I spoke in muffled, disappointed tones to Constanze, who sat in the next room clothed in her own indifference to yet another humiliating performance of the opera, which she had not bothered to see since the Viennese premiere.
“Are you sure you won’t come with me?” One last attempt.
“I’m quite sure. The baby isn’t well, you know. Someone should stay with her. Besides, I saw enough of it in Prague. It’s too depressing, especially now.”
I sighed, sending a white stream of powder out through the small hole in the tip of the cone, and I smiled as Primus huffed and powder-puffed away at his work.
So now it was Thresl, the baby born just two days after my dead mother’s birthday. Not she! Not my little Kätzchen, the little brown-eyed, rosebud-lipped daughter of my heart! Lord God, Almighty Shepherd, please don’t take this little one! You don’t need her. You’ve taken too many already! I’ll abstain. I’ll go to confession and Mass. I’ll never again eat meat on Friday. I will, I will... what? God blesses man with virility, only to remind him of his ultimate impotence when the fruits of his passion are placed in too-small boxes and are covered with dirt. And I had been blessed with too much physical and creative virility—and worldly impotence. I decided my wife was right to stay home. Her sullen presence would only serve to depress me further.
At the theater I could almost see the quavers and semi-quavers flying into the air and past me into the audience. Notes of comedic yellow and romantic blue. Notes of jealous green and lusty crimson. Notes of heavenly opalescent white and notes of demonic black. They flew past me from strings and bells, tubes, and mallets. I surrendered myself to the great sea of music and emotion, each note simultaneously animating my soul. Casting a glance up over my shoulder, I glimpsed the box that once held my honey-skinned Nancy.
“I really did do Constanze a favor,” I thought, recalling my golden summer of secret love. “I didn’t hound her for her favors, and she got the rest she needed. And I was in a better humor when I was around, besides.” I sniffed at my self-righteous justification. If it were such a noble and virtuous thing I’d done, then why had I slunk into our bed like a thief, praying she wouldn’t waken to smell another woman on my conscience?
I shifted my weight a little on the chair to play a recitative. A disappointedly placid Zerlina met my gaze and opened her mouth to sing; a violist opened his mouth to yawn. It wasn’t going well—even with my back to the audience, I knew. Conversation, rustling gowns, laughter. I heard distracted silk and lace fans vainly attempting to chase away the heat of the June evening and wax candles.
“If she were here to witness this inferior performance, would she receive me? Would her tender heart let me disappear into the haven of her arms, her comforting breast?”
I was suddenly lost in a reverie, in which I quickly scribbled out a note and slipped it, along with a Kreuzer, into the overeager palm of a page.
“Repent your wicked life!”
“No, you tiring old man!”
“Repent!”
“No!
“Repent!”
“No!
“Ah, then you have run out of time...”
As if it could be foreseen, my little daughter died, only six months old. As she was taken away—yet another in my agonizing parade of failures—I looked darkly at Constanze, then turned away and resumed my work.
The demands of life are not respecters of grief or despair, and in preparation for summer subscription concerts, I completed two more symphonies. These would turn out to be my last, although I couldn’t have known that at the time, and certainly not the last I intended to pen.
The rest of 1788 was spent battling my consuming depression. The concerts I’d counted on were never held because of low ticket sales. Another war had broken out between Austria and Turkey, and the gentry fled the city with their healthy sons in hope of eluding the conscription Emperor Joseph had enacted. With them too went their money, and with no wealthy aristocrats, there were no soirées, parties, or balls. The German Company of the National Theater folded, and not long after the Italian Company followed suit. Vienna was plunged into impoverishment and depression as inflation ran rampant. many people suffered. Most people suffered.
Constanze was very ill and doctor bills began to pile up. I had to do some fast shuffling, robbing Peter to pay Paul, to cover my debts. Thankfully I found help from Michael Puchberg, a fellow freemason who was more than happy to issue loans to me with only small, comfortable interest fees.
Sitting at my fortepiano, I heard someone come in the front door of our apartment, and judging by the footfall on the wooden parquet floor of the foyer, I knew it was Constanze and that she was angry about something. I braced myself for her cloud of darkness to break into my study.
“We have to talk,” she said, bursting through the wing doors. Her face was dark with anger and her eyes shone like two hot coals.
“What is it?” I asked, feigning concentration upon my work.
“Put that away, Wolfgang, and come into the salon. This is important!”
“So is this aria.”
“Wolfgang!” she shouted.
I sighed, put my pen down, and stood, walking past her in my most impatient manner. In the salon, I plopped into my chair.
“What.”
“I’ve just had the most enlightening conversation with my sister Aloysia. I am but inches from leaving you.
Never have I been so angry with you!”
“What did I do this time?” I asked with a resigned sigh.
“Can you imagine my humiliation when she informed me of your little summer romps at Laxenberg last year? How could you!”
“Laxenburg! That’s what this is about? What about Laxenburg? What poison has your sister filled you with?”
“She told me everything, Wolfgang. She told me about the trysts with Nancy Storace, she told me about the parties and the orgies—“
“Orgies! There were no orgies. None that I took part in anyway!”
“Oh, but you don’t deny the trysts, do you, you wretched man!”
“I haven’t really had the chance now, have I?”
“I also know about that baby.”
“Oh, Christ Almighty. And you believe that piece of dirt? Honestly, Constanze, if you remember correctly, Nancy was married.”
“Yes, but Aloysia and I did the math. Her husband had already been banished when she conceived that child. I hate you! Everyone has always known about your feelings for Nancy. Everyone but me! You purposely made me believe you two were only flirting, and now I learn why you spent so many nights out of the city! Now that whole idea of going to London makes sense to me, too, and why you tried to dissuade me from going. That would have put quite a damper on your plans, wouldn’t it? And you burning your father’s letters makes perfect sense. We foiled your plans, didn’t we?” She paced the room, then stopped right in front of me. “So what is it then? I want the truth. Do you love her? Is that why she and her brother are working so hard to get you a post in London?”
I sat in silence for a moment, trying to form my thoughts.
“Your silence speaks louder than your lying words ever could,” she said with a soft, cold voice. “You can consider yourself very unwelcome in my bed from now on. I’ve overlooked your empty indiscretions, but I cannot overlook the fact that you are in love with someone else. Beast. I wish I’d never met you.” She turned and left the room and I sat for a moment before returning to my work.
What a mess. How was I going to fix this one? Did I even want to? Why could I not just leave for London, leaving Constanze with a good sum of money, then send her money from my jobs? We could call ourselves estranged like so many other couples I knew.
As I sat in my favorite tavern with a glass of beer, the proprietor brought a letter to me. It was through this address that Nancy and I had carried on our correspondence so that her letters would not arrive at my house and Constanze would never find me writing to her. I took the letter, thanking him, and opened it. In it, Nancy told me that she would not be returning to Vienna due to the small amount the Emperor had offered her.
I took out my traveling pen set and called for some paper, then I wrote a reply assuring Nancy that all was not lost—I would somehow find a way to join her in London, although I knew it was hopeless. I took her letter to the furnace and threw it into the fire, left the tavern, and dropped my reply in a postbox.
In December Joseph II returned from the war and asked to see Don Giovanni. His request was a surprise to both myself and Da Ponte, who came to me the morning after the performance to tell me that the Emperor had found the opera divine, perhaps even more beautiful than Figaro, but not suited to the teeth of his “dear Viennese.” I scowled at Da Ponte and quietly replied, “Give them time to chew on it.”
The year 1789 didn’t begin any better than the previous year had ended. The weather was dreary, with more rain than we had seen in a number of years. I think we moved again; I lost count. Constanze was forever in search of a better rent, better light, better air. No place we lived was ever good enough, somehow. We negotiated a kind of truce between us, but things were never quite the same ever again.
I had very little music to write as commissions no longer came in; it was probably the worst year of my life. Baron van Swieten still held his Sunday musicales, and he had developed an almost obsessive love for the music of Handel while living in London as a diplomat when he was a young man. He was a kind man, and perceiving the sad state of my accounts, he began to give me pieces of Handel’s music to arrange for his salon. The pay was small, but it helped cover some of the expenses incurred by Constanze’s recent illness. It soon became apparent, however, that she was once again pregnant—apparently our last night together had been fruitful. I couldn’t even pretend to be happy. Another christening always seemed to herald another funeral.
It was not that we were poor—far from it. Simply put, we were accustomed to a certain lifestyle and I strived to maintain it as much as possible for the sake of reputation. We had our domestics, our fine clothes, and our nights out, but apothecary and doctor bills seemed to find our house a virtual breeding ground.
I had incurred quite a gambling debt—to appear well off normally insured the patronage of the gentry, and to gamble amongst them gave the appearance of being well off. Like most gentlemen, I often played on credit, but this dangerous game soon caught up with me.
Prince Karl Lichnowsky was a freemason whom I’d met at one function or another. Five years my junior, he was, quite frankly, a spoiled dilettante who was used to things going his way regardless of what it might cost others. He wasn’t unlikeable, but he possessed the peculiar notion that the entire world was there for his use, and that included people as well. Typical of his sort, he was a generous patron of the arts, but was often heard bad-mouthing those who might not voice their appreciation for his help loudly enough in public, with due laurel-tossing. I hadn’t spent a great deal of time with him for he wasn’t in my immediate circle of friends, but hearing about my debt, he offered to pay it for me. I of course leapt at this opportunity and thanked him with all obeisances. Later, however, when he began to press me for payment, I was in the unhappy circumstance of having to explain that I could not. He asked if I might like to go with him to Berlin, where he had contacts with the court, and thus pay him back from what I would receive from concerts. I thought this could turn out to be quite beneficial for both of us.
In early April, the Prince and I left Vienna for Berlin, our first stop being Prague. It was for the most part a quiet trip because he was not very talkative, so I read a great deal. We stopped in Dresden for a week for I had friends, including Josefa Duschek, who were also visiting there. We decided to travel together on the tour and I was pleased for the company. I had the pleasure of performing for the electoral princess of Saxony, from whom I received a payment of one hundred ducats tucked inside a handsome snuff box. I pawned the snuffbox and added the amount to my purse.
From Dresden we headed to Leipzig, where I had the great honor of playing upon Johann Sebastian Bach’s organ in the Thomaskirche. I was also allowed to peruse some of his original scores, which gave me the greatest pleasure you can imagine. Since I have already conveyed to you how I feel about the elder Bach, I will not repeat myself.
We reached Potsdam on the twenty-third, when I was called to perform before the King of Prussia. Afterward, I received a commission from His Majesty for six string quartets and six piano sonatas for his daughter. There was some talk of trying to keep me in Potsdam as a court musician, but nothing came of it. I doubt he would’ve proved to be any more generous than Joseph II anyway.
We went back to Leipzig, where I spent more time with my friends and performed an enormous concert, during which Josefa sang two of my arias. It was at this time that the prince told me he was to return to Vienna, and he demanded payment in full on the loan, which I was happy to fulfill in order to get him off of my back. After receiving his payment he made plans to leave my company. His claims to having connections proved false besides, and I was glad to see his backside as we parted ways.
In Berlin at last, I was able to see a performance of my Seraglio. I bought a ticket and went into the theater, content to stand near the back, but when an incorrect note was played time and again, I could bear it no longer and hurried down the aisle to the orchestra.
“Play it right, will you!” I yelled. A burly man was immediately beside me, grabbing my arm. I looked up at him. “How dare you!”
“It’s Mozart!” the whispers spread through the theater. I heard them, but did not care.
“Let go of me at once, you oversized ape!” I shouted, and the concertmaster waved, signaling the man to release me.
“I’m sorry, Maestro!” the concertmaster said, stopping the performance. “The error won’t happen again!”
I pulled my jacket back into place, feeling my face begin to flush.
“No, it’s I who must apologize,” I said a little sheepishly, realizing I had upset the entire performance with both my presence and my outburst. “Please carry on.”
The actress who was singing the role of Blondchen, however, would not appear until I agreed to coach her backstage. I met with her and we struck up an immediate rapport. Later we enjoyed a quiet dinner, discussing the opera, her talents, and my latest pieces. I admit I found her attractive, and I confess that I availed myself of her charms, much to the consternation of my friends, who did not wish to see me get into trouble with her benefactor, Frederick William II.
The plain truth was that I had never been apart from Constanze in the seven years we’d been married, and I missed her. I couldn’t wait to wind things up and return to Vienna, where I could feel her arms around me once more. Regardless of the troubles we seemed to be constantly going through, I loved her dearly, but I was riddled with shame because I couldn’t seem to make a pleasant and carefree life for her. “If I could do this,” I thought, “perhaps she would be kinder to me.” When I wrote home, I asked her to make sure someone came with her to the customs house to take care of all the legal business for me so that we could get home together as soon as possible. I found I was not as fond of touring as I had been when I was younger.
I returned to Vienna, bringing with me a large purse of money, which I showered all over her as she lay upon our bed, laughing up at me, happiness shining in her eyes. I fell into her then, drinking from her all the love and affection that always seemed so difficult to find.
“I love you, Constanze. It’ll get better, I promise. Only love me half as much as I love you. Please, just be kind to me. Your cutting words and cold indifference break my heart so.”
It was only six weeks later that she fell dangerously ill with an ulcerated foot. I spared no expense in her treatments, and it wasn’t long before the money from my tour was gone. I had never seen her so ill; the doctor gave us little hope. I was beside myself with fear and grief and I couldn’t work. As she convalesced, I sat at her bedside, working on the Potsdam commissions. The slightest noise would ignite my fury, for she slept so little due to pain, and when she did sleep, I guarded it jealously.
The room was kept rather dark and I sat in my customary place, while Sophie sat on the other side of the bed, crushing medicinal herbs in a bowl. I had been cutting quills, something Constanze usually did for me because I was never any good with knives. The weather had turned warmer, being spring, and a slight breeze stirred the curtains. It had been a long afternoon and it was about time for our daily Jause, or afternoon coffee break. Sophie and I had not spoken in about an hour and the entire room felt languid and still. My eyes began to drop in tiredness when all of a sudden the bedroom door burst open.
“Herr Mozart?” the maid said in her shrill voice.
“Shh!” I jumped to my feet angrily, pushing the chair back, and I felt a sudden blinding pain in my thigh. Looking down, I saw that my penknife had completely lodged itself there. I nearly fainted from the sight, but managed to hobble stiffly out of the room to the salon, with Sophie’s help, without so much as a peep. I’d always had a very low tolerance for pain, so I was surprised at my stoic reaction. When Caecilia saw what I’d done, she gasped and helped me to sit down.
“We must remove it now! Sophie, go get some bandages from the bedroom, and some water,” she said, reaching for the knife’s mother-of-pearl handle.
“No! Sophie, you do it.” I said, unable to hold back my tears and blocking my mother-in-law’s hand. Sophie looked into my eyes in her quiet way and kissed my forehead. “You do it—gently,” I whispered. “Not a word to Constanze about this. Promise?”
Caecilia rushed into the bedroom and emerged with a handful of linen bandages.
“Take it out!” she said, and Sophie drew it out in one swift, smooth pull. The blood began to flow and she made quick work of stemming the flow that issued forth. The wound healed in time, although I walked with a slight limp for quite a while—but only when my wife could not see me.
It was at this time that I received a visit from a lawyer who represented the prince, who had filed a suit against me for non-payment of his loan. I explained that I had indeed paid him back when he left my company on the tour and could not have asked for a receipt without seriously challenging the prince’s honor. The suit fell into arbitration, and I tried to forget about it. I was laboring under constant oppression due to this affair, and at the most crucial moment that could very well shape my entire future, I called upon Michael Puchberg, opening my heart to him.
Da Ponte and I received a commission from the Emperor to write another opera, this time using some tawdry local gossip as its subject. That opera was Così fan Tutte (So Are They All). After the impenetrability of Don Giovanni, this was light fare, and it was my first commissioned work since my Imperial appointment.
When Constanze returned from the spa she was very ill from her pregnancy—unlike any before—and was put immediately to bed. The poor little baby, another girl, died only an hour after she was born. She lived long enough, however, to be baptized Anna. I had no outward reaction at all and neither did Constanze, but within me blazed a rage so powerful, I almost couldn’t feel it. She turned onto her side and fell asleep while I went to my study.
Soon we moved into a little apartment in the Judenplatz (after once again trying the suburbs) because, with the opera to work on, I needed to be in town. Here, my wife and I entered a new decade, praying for a turn for the better.
Too much for what I do, too little for what I could do.
Da Ponte and I were told that the Emperor wanted Don Giovanni to be performed early in May. We were frantic with work, for the opera needed extensive revision. We added a few new arias to lengthen the piece and removed the “happy ending” to challenge the Viennese, who, although they enjoyed a life of felicity and secret decadence, did not care to be called to account for it. Predictably, the public brought their ears to the theater the night of the premiere but not their hearts, for it was a miserable failure.
To soothe my battered self-esteem, I began a symphony in E-flat and poured myself into it, working feverishly. Desperation clouded my every waking and dreaming thought; Vienna had let me down once again. Working myself into illness time and again, the city I loved never took me seriously as a composer. Yes, my music was always good for feasting, dancing, and gaming, but I was a serious composer and my court commissions demanded nothing of me but a few hours of my time.
We moved again, this time to help little Thresl, who had become seriously ill. I cared for her and hovered over her like never before. I loved her so much that I had even begun to stop at St. Peter’s each day to pray.
The music filled the white and gilt theater, rising from the orchestra and swirling around me like the clouds of powder used on my hair earlier in my bedroom. A blue silk cone covering my face, I spoke in muffled, disappointed tones to Constanze, who sat in the next room clothed in her own indifference to yet another humiliating performance of the opera, which she had not bothered to see since the Viennese premiere.
“Are you sure you won’t come with me?” One last attempt.
“I’m quite sure. The baby isn’t well, you know. Someone should stay with her. Besides, I saw enough of it in Prague. It’s too depressing, especially now.”
I sighed, sending a white stream of powder out through the small hole in the tip of the cone, and I smiled as Primus huffed and powder-puffed away at his work.
So now it was Thresl, the baby born just two days after my dead mother’s birthday. Not she! Not my little Kätzchen, the little brown-eyed, rosebud-lipped daughter of my heart! Lord God, Almighty Shepherd, please don’t take this little one! You don’t need her. You’ve taken too many already! I’ll abstain. I’ll go to confession and Mass. I’ll never again eat meat on Friday. I will, I will... what? God blesses man with virility, only to remind him of his ultimate impotence when the fruits of his passion are placed in too-small boxes and are covered with dirt. And I had been blessed with too much physical and creative virility—and worldly impotence. I decided my wife was right to stay home. Her sullen presence would only serve to depress me further.
At the theater I could almost see the quavers and semi-quavers flying into the air and past me into the audience. Notes of comedic yellow and romantic blue. Notes of jealous green and lusty crimson. Notes of heavenly opalescent white and notes of demonic black. They flew past me from strings and bells, tubes, and mallets. I surrendered myself to the great sea of music and emotion, each note simultaneously animating my soul. Casting a glance up over my shoulder, I glimpsed the box that once held my honey-skinned Nancy.
“I really did do Constanze a favor,” I thought, recalling my golden summer of secret love. “I didn’t hound her for her favors, and she got the rest she needed. And I was in a better humor when I was around, besides.” I sniffed at my self-righteous justification. If it were such a noble and virtuous thing I’d done, then why had I slunk into our bed like a thief, praying she wouldn’t waken to smell another woman on my conscience?
I shifted my weight a little on the chair to play a recitative. A disappointedly placid Zerlina met my gaze and opened her mouth to sing; a violist opened his mouth to yawn. It wasn’t going well—even with my back to the audience, I knew. Conversation, rustling gowns, laughter. I heard distracted silk and lace fans vainly attempting to chase away the heat of the June evening and wax candles.
“If she were here to witness this inferior performance, would she receive me? Would her tender heart let me disappear into the haven of her arms, her comforting breast?”
I was suddenly lost in a reverie, in which I quickly scribbled out a note and slipped it, along with a Kreuzer, into the overeager palm of a page.
Three loud, resounding knocks pulled me instantly from my ruminations as the Commendatore burst through the door onstage. Had so much time passed?Your fan open if yes, closed if no.
I looked up at Nancy’s box and saw her fan was open, and beneath it the generous, rosy lips of the woman I desired to distraction. I smiled and turned my mind to the music. The evening needed my attention now; the night would take care of itself.
It was two hours after the final curtain when I at last landed myself in a Fiaker. I was monumentally tired—weary to the bone—but every nerve in my body buzzed, and my mind ached from sheer velocity. I slumped back into the red damask seat and rubbed my eyes with a finger and thumb. I would be very late in coming home, but that was already presumed. Often I didn’t stumble or stagger in until dawn.
The silent night streets sang their arias: the wheels upon uneven cobblestone, a cat’s call, a whore’s invitation, a drunkard’s song, a baby’s midnight cry from a tired candlelit window. The driver whistled a simple melody that I couldn’t help but meddle with in my mind, tired as I was. He would soon be lying himself down in nightshirt and cap beside an Austrian dumpling wife who probably snored louder than he.
I was late in arriving, and I was afraid Nancy might have given up on me and gone to bed. Later, the cab arrived at Palais Laxenburg and drew up to the curb, where I stepped down and paid the driver.
Inside the dark corridor of the wing of apartments in which hers was located, her door opened and she stood in a peach silk negligee, her eyes soft with sleep, her hair tumbling all around her like dark, stormy clouds. She smiled, standing aside for me to enter, then she went directly to the wine table to pour a large glass for me.
“Here, Wolfgango,” she said. She helped me to remove my jacket and waistcoat, and I plopped heavily into the chair.
“Did I wake you? I’m sorry. I couldn’t help being late.”
“It’s no matter. You know I’ll always wait for you. How was the performance?” she asked, sitting on the settee across from me. I shot a frigid glare, not directed at her but to her.
“What do you think of the opera?” I asked, my voice softly distant.
“I find it terrifying, but very beautiful. I can’t imagine what it is that troubles you so that you can compose such fear and horror. What has transpired since I left?”
“You left. That’s what happened. Everything’s falling apart. It started the very minute you left.” I paused.
“Ah,” I waved my hand then and swallowed a gulp of wine, “Wanze, you can’t always determine a composer’s mood by that of his music.”
“No?” She looked at me, knowing me, understanding full well that it was horror indeed that was driving me to her bed that very night. “Is the Commendatore your father, Wolfgango? Is that what troubles you and destroys your peace?”
I replied by finishing my wine and holding the glass out to her for a refill, with a wry smile that said emphatically, “Don’t press.”
We spoke of the performance, the sets, and the audience. I told her a few juicy backstage stories and she took my empty glass away, setting it on the table. As she passed by to resume her seat, she lingered behind me to massage my temples. After a little while, I took her hand and pulled her onto my lap, holding her close.
“Enough of this folderol,” I said. “There’s more to a man’s life than mediocre performances for jaded, mediocre audiences.” With one arm around her waist, my right hand traveled up and stroked the full, soft skin just above the bodice of her low neckline. I lay my cheek against that silken pillow and closed my eyes.
“Cara, you are truly sweeter than any confection,” I whispered.
She touched my face, her cheek against my hair. To hold and be held thus. Often, this was all I wanted from my wife, but she had never seemed to understand that. Her affections toward me were lately scarce, and what maternal instincts she had to spare were rightly directed toward our children, living and dead. I turned to kiss the cleft pressed against my face.
“Repent your wicked life!”
“No, you tiring old man!”
“Repent!”
“No!
“Repent!”
“No!
“Ah, then you have run out of time...”
As if it could be foreseen, my little daughter died, only six months old. As she was taken away—yet another in my agonizing parade of failures—I looked darkly at Constanze, then turned away and resumed my work.
The demands of life are not respecters of grief or despair, and in preparation for summer subscription concerts, I completed two more symphonies. These would turn out to be my last, although I couldn’t have known that at the time, and certainly not the last I intended to pen.
The rest of 1788 was spent battling my consuming depression. The concerts I’d counted on were never held because of low ticket sales. Another war had broken out between Austria and Turkey, and the gentry fled the city with their healthy sons in hope of eluding the conscription Emperor Joseph had enacted. With them too went their money, and with no wealthy aristocrats, there were no soirées, parties, or balls. The German Company of the National Theater folded, and not long after the Italian Company followed suit. Vienna was plunged into impoverishment and depression as inflation ran rampant. many people suffered. Most people suffered.
Constanze was very ill and doctor bills began to pile up. I had to do some fast shuffling, robbing Peter to pay Paul, to cover my debts. Thankfully I found help from Michael Puchberg, a fellow freemason who was more than happy to issue loans to me with only small, comfortable interest fees.
Sitting at my fortepiano, I heard someone come in the front door of our apartment, and judging by the footfall on the wooden parquet floor of the foyer, I knew it was Constanze and that she was angry about something. I braced myself for her cloud of darkness to break into my study.
“We have to talk,” she said, bursting through the wing doors. Her face was dark with anger and her eyes shone like two hot coals.
“What is it?” I asked, feigning concentration upon my work.
“Put that away, Wolfgang, and come into the salon. This is important!”
“So is this aria.”
“Wolfgang!” she shouted.
I sighed, put my pen down, and stood, walking past her in my most impatient manner. In the salon, I plopped into my chair.
“What.”
“I’ve just had the most enlightening conversation with my sister Aloysia. I am but inches from leaving you.
Never have I been so angry with you!”
“What did I do this time?” I asked with a resigned sigh.
“Can you imagine my humiliation when she informed me of your little summer romps at Laxenberg last year? How could you!”
“Laxenburg! That’s what this is about? What about Laxenburg? What poison has your sister filled you with?”
“She told me everything, Wolfgang. She told me about the trysts with Nancy Storace, she told me about the parties and the orgies—“
“Orgies! There were no orgies. None that I took part in anyway!”
“Oh, but you don’t deny the trysts, do you, you wretched man!”
“I haven’t really had the chance now, have I?”
“I also know about that baby.”
“Oh, Christ Almighty. And you believe that piece of dirt? Honestly, Constanze, if you remember correctly, Nancy was married.”
“Yes, but Aloysia and I did the math. Her husband had already been banished when she conceived that child. I hate you! Everyone has always known about your feelings for Nancy. Everyone but me! You purposely made me believe you two were only flirting, and now I learn why you spent so many nights out of the city! Now that whole idea of going to London makes sense to me, too, and why you tried to dissuade me from going. That would have put quite a damper on your plans, wouldn’t it? And you burning your father’s letters makes perfect sense. We foiled your plans, didn’t we?” She paced the room, then stopped right in front of me. “So what is it then? I want the truth. Do you love her? Is that why she and her brother are working so hard to get you a post in London?”
I sat in silence for a moment, trying to form my thoughts.
“Your silence speaks louder than your lying words ever could,” she said with a soft, cold voice. “You can consider yourself very unwelcome in my bed from now on. I’ve overlooked your empty indiscretions, but I cannot overlook the fact that you are in love with someone else. Beast. I wish I’d never met you.” She turned and left the room and I sat for a moment before returning to my work.
What a mess. How was I going to fix this one? Did I even want to? Why could I not just leave for London, leaving Constanze with a good sum of money, then send her money from my jobs? We could call ourselves estranged like so many other couples I knew.
As I sat in my favorite tavern with a glass of beer, the proprietor brought a letter to me. It was through this address that Nancy and I had carried on our correspondence so that her letters would not arrive at my house and Constanze would never find me writing to her. I took the letter, thanking him, and opened it. In it, Nancy told me that she would not be returning to Vienna due to the small amount the Emperor had offered her.
I took out my traveling pen set and called for some paper, then I wrote a reply assuring Nancy that all was not lost—I would somehow find a way to join her in London, although I knew it was hopeless. I took her letter to the furnace and threw it into the fire, left the tavern, and dropped my reply in a postbox.
In December Joseph II returned from the war and asked to see Don Giovanni. His request was a surprise to both myself and Da Ponte, who came to me the morning after the performance to tell me that the Emperor had found the opera divine, perhaps even more beautiful than Figaro, but not suited to the teeth of his “dear Viennese.” I scowled at Da Ponte and quietly replied, “Give them time to chew on it.”
The year 1789 didn’t begin any better than the previous year had ended. The weather was dreary, with more rain than we had seen in a number of years. I think we moved again; I lost count. Constanze was forever in search of a better rent, better light, better air. No place we lived was ever good enough, somehow. We negotiated a kind of truce between us, but things were never quite the same ever again.
I had very little music to write as commissions no longer came in; it was probably the worst year of my life. Baron van Swieten still held his Sunday musicales, and he had developed an almost obsessive love for the music of Handel while living in London as a diplomat when he was a young man. He was a kind man, and perceiving the sad state of my accounts, he began to give me pieces of Handel’s music to arrange for his salon. The pay was small, but it helped cover some of the expenses incurred by Constanze’s recent illness. It soon became apparent, however, that she was once again pregnant—apparently our last night together had been fruitful. I couldn’t even pretend to be happy. Another christening always seemed to herald another funeral.
It was not that we were poor—far from it. Simply put, we were accustomed to a certain lifestyle and I strived to maintain it as much as possible for the sake of reputation. We had our domestics, our fine clothes, and our nights out, but apothecary and doctor bills seemed to find our house a virtual breeding ground.
I had incurred quite a gambling debt—to appear well off normally insured the patronage of the gentry, and to gamble amongst them gave the appearance of being well off. Like most gentlemen, I often played on credit, but this dangerous game soon caught up with me.
Prince Karl Lichnowsky was a freemason whom I’d met at one function or another. Five years my junior, he was, quite frankly, a spoiled dilettante who was used to things going his way regardless of what it might cost others. He wasn’t unlikeable, but he possessed the peculiar notion that the entire world was there for his use, and that included people as well. Typical of his sort, he was a generous patron of the arts, but was often heard bad-mouthing those who might not voice their appreciation for his help loudly enough in public, with due laurel-tossing. I hadn’t spent a great deal of time with him for he wasn’t in my immediate circle of friends, but hearing about my debt, he offered to pay it for me. I of course leapt at this opportunity and thanked him with all obeisances. Later, however, when he began to press me for payment, I was in the unhappy circumstance of having to explain that I could not. He asked if I might like to go with him to Berlin, where he had contacts with the court, and thus pay him back from what I would receive from concerts. I thought this could turn out to be quite beneficial for both of us.
In early April, the Prince and I left Vienna for Berlin, our first stop being Prague. It was for the most part a quiet trip because he was not very talkative, so I read a great deal. We stopped in Dresden for a week for I had friends, including Josefa Duschek, who were also visiting there. We decided to travel together on the tour and I was pleased for the company. I had the pleasure of performing for the electoral princess of Saxony, from whom I received a payment of one hundred ducats tucked inside a handsome snuff box. I pawned the snuffbox and added the amount to my purse.
From Dresden we headed to Leipzig, where I had the great honor of playing upon Johann Sebastian Bach’s organ in the Thomaskirche. I was also allowed to peruse some of his original scores, which gave me the greatest pleasure you can imagine. Since I have already conveyed to you how I feel about the elder Bach, I will not repeat myself.
We reached Potsdam on the twenty-third, when I was called to perform before the King of Prussia. Afterward, I received a commission from His Majesty for six string quartets and six piano sonatas for his daughter. There was some talk of trying to keep me in Potsdam as a court musician, but nothing came of it. I doubt he would’ve proved to be any more generous than Joseph II anyway.
We went back to Leipzig, where I spent more time with my friends and performed an enormous concert, during which Josefa sang two of my arias. It was at this time that the prince told me he was to return to Vienna, and he demanded payment in full on the loan, which I was happy to fulfill in order to get him off of my back. After receiving his payment he made plans to leave my company. His claims to having connections proved false besides, and I was glad to see his backside as we parted ways.
In Berlin at last, I was able to see a performance of my Seraglio. I bought a ticket and went into the theater, content to stand near the back, but when an incorrect note was played time and again, I could bear it no longer and hurried down the aisle to the orchestra.
“Play it right, will you!” I yelled. A burly man was immediately beside me, grabbing my arm. I looked up at him. “How dare you!”
“It’s Mozart!” the whispers spread through the theater. I heard them, but did not care.
“Let go of me at once, you oversized ape!” I shouted, and the concertmaster waved, signaling the man to release me.
“I’m sorry, Maestro!” the concertmaster said, stopping the performance. “The error won’t happen again!”
I pulled my jacket back into place, feeling my face begin to flush.
“No, it’s I who must apologize,” I said a little sheepishly, realizing I had upset the entire performance with both my presence and my outburst. “Please carry on.”
The actress who was singing the role of Blondchen, however, would not appear until I agreed to coach her backstage. I met with her and we struck up an immediate rapport. Later we enjoyed a quiet dinner, discussing the opera, her talents, and my latest pieces. I admit I found her attractive, and I confess that I availed myself of her charms, much to the consternation of my friends, who did not wish to see me get into trouble with her benefactor, Frederick William II.
The plain truth was that I had never been apart from Constanze in the seven years we’d been married, and I missed her. I couldn’t wait to wind things up and return to Vienna, where I could feel her arms around me once more. Regardless of the troubles we seemed to be constantly going through, I loved her dearly, but I was riddled with shame because I couldn’t seem to make a pleasant and carefree life for her. “If I could do this,” I thought, “perhaps she would be kinder to me.” When I wrote home, I asked her to make sure someone came with her to the customs house to take care of all the legal business for me so that we could get home together as soon as possible. I found I was not as fond of touring as I had been when I was younger.
I returned to Vienna, bringing with me a large purse of money, which I showered all over her as she lay upon our bed, laughing up at me, happiness shining in her eyes. I fell into her then, drinking from her all the love and affection that always seemed so difficult to find.
“I love you, Constanze. It’ll get better, I promise. Only love me half as much as I love you. Please, just be kind to me. Your cutting words and cold indifference break my heart so.”
It was only six weeks later that she fell dangerously ill with an ulcerated foot. I spared no expense in her treatments, and it wasn’t long before the money from my tour was gone. I had never seen her so ill; the doctor gave us little hope. I was beside myself with fear and grief and I couldn’t work. As she convalesced, I sat at her bedside, working on the Potsdam commissions. The slightest noise would ignite my fury, for she slept so little due to pain, and when she did sleep, I guarded it jealously.
The room was kept rather dark and I sat in my customary place, while Sophie sat on the other side of the bed, crushing medicinal herbs in a bowl. I had been cutting quills, something Constanze usually did for me because I was never any good with knives. The weather had turned warmer, being spring, and a slight breeze stirred the curtains. It had been a long afternoon and it was about time for our daily Jause, or afternoon coffee break. Sophie and I had not spoken in about an hour and the entire room felt languid and still. My eyes began to drop in tiredness when all of a sudden the bedroom door burst open.
“Herr Mozart?” the maid said in her shrill voice.
“Shh!” I jumped to my feet angrily, pushing the chair back, and I felt a sudden blinding pain in my thigh. Looking down, I saw that my penknife had completely lodged itself there. I nearly fainted from the sight, but managed to hobble stiffly out of the room to the salon, with Sophie’s help, without so much as a peep. I’d always had a very low tolerance for pain, so I was surprised at my stoic reaction. When Caecilia saw what I’d done, she gasped and helped me to sit down.
“We must remove it now! Sophie, go get some bandages from the bedroom, and some water,” she said, reaching for the knife’s mother-of-pearl handle.
“No! Sophie, you do it.” I said, unable to hold back my tears and blocking my mother-in-law’s hand. Sophie looked into my eyes in her quiet way and kissed my forehead. “You do it—gently,” I whispered. “Not a word to Constanze about this. Promise?”
Caecilia rushed into the bedroom and emerged with a handful of linen bandages.
“Take it out!” she said, and Sophie drew it out in one swift, smooth pull. The blood began to flow and she made quick work of stemming the flow that issued forth. The wound healed in time, although I walked with a slight limp for quite a while—but only when my wife could not see me.
It was at this time that I received a visit from a lawyer who represented the prince, who had filed a suit against me for non-payment of his loan. I explained that I had indeed paid him back when he left my company on the tour and could not have asked for a receipt without seriously challenging the prince’s honor. The suit fell into arbitration, and I tried to forget about it. I was laboring under constant oppression due to this affair, and at the most crucial moment that could very well shape my entire future, I called upon Michael Puchberg, opening my heart to him.
O God! I can hardly bring myself to dispatch this letter—and yet I must! If this business had not befallen me, I should not have been obliged to beg so shamelessly from my only friend. Yet I hope for your forgiveness, for you know both the good and the bad prospects of my situation. The bad is temporary; the good will certainly persist, once the momentary evil has been alleviated. Adieu. For God’s sake forgive me, only forgive me!—and—Adieu!When the doctor prescribed the waters at the prestigious Baden-am-Wien spa village for Constanze’s foot, I saw it as a godsend. It would be costly, but perhaps my wife wouldn’t find out about the suit against me. As always happened, however, she heard about it somehow. Too unwell to really care, she left in August, and as I closed the coach door I promised to join her just as soon as I could. She didn’t go alone, of course, for she had her maid to look after her. As it turned out, she got along quite well without me. I received letters from her in which she described her gay evenings with some of our wealthy Viennese friends who spent their weekends at the spa. I couldn’t begrudge her these carefree times though—she had been so close to death—but I wrote to remind her always to consider her reputation, and my honor. Her response to this was not particularly pleasant, as you might imagine, considering my own indiscretions through the years.
Da Ponte and I received a commission from the Emperor to write another opera, this time using some tawdry local gossip as its subject. That opera was Così fan Tutte (So Are They All). After the impenetrability of Don Giovanni, this was light fare, and it was my first commissioned work since my Imperial appointment.
When Constanze returned from the spa she was very ill from her pregnancy—unlike any before—and was put immediately to bed. The poor little baby, another girl, died only an hour after she was born. She lived long enough, however, to be baptized Anna. I had no outward reaction at all and neither did Constanze, but within me blazed a rage so powerful, I almost couldn’t feel it. She turned onto her side and fell asleep while I went to my study.
Soon we moved into a little apartment in the Judenplatz (after once again trying the suburbs) because, with the opera to work on, I needed to be in town. Here, my wife and I entered a new decade, praying for a turn for the better.
