Klarinet Archive - Posting 000392.txt from 2001/03

From: Neil Leupold <leupold_1@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] New Mozart found
Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 14:05:17 -0500

LONDON (AP) More Mozart?

A British academic believes she has discovered a long-lost
work by the composer in a local public records office.

Rachel Cowgill, an expert on Mozart who teaches music at
Leeds University, found the adaptation of George Frideric
Handel's oratorio "Judas Maccabaeus" at the records office
of the local Calderdale Council.

"I opened the score and looked at the title page where it
quite clearly said, `By Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart,' then I
realized it was `Judas Maccabaeus,"' she said.

Other experts are examining the piece, which is not in
Mozart's own hand. But Cowgill is convinced it's genuine,
saying the arrangement techniques match those in Mozart's
adaptation of Handel's "Messiah."

"It tells us much more about how Mozart responded to an
earlier great master like Handel," said Cowgill. "I couldn't
put a monetary value on it but in terms of scholarship
it is extremely valuable."

Mozart adapted four pieces written by Handel in the 1780s
to make them more appealing to more florid contemporary tastes.

Scholars found references to Mozart's adaptation of a fifth
piece by the German-born composer but no manuscript was traced
until now.

Mozart reworked Handel's music at the request of his friend
and patron, Baron Gottfried van Swieten, a scholar and poli-
tician whom he met in 1782. Mozart's first Handel arrangement
for van Swieten was "Acis and Galatea" in 1788, followed by
"Messiah" in 1789, and "Alexander's Feast" and "Ode for St.
Cecilia's Day," both in 1790.

In a letter to Mozart on March 21, 1789, van Swieten praised
the composer's ability to "clothe Handel so solemnly and so
tastefully that he pleases the modish fop on the one hand and
on the other still shows himself in his sublimity."

Cowgill said Mozart added extra woodwind and brass parts par-
ticularly clarinets and trombones to "Judas Maccabaeus" and
later performed his updated version of the work.

Music lovers know "Judas Maccabaeus" as the source of the hymn
"Thine Be The Glory," which Handel wrote in 1747. Handel died
in 1759 and never heard Mozart's version.

Copyright © 2001 ABC News

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