REQUIEM IN D MINOR BY WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

Today, coinciding with the anniversary of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's death, The Grandma has been listening to the Requiem, the last work that this Austrian genius left us.

The Requiem in D minor, K. 626, is a Requiem Mass by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791). 

Mozart composed part of the Requiem in Vienna in late 1791, but it was unfinished at his death on 5 December the same year. 

A completed version was delivered to Count Franz von Walsegg, who had commissioned the piece for a requiem service on 14 February 1792 to commemorate the first anniversary of the death of his wife Anna, who had died at the age of 20 on 14 February 1791.

The autograph manuscript shows the finished and orchestrated movement of Introit in Mozart's hand, and detailed drafts of the Kyrie and the sequence, the latter including the Dies irae, the first eight bars of the Lacrimosa, and the Offertory. First Joseph Eybler and then Franz Xaver Süssmayr filled in the rest, composed additional movements, and made a clean copy of the completed parts of the score for delivery to Walsegg, imitating Mozart's musical handwriting but clumsily dating it  1792.

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.

Walsegg probably intended to pass the Requiem off as his own composition, as he is known to have done with other works. This plan was frustrated by a public benefit performance for Mozart's widow Constanze. She was responsible for a number of stories surrounding the composition of the work, including the claims that Mozart received the commission from a mysterious messenger who did not reveal the commissioner's identity, and that Mozart came to believe that he was writing the Requiem for his own funeral.

In addition to the Süssmayr version, a number of alternative completions have been developed by composers and musicologists in the 20th and 21st centuries. At least 19 conjectural completions have been made, eleven of which date from after 2005.

The Requiem is scored for two basset horns in F, two bassoons, two trumpets in D, three trombones (alto, tenor, and bass), timpani (two drums), violins, viola, and basso continuo (cello, double bass, and organ). The basset horn parts are sometimes played on conventional B♭ or A clarinets and sometimes the related alto clarinet, even though this changes the sonority.

The vocal forces consist of soprano, contralto, tenor, and bass soloists and an SATB mixed choir.

Süssmayr's completion divides the Requiem into eight sections:

I. Introitus
- Requiem aeternam

II. Kyrie

III. Sequentia
-Dies irae
-Tuba mirum
-Rex tremendae
-Recordare
-Confutatis
-Lacrymosa

IV. Offertorium

-Domine Jesu

-Hostias

V. Sanctus

VI. Benedictus

VII. Agnus Dei

VIII. Communio
-Lux aeterna
-Cum sanctis tuis

All sections from the Sanctus onwards are not present in Mozart's manuscript fragment. Mozart may have intended to include the Amen fugue at the end of the Sequentia, but Süssmayr did not do so in his completion.

The eccentric count Franz von Walsegg commissioned the Requiem from Mozart anonymously through intermediaries. The count, an amateur chamber musician who routinely commissioned works by composers and passed them off as his own, wanted a Requiem Mass he could claim he composed to memorialize the recent passing of his wife.

Mozart received only half of the payment in advance, so upon his death his widow Constanze was keen to have the work completed secretly by someone else, submit it to the count as having been completed by Mozart and collect the final payment.

Joseph von Eybler was one of the first composers to be asked to complete the score. He worked on the movements from the Kyrie up until the Lacrymosa, carefully adding his additions to the incomplete manuscript while mimicking Mozart's handwriting. In addition, a striking similarity between the openings of the Domine Jesu Christe movements in the requiems of the two composers suggests that Eybler at least looked at later sections. After this work, he felt unable to complete the remainder and gave the manuscript back to Constanze Mozart.

The task was then given to another composer, Franz Xaver Süssmayr. Süssmayr added his own orchestration to the movements from the Kyrie onward, completed the Lacrymosa, and added several new movements which a Requiem would normally comprise: Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei. He then added a final section, Lux aeterna by adapting the opening two movements which Mozart had written to the different words which finish the Requiem Mass, which according to both Süssmayr and Mozart's wife was done according to Mozart's directions.

More information: The Classic Review

 Nevertheless the passions, whether violent or not, 
should never be so expressed as to reach t
he point of causing disgust; and music, 
even in situations of the greatest horror, 
should never be painful to the ear 
but should flatter and charm it, 
and thereby always remain music.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart