If you are reading my posts and find yourself tempted to ask, ‘who does this person think she is?’ I would ask you to just bear with me for a moment. And, if you are interested, ask why, when so many people have heard die zauberflote, you have yet to hear of me from them…
It is a fairly accepted concept that when someone is doing something really different they are likely to attract a lot of flak. In fact, it may seem that all sorts of odd people even crawl out of the woodwork to try to stop the change. This is what happened with Mozart. Due to an ineffable quality of his personality, that we also hear in his music, and which has been labeled “the Mozart effect”, he created controversy wherever he went. It didn’t matter what he did or what he said. His mere presence in a room was sufficient to create a vortex of energies. He had a tendency to polarize people — a few ‘got’ him and were astounded by his gifts; the rest despised him and slandered him at virtually every opportunity. Since much of this antipathy occurred behind Wolf’s back, he was unable to assess the potential for damage to his good name and credibility and takes steps to protect himself. In addition, he had an annoying habit of being ‘right’ about everything connected to music. He was on a mission where he did seem to sense he had to move as quickly as possible, and naively believed others would understand that and have some empathy, not to mention respect, for his advice.
It is my thinking that it was not until toward the end of his life that Mozart began to understand what he was up against. In fact, there was virtually no one whom he could trust to look out for him. Certainly not the sweet little wife, Constanze, always so helpful, such a saint, so patient with him. I doubt that there was a more dedicated antagonist in Wolf’s life than his wife. They were separated during those last months, due to her needing more treatment at a spa for health issues. But was she sympathetic to him, or watching and waiting for the poison she doled out daily in tiny doses when they were together to take hold?
In the Bible, it is the ‘little horn’ who becomes the most wicked Anti-Christ. It is someone who stays in the background, appears to follow all the rules, appears to be a team member, but who has a hidden agenda, that can create the most confusion in the end. And so I think it was with Mozart…
Le Chant du Rossignol...(song of the nightingale) 