Mozart's "Esulate, jubilate"

Synopsis

On today's date in 1773, Wolfgang Mozart was a few days shy of his seventeenth birthday and found himself in Italy, in the company of his father, Leopold. This was their third trip to Italy, in fact, and this time around young Wolfgang was under contract to produce a new opera, "Lucio Silla," for the city of Milan.

The lead singer scheduled for Mozart's new opera was the castrato Venanzio Rauzzini, a male soprano, who, Leopold Mozart said 'sang like an angel."

For Rauzzini, the teenage Mozart also composed a sacred work, tailor-made to show off his remarkable voice and vocal dexterity: this was a solo motet entitled "Exsultate, jubilate," which had its premiere performance in Milan's Church of San Antonio on today's date in 1773.

The church is still standing, but these days the authentic performance practice movement hasn't gone quite so far as to surgically create new male sopranos, so more often than not, Mozart's "Esultate jubilate" is sung by sopranos or mezzos, who adjust portions of the vocal line up or down to make the best effect in the work's more brilliant passages.

And so, although originally written for a divo, "Esultate, jubiliate" is one of the earliest of Mozart's major works to find a lasting place in the repertory of many grateful divas.

Music Played in Today's Program

Wolfgang Mozart (1756 - 1791) Esultate, jubilate

On This Day

Births

• 1706 - American statesman, composer of string quartets, publisher and inventor of the glass harmonica Benjamin Franklin, in Boston (Gregorian date: Jan. 28);

• 1712 - English composer John Stanley (Gregorian date: Jan. 28);

• 1734 - Belgian composer François-Joseph Gossec, in Vergnies;

• 1907 - Dutch composer Henk Badings, in Bandung, Java;

• 1927 - American composer Donald Erb, in Youngstown, Ohio;

• 1934 - Canadian-born American composer, conductor and clarinetist Sydney Hodkinson, in Winnipeg, Manitoba;

Deaths

• 1738 - French composer and organist Jean François Dandrieu, age c. 56, in Paris;

• 1750 - Italian composer Tomaso Albinoni, age 78, in Venice;

• 1826 - Spanish composer Juan Crisostomo Arriaga, age 19, in Paris;

• 1869 - Russian composer Alexander Dargomizhsky, age 55, in St. Peterburg (Julian date: Jan. 5);

• 1969 - Polish composer Grazyna Bacewicz, age 55, in Warsaw;

Premieres

• 1880 - Franck: Piano Quintet in f, in Paris, by the Marsick Quartet, with Camille Saints-Saëns at the piano;

• 1901 - Mascagni: opera "Le Maschere" (The Masks), simultaneously in 6 cities;

• 1944 - Copland: Violin Sonata, at Times Hall in New York, by violinist Ruth Posselt with the composer at the piano;

• 1991 - Ellen Taaffe Zwilich: Oboe Concerto, by soloist John Mack, with the Cleveland Orchestra, Christoph von Dohnanyi conducting;

Others

• 1745 - Handel publishes a letter in the London ":Daily Advertiser" offering to return three-fourths money to the subscribers to his current series of concerts, then in progress, suggesting that his attempts to please the public have proved ineffectual; The letter prompts a flurry of support, and Handel resumes the concerts a week later; In all, 16 out of the promised 24 concerts would take place; The series closed on April 23, 1745, with a revival performance of ":Messiah." (Gregorian dates: Jan. 28 and May 4, respectively);

• 1919 - Polish composer and pianist Ignaz Jan Paderewski becomes premiere of Poland.