Franz Xaver Süßmayr: Missa Solemnis in D

Franz Xaver Süßmayr (1766-1803) is primarily known today as a former pupil of Mozart and for his role in completing the Requiem upon the death of Mozart; in addition Mozart also consulted him for work on the "Clemenza di Tito" (1791), whose recitatives Süßmayr wrote. From Süßmayr`s own compositions comes the musical comedy "The Mirrors of Arcadia" (1794) which is renowned as a successful work of literature amongst its kind. Further works were performed only again in 2003 upon the occasion of the two hundred year anniversary of the death of the composer; consistently played with success, the most spectacular event being the performance of the Mass in D-Major with Claudio Abbado and the Vienna Philharmonic. Süßmayr originally came from Schwanenstadt in Upper Austria where he was born the son of a teacher, who fulfilled the traditional role as church carekeeper and choir master of the Catholic Church and gave his son his first lessons. Süßmayrs schooling included a period at the monastery highschool and finally ended at the Knights Academy in Kremsmünster. In 1788, he went to Vienna to become a pupil and a sort of factotum of Mozart. In 1794 he was appointed the bandmaster at the k.k. National Theater. The Thematic catalogue of works (SmWV) features the musical works of Franz Xaver Süßmayr, namely 4 masses, 2 German Requiem, 55 smaller churchly works, 26 operas, musical comedies and operettas, 5 ballets, 14 opera sections, 14 opera inserts, 16 cantatas, 8 choirs and canons, 22 songs, 7 symphonies, 30 dances and marches, 6 concerts and concert fragments, 13 works for chamber music, 2 piano works and in addition arrangements and compositions of uncertain origin. [Erich Duda, Das musikalische Schaffen Franz Xaver Süßmayrs. Thematisches Werkverzeichnis (SmWV) mit ausführlichen Quellenangaben und Skizzen der Wasserzeichen. Kassel etc. 2000, Schriftenreihe der Internationalen Stiftung Mozarteum Salzburg Bd. 12]. The period under Mozart undoubtedly left a large impression on Süßmayr, leaving traces in his work. Walter Wlcek, the publisher of the present volume, already pointed out in his dissertation however that these peculiarities themselves, which were already in the Kremsmünster early work, had held consistent with Süßmayrs works, in other words, even though the influences of Mozart were present, Süßmayr had demonstrated, particularly in the case of the Mass in D-Major, that he was above all, a self-made composer. In contrast to this, an interesting phenomena is brought up by Erich Duda: namely that Süßmayr not only completed the score of Mozart`s Requiem, prompted by Constanze Mozart himself, successfully matching the handwriting as exactly as possible and in a way that only later research would be able to differentiate it from Mozart`s own handwriting, but moreover that he would then maintain this acquired handwriting for the remainder of his life. This incidentally caused great difficulties during research to determine the handwriting of Süßmayr; not in his later works which were already known but rather in his earlier works and in fact it was only Duda himself, who was able to identify anonymous transcripts of compositions as authentic Süßmayr autographs. The original sources of the Mass in D-Major are unfortunately not fully reliable. The edition printed by the "Chemischen Druckerei" in Vienna after the death of Süßmayr would become the primary source of this work. However it contains substantial errors (e.g. parallel fifth), which appear surprisingly also in the manuscript sources one to assume that these may be largely dependent upon the print. A complete source from Süßmayr`s lifetime does not exist. All the manuscript sources date after the print. Erich Duda used 17 separate manuscripts for the edition, another 6 are held in Czech libraries which he was not able to access. The only undoubtable authentic source is that of some autograph wind parts, that differ from the printed version. Wlcek summised that these parts were perhaps created for a specific performance. The errors in the autograph parts suggest that it was written in haste for the event. The autograph set of wind parts will be published in the appendix of the edition. Süßmayr`s Mass in D-major remained one of the most frequently performed masses well into the 19th century, at least in Vienna. Statistics like those of St. Stephan or St. Karl Borromaeus document the frequency of performances. Among all other works by Süßmayr his D-major Mass experienced the most performances during and even after his lifetime, causing the composer to remain present in memory and performances, at least within the realm of church music until approximately 1870. After the Second World War the Mass in D-major was individually performed several times, under Alois Strassl in Wien/Mauer as well as under Ernst Hinreiner in Salzburg. The planning of the edition of this work was therefore already initiated by the former editing director of the "Gesellschaft zur Herausgabe von Denkmälern der Tonkunst in Österreich", Othmar Wessely. The difficulties of identifying the original sources of this work and other various circumstances have hindered this plan somewhat. Hopefully now, this important work of Austrian Church music (after the representative performances in the commemorative year 2003) can be presented to the public within the traditional edition series of the "Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Österreich".