: Life of Mozart Vol. 1 (of 3) by Jahn Otto Grove George Commentator Townsend Pauline D Translator - Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus 1756-1791

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Preface to the English Edition.

Introduction............

Introduction to the Second Edition Translator's Note.........

I HAVE been asked to say a few words by way of welcome to the translation of Jahn's Life of Mozart, and I do so with pleasure. The book has been long familiar to me, and I regard its appearance in an English dress as an event in our musical history. It will be a great boon to students and lovers of music, and it shows how much the study of music has advanced among us when so large and serious a work is sufficiently appreciated to repay the heavy expense attendant on its translation and publication. The book itself is what the Germans call an "epoch-making work." The old biographies of musicians, such as Forkel's Life of Bach and Dies's of Haydn , are pleasant gossipy accounts of the outward life of the composers; but they concern themselves mainly with the exterior both of the man and his productions, and there is a sort of tacit understanding throughout that if the reader is a professional musician he will know all about the music, if he is an amateur it is altogether out of his reach. Characteristic traits and anecdotes there are in plenty, but as to how the music was made or came into being, what connection existed between it and the circumstances or surroundings of the composer, what relation it had to that of his predecessors or contemporaries, how far the art was advanced by the labours of this particular composer or player--all that is outside the province of the book. Schindler's Life of Beethoven was hardly more

than this, and in addition is so deformed by want of method and by faults of style as to be very uninviting to the reader. A step in the right direction was taken in Moscheles' English translation of Schindler . Moscheles' residence in London had shown him that there was even then a public outside the professional musician to whom such works would be interesting, and he accordingly took pains, by inserting musical examples and other means, to make his edition attractive to this class. But the inherent defects of the original work prevented more than a moderate success.

those which he employs over some other German works. He calls it an "interesting and readable biography," "a trustworthy and, as far as was then possible, exhaustive account... the most trustworthy and serviceable that could be produced by skilful use of the materials generally accessible" . In fact, it has been said with truth that whole pages may be found in which the two works are so closely alike that the one might be thought to be a translation of the other, the probability being that both Holmes and Jahn were borrowing from the same sources.

and utilise the additional information acquired in the interval .

Such a work may well be called an Encyclopaedia; and to have steered through this ocean of material as Jahn has

done, never losing the thread of the narrative, and maintaining the interest in the hero throughout, implies no ordinary tact and skill; for the book is remarkably readable, and there are few pages which are not enlivened by some anecdote or lifelike touch. Nor is it less remarkable for accuracy than for the other qualities already mentioned. The writer has used it constantly for many years, and has never yet discovered a mistake of any moment. Perhaps it would have been better if the secondary treatises of which we have spoken had been relegated to Appendixes; but this is directly opposed to the German method, and we must accept the work as we have it. There are indeed already nineteen Appendixes to the original work, as follows i. Family documents. 2. Marianne Mozart. 3. Testimonials, eulogistic poems, articles, &c. 4. Dedications. 5. Mozart's letters on his journeys. 6. Text of his church music. 7. Arrangements and adaptations of ditto. 8. His cousins. 9. Mozart as a comic poet. 10. Mozart and Vogler. 11. A letter of Leopold Mozart's. 12. Mozart's letters on the death of his mother. 13. The choruses for "King Thamos." 14. The text of "Idomeneo." 15. Alterations in that opera. 16. Mozart's letters to his wife. 17. The Requiem. 18. Mozart's residences in Vienna. 19. Portraits. Of these it has been considered necessary to retain only Nos. 2, 7, and 19, which form Appendixes 1, 2, and 3 of the present edition. Another has been added: namely, a classified list of the whole of his works, according to the complete edition now in course of publication, with the references to the invaluable Catalogue of K?chel. With these exceptions the English translation is exactly in accordance with the German original.

A word of special praise is due to Miss Townsend, the translator, who has performed her laborious task with great accuracy and intelligence, and has established an additional claim on the gratitude of the student by her exhaustive Index, in which the original work is very deficient.

The new branch of musical literature, founded by Holmes and Jahn, already shows some considerable monuments. Passing by the voluminous and accurate thematic catalogues of Mozart by the Ritter von K?chel , of Weber by Jahns , and of Beethoven and Schubert by Nottebohm , works which properly belong to a separate department of the subject--we already possess the Life of Handel by Chrysander , that of Beethoven by A. W. Thayer , that of Haydn by C. F. Pohl --all three still in progress--and that of Bach by Spitta . But these laborious and conscientious works, while they rival and even surpass Jahn in their wide range and the manner in which they embalm every minute particular relating to the subject, are far behind him in lucidity, and in the ease with which he handles his vast materials. In these respects, as might be expected from his literary position, Otto Jahn stands hitherto quite alone.

GEORGE GROVE.

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