Mass in C major (Beethoven)

Mass in C major
by Ludwig van Beethoven

Beethoven around 1805, detail of a portrait by Joseph Willibrord Mähler
Key C major
Catalogue Op. 86
Text
Dedication
Performed 13 September 1807 (1807-09-13): Eisenstadt
Published 1812 (1812): Leipzig
Publisher Breitkopf & Härtel
Scoring
  • soloists
  • choir
  • orchestra

Ludwig van Beethoven composed the Mass in C major, Op. 86, to a commission from Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II in 1807. The mass, scored for four vocal soloists, choir and orchestra was premiered the same year by the Prince's musical forces in Eisenstadt. Beethoven performed parts of it in his 1808 concert featuring the premieres of four major works including his Fifth Symphony. The mass was published in 1812 by Breitkopf & Härtel.

While the Prince who commissioned the mass was not pleased, contemporary critic E. T. A. Hoffmann appreciates the "expression of a childlike serene mind", while Michael Moore notes the music's "directness and an emotional content".

History and composition

Beethoven had studied counterpoint in Vienna with Johann Georg Albrechtsberger, an authority in the field, but had not turned to sacred music until late in his career.[1] He received a commission from Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II in 1807, extending a tradition established by Joseph Haydn, who for decades had served as the family's Kapellmeister (music director). Following his return from England in 1795, Haydn had composed one mass per year for the Esterházy family, to celebrate the name day of the Prince's wife. Haydn had ceased this tradition with the failure of his health in 1802. Beethoven was fully aware of the tradition that Haydn had established and it influenced him strongly in writing the Mass in C major. Beethoven confessed in a letter to the prince: "may I just say that I will hand the mass over to you with great trepidation, as Your Serene Highness is accustomed to having the inimitable masterworks of the great Haydn performed."[1] Lewis Lockwood writes:

On accepting the prince's commission Beethoven had praised Haydn's masses, calling them "inimitable masterpieces." Beethoven meant it. He clearly studied Haydn's masses while composing his own, no doubt for reasons far beyond the fact that the Esterházys had commissioned it, as we see from his sketches for the Gloria. The sketches include two passes copied from the Gloria of Haydn's Schöpfungsmesse ("Creation Mass"), one of four late Haydn masses easily available to Beethoven in published editions.[2]

Premiere

Beethoven's mass was premiered on 13 September 1807 by the Prince's own musical forces in Eisenstadt, the ancestral seat of the Esterházys not far from Vienna. It is not known what building housed the performance, but the two likely candidates are the Bergkirche, which had hosted a number of the Haydn premieres, and the chapel of the Prince's principal residence, Schloss Esterházy.[3]

The first performance was underrehearsed; Stoltzfus describes the dress rehearsal as "unsatisfactory" and notes that only one of the five altos in the chorus was present.[4]

Beethoven conducted parts of the mass, the Gloria and the Sanctus, in a concert on 22 December 1808, which featured the public premieres of his Symphony No. 5, Symphony No. 6, Piano Concerto No. 4 and Choral Fantasy.[1]

Publication

Beethoven offered the mass, after revising the composition, to the publisher Breitkopf & Härtel, together with the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies. Originally, the mass had been dedicated to Prince Esterházy; this dedication appears on the manuscript score used at the premiere.[5] Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the outcome of the first performance and the Prince's reaction, Beethoven dedicated the published version (1812) to another individual, specifically Prince Kinsky. The first publication consisted of a printed score with handwritten copies of orchestral parts on request.[1]

Nikolaus II Esterházy, who commissioned the mass and arranged its premiere. Josef Lanzedelli, 1803

The publisher sent Beethoven an alternative German text by Christian Schreiber, which Beethoven commented on 16 January 1811: "The translation of the Gloria seems to fit well to me, but to the Kyrie not so well, although the beginning “tief im Staub anbeten wir” [deep in dust we worship] fits very well; yet it seems to me in some expressions such as “ew’gen Weltenherrscher” [eternal ruler of the world] “Allgewaltigen” [omnipotent] are more suitable for the Gloria. The general character [...] in the Kyrie is heartfelt resignation, from where the depth of religious feelings “Gott erbarme dich unser” [God have mercy upon us] without, however, being sad, gentleness is the basis of the whole work, [...] although “eleison have mercy upon us” – yet there is cheerfulness in the whole. The Catholic goes to his church on Sundays bedecked with festive cheerfulness. The Kyrie Eleison is likewise the introduction to the whole mass; with such strong expressions little remains over for the places where they should really be strong."[6][1]

Structure and scoring

The composition is scored for four soloists (soprano, alto, tenor, bass), a four-part choir (SATB), and a symphony orchestra of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, trumpets, timpani, strings and organ. The setting of the Latin Order of Mass is structured in five movements. In the following table of the movements, the voices, markings, keys and time signatures are taken from the score.

No. Part Incipit Vocal Marking Key Time
1 Kyrie Kyrie SATB + soloists Andante con moto assai vivace quasi Allegretto ma non troppo C major 2
4
2 Gloria Gloria SATB + T Allegro con brio C major
Qui tollis peccata mundi A + SATB Andante mosso F minor 3
4
Quoniam tu solus sanctus SATB + soloists Allegro ma non troppo C major
3 Credo Credo SATB Allegro con brio 3
4
Et incarnatus est soloists + SATB Adagio E-flat major 2
4
Et resurrexit B + SATB Allegro C major
Et in Spiritum Sanctum A T B S + SATB Allegro
Et vitam venturi saeculi SATB + soloists Allegro ma non troppo
4 Sanctus Sanctus SATB Adagio A major
Pleni sunt coeli, Osanna SATB Allegro
Benedictus soloists + SATB Allegretto ma non troppo F major
Osanna SATB Allegro A major
5 Agnus Dei Agnus Dei SATB Poco Andante C minor 12
8
Dona nobis pacem soloists + SATB Allegro ma non troppo C major
SATB Andante con moto, Tempo del Kyrie

Reception

The premiere was not well received, particularly by the man who commissioned it, Prince Esterházy. Lewis Lockwood narrates the episode, reporting an anecdote told by the 19th century biographers Anton Schindler and Alexander Wheelock Thayer:

According to the story, the prince, after hearing the work—and probably noticing its stark difference from the styles of Mass composition he revered in Haydn—said to Beethoven, "But, my dear Beethoven, what is that you have done again?" Whereupon, continues the story, the court chapel master was heard to laugh—this being none other than Johann Nepomuk Hummel, the composer and pianist who had himself written masses for the Esterházy court, including one in the same key, C major, just the previous year. Reacting angrily to the prince's question and furious over Hummel's pompous laughter as well as the inferior guest quarters he had been given in Eisenstadt, Beethoven left in a huff.[7]

Charles Rosen has called the episode Beethoven's "most humiliating public failure".[8] The prince had perhaps muted his reactions in directly addressing Beethoven, as in a later letter to the Countess Henriette von Zielinska he went so far as to say, "Beethoven's mass is unbearably ridiculous and detestable, and I am not convinced that it can ever be performed properly. I am angry and mortified."[9]

E. T. A. Hoffmann wrote in a review in 1813, expecting the power of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, about the "expression of a childlike serene mind, which, relying on its purity, trusts in belief in God's mercy and pleads to him as to a father who wants the best for his children and fulfills their requests ("den Ausdruck eines kindlich heiteren Gemüths, das, auf seine Reinheit bauend, gläubig der Gnade Gottes vertraut und zu ihm fleht wie zu dem Vater, der das Beste seiner Kinder will und ihre Bitten erhört)".[10] In the C minor Agnus Dei he heard "a feeling of inner hurt which does not tear the heart but is good for it, and dissolves, like a sorrow from another world, to unearthly delight" ("ein Gefühl der inneren Wehmut, die aber das Herz nicht zerreisst, sondern ihm wohlthut, und sich, wie der Schmerz, der aus einer andern Welt gekommen ist, in überirdische Wonne auflöst").[10]

Today, the mass is appreciated by critics (such as Rosen) but is probably one of the least performed of Beethoven's larger works. Michael Moore has written, "While [it] is often overshadowed by the immense Missa Solemnis, written some fifteen years later, it has a directness and an emotional content that the latter work sometimes lacks."[11] The Penguin Guide to Compact Discs (2004 edition) calls the work a "long-underrated masterpiece."

References

Notes
  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Herttrich 2010.
  2. ↑ Lockwood (2005:272)
  3. ↑ Fred Stoltzfus (1982) Beethoven's "Mass in C" Notes on History, Structure, and Performance Practice. The Choral Journal 23:26–30, page 29 n.
  4. ↑ Stoltzfus, p. 26
  5. ↑ Stoltzfus, p. 23
  6. ↑ The original is as follows (in Beethoven's spelling, including some ellipses): "die Ubersezung zum gloria scheint mir sehr gut zu paßen zum Kyrie nicht so gut obwohlen der Anfang „tief im Staub anbeten wir“ sehr gut paßt, so scheint mir doch bey manchen Ausdrücken wie „ew’gen Weltenherrscher“ „Allgewaltigen“ Mehr zum gloria tauglich. der allgemeine charakter [...] in dem Kyrie ist innige Ergebung, woher innigkeit religiöser Gefühle „Gott erbarme dich unser“ ohne deswegen Traurig zu seyn, sanftheit liegt dem Ganzen zu Grunde, [...] obwohlen „eleison erbarme dich unser“ – so ist doch heiterkeit im Ganzen, Der Katholike tritt sonntags geschmückt festlich Heiter in seine Kirche das Kyrie Eleison ist gleichfalls die Introdukzion zur ganzen Messe, bey so starken ausdrücken würde wenig übrig bleiben für da, wo sie wirklich stark seyn Müßen."
  7. ↑ Lockwood, Lewis (2005) Beethoven: The music and the life. New York: Norton.
  8. ↑ Rosen, Charles (1971/1997) The Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven. New York: Norton, p. 366.
  9. ↑ Translation from Theodore Albrecht (1996) Letters to Beethoven and Other Correspondence: 1824–1828. University of Nebraska Press, p. 194. Esterházy wrote in French, saying, "La Messe de Beethoven est insuportablement ridicule et détestable, je ne suis pas convaincu qu’elle puisse même paroitre honêtement: j’en suis coleré et honteux."; original cited in Herttrich 2010, p. iv
  10. 1 2 Hoffmann 1813.
  11. ↑ (Moore 1999)
Sources
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