So Faithful a Heart

My First Book Signing!

2011-10-30T22:20:00.001-05:00

My very first book signing has been scheduled for Saturday, February 11, 2012 from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. at Hastings Bookstore in Stillwater, OK. The first five copies of So Faithful a Heart, Special Edition were shelved at Hastings last Monday, and when I went back to check on Friday, two copies had already been sold! I'm hoping this will be a trend, and also hoping to get into more stores very soon!

Happy Birthday, Nancy Storace

2011-10-27T04:16:00.001-05:00

Anna "Nancy" Storace

Mozart's original Susanna

27 October, 1765 to 24 August 1817

Agendas, distortion, and shoddy research

2011-10-17T19:19:00.000-05:00

As the author of two passionate novels about the love between two real people in history, I'll be the first to admit that I had an agenda when I wrote them; that being to tell a great story that was as factual as I could make it and at the same time entertaining and compelling for the reader. That's why I took 10 plus years to research before I started writing, and why I made a detailed timeline of Nancy Storace's life and laid it against a timeline of Mozart's to make certain the events that I described in my novels could have taken place in the time and place in which I described them. As an historian, this was extremely important to me, for I didn't want the integrity of my work questioned, nor did I want to distort the facts to make them fit my agenda.

All of this is to say that because I am such a stickler for historical accuracy and detail, I'm troubled and even angered by writers who aren't as meticulous with their research or who have agendas that don't line up with history, so they either distort the facts or omit them altogether. I was rather ruthless and unforgiving in my criticism of Geoffrey Brace in the afterword of When Love Won't Die, for his distorted facts and blatant omissions of key events in Nancy's life (in his biography of Nancy entitled Anna Susanna), which were key evidence to the beliefs of many noted Mozart historians in the love affair that most likely existed between Mozart and Storace.

Today I was reminded again, why historical accuracy is so essential by a friend who is reading another novelized account of Mozart's life which focuses on the events surrounding the courtship and subsequent marriage of Mozart and Constanze Weber. In this particular novel is a conversation that takes place between Mozart and Constanze (who is not yet his fiance), where she questions his devotion to her, because she had been told that there were rumors going around Vienna that he was in love with the new English singer in town and that they had been seen together at parties and other musical events. Mozart vehemently denies that he's in love with Nancy Storace and tells Constanze that the only love he feels is for her, and dismisses Constanze's fears by convincing her that what she's heard is only idle gossip. I have read this novel (a few years ago), and had forgotten about that passage. This scene was obviously inserted to push the agenda that Mozart was never in love with Storace in the first place, and that his affections had always belonged to Constanze. However, what was interesting about this situation is the fact that Nancy Storace didn't even arrive in Vienna until six months after Mozart and Constanze were married, so this conversation, while it could have taken place, wouldn't have taken place until sometime in 1783 or 1784 and not in 1781, and would have arisen out of a wife's jealousy and not over a girl's questioning her suitor's devotion.

See how easily things can be distorted to meet an agenda by simply changing the timeline?

On the road to legitimacy

2011-10-16T08:42:00.002-05:00

It's strange that even in this age of mass communication, web marketing, Ebay purchasing and selling, Ebooks & Ereaders, Amazon.com, etc., that the public still doesn't consider a book "legitimate" until it is available for purchase in a "brick & mortar" bookstore. Well, today I am happy to announce that So Faithful a Heart: Special Edition is soon to be available at Hastings in Stillwater, Oklahoma, with a local author book signing to be announced sometime after the beginning of the new year. This will be the first step towards making my book available in brick & mortar bookstores throughout the entire state of Oklahoma as well as nationwide. I'm truly excited about this new development, and will keep friends and locals posted once I get an actual date for the book signing.

It begins with the first step...

"When Love Won't Die" to be reviewed at History Undressed

2011-10-15T08:42:00.000-05:00

Noted historical fiction romance author/reviewer Eliza Knight, at History Undressed has announced that she will review So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die in the coming months. Some will recall that last year she reviewed the first novel in the So Faithful a Heart series, The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart and left this fabulous review. I'm only too excited and honored that Ms. Knight has enthusiastically agreed to read and review the second, and look forward to it in the next few months. (She says her queue is quite long right now!) I'll keep everyone posted.

My Apologies to My First Readers

2011-10-07T23:13:00.000-05:00

Today I happened to go to the Amazon.com page for the print version of my new book, So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die, Special Edition and found that they had dropped the price from $23.50 to $16.92 and was quite upset over it. Normally, it wouldn't have bothered me, but (a) I wasn't notified that they were going to do this, (b) the book has been out for less than a month and I've barely had a chance to market it, (c) my first readers, who paid the regular list price, will go to my page to leave reviews only to find that they paid nearly $10.00 more and (d) in dropping the price so low within the first month of its release it looks bad on me and on my book and indicates that Amazon doesn't have much faith in its success (although how an independent author is supposed to have roaring success within the first month of their book's release is beyond me).

My apologies to my first readers who paid a much higher price for their books. I assure you, this was not my doing. I set the price at $23.50 with the thought that this was reasonable for a 530 page, 180,000 word novel that was written, edited, and published with such high quality as this one has been. I could see Amazon lowering the price after six months or so, if the book wasn't selling well, but not within two weeks of the marketing page's debut. That's simply ridiculous. Believe me, Amazon HAS heard from me on this.

Look what arrived in the mail today!

2011-09-29T19:34:00.001-05:00

It looks like I have some books to sign!

(They're beautiful, aren't they?)

Available in ALL Ereader formats

2011-09-29T07:52:00.000-05:00

If you own an Ereader, but it's not a Kindle, I've thought of you, too. My newest book is available at Smashwords.com in ALL Ereader formats including Epub, Nook, Palm Doc, and RTF.

So what's it all about?

2011-09-25T09:50:00.000-05:00

I've had several people ask me what my new book, So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die is all about since everyone who read the first book knows the ending to Nancy and Wolfgang's love story. After several people read The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart, they came to me and said that they fell so in love with Nancy Storace that they wanted to know the rest of her life's story. So it was with those requests in mind that I wrote the sequel, When Love Won't Die.

Set in the late 18th century through the early 19th century (starting in 1791 to 1817), When Love Won't Die tells of Nancy's struggle to move past the unexpected death of her lover, Wolfgang Mozart, and go on with her life and career. Although Mozart is dead, he looms large throughout the entire story, right to the end, through the letters that he wrote to Nancy throughout the course of the last five years of his life.

Nancy is confronted with the formidable task of going on despite her loss and is met with the challenge of opening herself up to love again. In this story we meet the young tenor, John Braham, who emerges as the new love interest. A student of Nancy's former voice instructor, Venanzio Rauzzini, Braham's relationship with Nancy begins when Rauzzini introduces them and asks Nancy to sing in the 19-year-old tenor's debut concert in Bath.

When Love Won't Die is filled with many of the characters that readers of the first book will know such as Nancy's older brother, Stephen Storace and her mother Elizabeth, the jolly and heart-warming Irish tenor, Michael Kelly, and the composer and dear friend of Mozart's, Joseph Haydn. There is also a host of new characters, all whom Nancy knew and with whom she shared close relationships including, Napoleon Bonaparte, Lord Admiral Horatio Nelson & his mistress Emma Hamilton, the famous English singer/actress Elizabeth Billington, and the famous English architect, Sir John Soane. There's even an element of intrigue in the underlying subplot involving Mozart's widow, Constanze and her new husband, the Danish dipolmat, Georg Nissen!

So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die is NOW AVAILABLE at Amazon.com in a picture-illustrated combined Special Edition with a re-edited and newly rewritten version of book One, So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart. It is also available in Kindle Ebook at Amazon.com and will soon be available in all other Ebook formats at Smashwords.com.

So Faithful a Heart, Special Edition Now on Kindle!

2011-09-12T18:36:00.000-05:00

So Faithful a Heart, Special Edition, including Book I, The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart, and Book II, the sequel When Love Won't Die is now available for purchase on Amazon Kindle!

The love story continues...

When Love Won't Die: Cover Blurb

2011-09-06T20:21:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Nellie Kampmann, author of A Haunted History of Columbus, Ohio for the cover blurb for So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die--Special Edition.

"What do you do when you wake up one morning to find love’sfondest hopes and dreams have been shattered in a single night? Famed 18th century opera singer Anna Storace faces this questionwhen life and death conspire to keep her apart from her beloved Mozart. Anna’sstruggle takes her on a sweeping adventure from the glittering stages of Europe, to its war torn battlefields, and back to herbucolic haven in the English countryside. Based on the true story of AnnaStorace’s life, So Faithful a Heart: WhenLove Won’t Die is a whirlwind of loss, romance, betrayal, intrigue, andeternal love."

On Schedule for October 1st Release

2011-08-28T22:57:00.002-05:00

That's right! So Faithful a Heart: Speical Edition including Books One and Two, The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart and When Love Won't Die, is on schedule for release on October 1st, 2011!

What do you do when you wake up one morning to find love’sfondest hopes and dreams have been shattered in a single night? Where do yourun, and to whom?

So Faithful A Heart:When Love Won’t Die is the continuing saga of the woman who Mozart vowedwould own his heart forever, and the story of the man who tries to steal herheart from him. Set against the background of one of the most turbulent timesin Western Europe, When Love Won’t Die gives you a window into the lives of some ofthe greatest and most colorful men and women in history!

So Faithful A Heart:When Love Won’t Die, the exciting and passionate sequel to So Faithful A Heart: The Love Story of NancyStorace & Wolfgang Mozart, by author, K. Lynette Erwin.

Available in a Special Combined Edition, including aspecially rewritten and re-edited version of So Faithful A Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & WolfgangMozart.

On October 1^st, 2011, the love story continues…

When Love Won't Die: The Continuing Story, Afterword & Acknowledgments

2011-08-14T10:44:00.008-05:00

The greatest challenge a writerfaces when creating an historical fiction piece based on the lives of realpeople is the balancing of the actual historical facts with good story-telling.Often the cold, hard facts fail to meet the criteria that make for a good storywith the rises, peaks, and falls in the proper places. That was not the casewith the life of Anna “Nancy” Storace, for her life was so packed with famouspeople and events that I had to choose which notable historical events andfigures to highlight and which ones to give slight mention to or no mention atall. To say Nancy Storace led an interesting and exciting life is a vastunderstatement, and it has been both an honor and a sheer pleasure to devotethe better part of thirteen years in getting to know this amazing, fascinatingand courageous woman. I have to admit that now that I’m finished with thetelling of her story, I’m really going to miss her.

After becoming familiar with thisincredible character through both academic and personal research, it isbaffling to me that only one biography has been written about her. It’s by aBritish lay music enthusiast and researcher, Mr. Geoffrey Brace, and it is hereI will thank Mr. Brace for his exhaustive research and for compiling andorganizing the facts and events of her life into one, concise work. Brace’sbook, Anna…Suanna: Anna Storace, Mozart’sfirst Suanna: her life, times and family (Published by Thames Publishing1991), has been invaluable to me and has served to provide the factual“skeleton” upon which I have structured both So Faithful A Heart novels.

My greatest disappointment inBrace’s work, however, is in some of the incorrect data and the deliberateomission of the event towards the end of Nancy’slife which appeared to be a major catalyst in the progression towards her finalillness and death. In an apparent effort to press his own admitted agenda ofseparating Storace from the belief held by some of the most noted Mozarthistorians (most notably Alfred Einstein), that there at least existed anemotional affair between Mozart and Nancy (Brace himself even admits that bothof Mozart’s first biographers, Joseph Lange and Georg Nissen claimed thatMozart was in love with Nancy), Brace failed to make even casual mention of themaid’s testimony at Storace’s death inquest regarding the visit from the two“German” men and their demands that Nancy hand over the “letters from Vienna”.

I also found other facts thatwere skewed to apparently manipulate the reader to his view, as well as someother statements that were simply based in poor research, the two most glaringregarding Nancy’s close friendship with Lady Emma Hamilton. The first is wherehe stated that Nancymost likely attended Admiral Horatio Nelson’s funeral and sat with Emma. It isa well-established fact that Lady Hamilton was forbidden to attend the funeralof Lord Nelson, so it is more likely that Nancyeither didn’t attend at all or, if she did, sat near her common-law husband,John Braham, who sang at the funeral. The other was at the end of the bookwhere he states that Emma Hamilton attended Nancy’sfuneral on 2 September, 1817 which would have been impossible as Hamilton died in exile in Calais, Franceon 15 January, 1815. These two glaring errors, along with Brace’s apparent needto skew and omit important details and facts made it difficult to trustanything in the book that wasn’t backed-up with hard documentation.

Brace was also very free aboutcasting value judgments on the relationships between Nancy and variousimportant people in her life such as her brother, Stephen, her son, Spencer,and her common-law husband of twenty years, John Braham, labeling them asbordering on an “unhealthy closeness” and using terms such as “pathetic devotion”in regards to her commitment to Braham. I’d personally like to know how Bracefound himself so in the midst of these relationships that he could make suchjudgment calls, and how, after he had gleaned so many facts about Nancy Storacethat screamed otherwise, he could ever say that this woman was “pathetic” aboutanything. The truth is that there wasn’t a pathetic bone in the woman’s body;Brace’s own research proves it. He had the facts (well most of them anyway),but his insights into the facts were pitifully lacking.

History has long taken a hard,and I will add unfair view of strong, independent, successful women like AnnaStorace. One of the most unfair views that seem to run common among historiansfamiliar with Storace’s life and career is the idea that she was involved in a“string” of unsuccessful love affairs. In Nancy’snearly fifty-two years she was only involved in three, what can be documentedand proven, “love affairs”, (aside from her disastrous marriage to John Fisher,which I don’t in any way count as a love affair). The three were with Francesco Benucci, who was Mozart’s original Figaro, the Spanish composer Martiny Soler, and the English tenor, John Braham (I don’t include Mozart because noaffair between them has been documented other than through hearsay andcircumstantial evidence, although I believe there is plenty of both toestablish the probability of an affair and that it was one of the two mostsignificant in her life). How anyone could judge these affairs as unsuccessfulis beyond me. Were they unsuccessful simply because they ended? I’d like to know what the criteria were inmaking this judgment.

The obviously most significantdocumented love affair was with John Braham. It lasted twenty years, produced achild (who grew up to be an educated and respected member of British society),brought in a tremendous amount of material wealth to both parties, and inBraham, produced one of the greatest singers Great Britain has ever known. Ifthat isn’t success, I don’t know what is! The relationship ended badly, but itstragic ending in no way diminishes its duration and accomplishments. Again, howdoes one define success in a love relationship—simply by one that ends only in“till death do us part”? I’ve known many a marriage that lasted fifty years ormore that didn’t produce half the amount of success created in the twenty yearsthat Nancy Storace spent with John Braham.

I’d also like to fill my readersin on some of the factual details concerning the fates of both Braham and thecouple’s son, Spencer. According to Brace, after Braham’s marriage toseventeen-year-old Frances Bolton, he went on to have six children and to diein 1856 a “pillar of Victorian society.” He was regarded as the finest tenorEngland had ever known, and also according to Brace, continued with his ratherdisingenuous and cynical attitude towards his profession as a musician byplaying up to whatever audience for which he happened to be singing at anygiven time. Lack of integrity continued to follow him through the rest of hislife and in all aspects of his life, including his relationship with his son,Spencer.

William Spencer Harris Braham wasfifteen years old (not fourteen, as Brace miscalculates in his book), at thetime of his mother’s death. Spencer was never reconciled with her death; goingon to blame his father for the decline in Nancy’shealth that led to her demise—something for which his father never forgave him.Apparently Nancy never did find the copy of the Last Will & Testament she searched for, andperhaps destroyed it by accident, along with the “letters from Vienna” on theday to which her maid, Miss Walthen (“Emma” is a name I gave her after myinability to find her actual first name), testified at Nancy’s death inquest.Because Nancy’s will was never changed, the bulk of her massive estate was notpassed on to Spencer as she intended, and the ₤2000 designated to Braham in theolder will, did go to him. However, Braham in this case did do the right thingand gave it back to his son in the amount of ₤150 annually. Spencer struggledin school for several years after his mother’s death, but eventually did go onto obtain both a B.A. and M.A. from Oxford.With the help of his father, he obtained a post in the clergy and married in1851, changing his surname to Meadows (the name of his wife’s family), to ridhimself of any connection to his father. It was quite obvious that theanimosity between them lingered on until Braham’s death. Spencer, too, had sixchildren and when he died in 1883, he held the post of rural dean of Chigwell, Essex.

Finally, I would like to expressmy thanks to the people who have worked with me, inspired and encouraged me,and lent their help and expertise:

First, I would like to thank mydaughter, Lauren Weaver, for lending her knowledge of the French language aswell as helpful information and an excellent timeline outlining the periods ofthe French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars.

Special thanks go to Dr. D. AllenScott for writing the Foreword to this book. There are certain people who comeinto your life and you know from the moment you meet them that they’re therefor a special reason. Allen is one of those people to me. I can honestly saythat without Dr. Scott’s encouragement and inspiration, neither of my So Faithful A Heart novels would havebeen written.

As always, I appreciate theunending love, support, expert advice, listening ear, patience, andprofessional assistance of my life partner, S.K. Waller. There is no greaterjoy than sharing one’s life and work with one’s best friend.

Last but not least, my heartfeltthanks go to the lovely, talented, warm, spirited and courageous woman whoselife and career inspired these novels, Anna “Nancy” Storace. I only hope I didyour story justice, Signora. Thank you for a life well-lived and for choosingme to be your messenger. Brava, Prima Buffa!

K. Lynette Erwin

Summer, 2011

So Faithful A Heart: When Love Won't Die

2011-07-22T20:03:00.000-05:00

What do you do when you wake up one morning to find love’sfondest hopes and dreams have been shattered in a single night? Where do yourun, and to whom?

So Faithful A Heart:When Love Won’t Die, the exciting and passionate sequel to So Faithful A Heart: The Love Story of NancyStorace & Wolfgang Mozart, by author, K. Lynette Erwin.

Available in soft cover and digital formats in October,2011.

The love story continues…

Of Press Kits, Photo Shoots, Sell Sheets & Sequels

2011-02-27T16:25:00.000-06:00

This week has been exciting and at the same time confusing and exhausting. Over the last several days my partner S.K. Waller and I have been learning some of the ins and outs of marketing a book and we've been trying to implement some of the things we've learned. One of the most important things we've discovered is that a Press Kit is absolutely essential for the successful marketing of a book and without one, an author can never hope for their work to take off. So, with that in mind, and realizing that it could cost thousands of dollars to put together a professional Press Kit, Steph, (who has done this kind of thing before with her own music career), put together both of our Press Kits in less than a week complete with professional quality photos, Press Releases, Sell Sheets, Title Sheets, and all the other things that are needed for a successful press kit. She is now offering her services professionally at Alla Breve Books for any author (or soon-to-be author) in need of a professional Press Kit, at very reasonable rates.

In the meantime, I've been working on the sequel to So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart, which is entitled So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die. I've finished the outline and am now writing the synopsis and doing a little more background research. This novel covers the period between 1791 and 1817, and encompasses a different time in history than the first book, most importantly, the French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon, so the setting has changed just a bit. Mozart is every bit as much a part of this story as in the first book, but his presence is felt as a "ghost" (figuratively speaking), that haunts Nancy's memories and her life and threatens to come between her and her other relationships. It promises to be every bit as compelling a story as the first and I'm extremely excited about it!

So Faithful a Heart: When Love Won't Die

2011-02-20T20:12:00.000-06:00

Yes, that's what it says; I'm writing the sequel to So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart. It's the rest of the story beginning from the point of Mozart's death until Nancy's death twenty-six years later. Filled with all the longing, tenderness, and passion of the original story, When Love Won't Die tells how Nancy goes on, all the while trying to forget her love for Mozart but discovering that no matter how much she throws herself into her career, or even into the arms of other lovers, the love she shared with him keeps coming back to haunt her.

Projected release is late summer of 2011.

Happy Valentine's Day: The Breath of Love

2011-02-12T17:13:00.000-06:00

A breath of love
From our sweetheart
A sweet refreshment
Will give a helping hand to the heart.

The heart which, nourished
By hope, by love,
Has no need of a better bait.

Now Available on Kindle at Amazon.com

2011-01-31T18:29:00.000-06:00

So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart is now available in a Kindle Edition for only $5.99. Download yours now, HERE. Don't own a Kindle and/or can't afford one? You can download a FREE Kindle reader for your PC, Netbook, or iphone HERE.

Happy 255th, Birthday Wolfgango

2011-01-27T07:45:00.001-06:00

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

27 January, 1756 to 5 December, 1791

The Villain You Love to Hate and Hate to Love: Count Almaviva

2011-01-25T19:09:00.001-06:00

Ah! Count Almaviva. How could a man be so cold and uncaring? How could he be so unfaithful to his lovely wife? And with her personal servant girl who's engaged to be married to his valet? Only Mozart and da Ponte could create a character so strong, so compelling...someone you hate to love and love to hate.

Simon Keenlyside sings the Count's aria, Hai gia vinta la causa.

Beloved Cherubino

2011-01-24T21:00:00.001-06:00

By far the most beloved character in Le Nozze di Figaro has to be the 14-year-old boy who is in love with love, Cherubino. Mozart and da Ponte created the role to be sung by a woman wearing men's clothing (a trouser role), and since that time it has been one of the most coveted roles for mezzo-soprano.

This scene features one of the most beloved Cherubinos of all time, Frederica von Stade, singing the aria "Non so piu".

Mozart Week: Le Nozze di Figaro Act I: Via, resti servita

2011-01-23T18:43:00.000-06:00

In this comical scene between the servant Susanna and the noblewoman Marcellina, we see the classical tension between the servant working class and the nobility. To say that Mozart and da Ponte removed the "politics" from Le Nozze di Figaro is a fallacy. Figaro is chocked full of the revolutionary politics of the time with the Count's servants working to outwit him and undo his plans at every turn.

Notice the slurs in the violins that sound like cats "meowing", indicating the "cat fight" that breaks out between them.

Marcellina (curtsying): To greet you, my lady, I'm honored supremely.
Susanna (curtsying): By your recognition I'm flattered extremely.
Marcellina (curtsying): Please enter before me.
Susanna (curtsying): No, no, you go first!
Marcellina: I beg you, ignore me!
Susanna (mocking): Your noble position, fine and patrician, inspires respect.
Marcellina (mocking): I know my position, bow to tradition, fine and patrician, with all due respect.
Marcellina: The bride of the hour!
Susanna: A lady of station!
Marcellina: The Count's little bella!
Susanna: The pride of the nation!
Marcellina: Her attitude!
Susanna: Dignified!
Marcellina: Her posture!
Susanna: Your age!
Marcellina: I swear I shall fly at her in one minute more!
Susanna (aside) Decrepit old battle ax, I'll settle your score.
Marcellina: I praise your deportment without reservation.
Susanna: And I, your experience and broad reputation!
Marcellina: So young and so pretty!
Susanna: The belle of the city!
Marcellina: What distance between us!
Susanna: The true Spanish Venus!
Marcellina: So innocent!
Susanna: Durable!
Marcellina: So simple!
Susanna: So old!
Marcellina: How dare she make fun of me, it is a disgrace!

It's Mozart Week!

2011-01-22T18:42:00.001-06:00

Because January 27th, is Mozart's 255th birthday, I'll be celebrating by posting a scene from his opera, The Marriage of Figaro every day through this coming Thursday. Mozart regarded Figaro as one of his greatest triumphs and the role of Susanna, created for Nancy Storace, is considered one of the most coveted soprano roles.

Today I've featured the opening scene in Act I of Le Nozze di Figaro. Starring Bryn Terfel as Figaro and Alison Hagley as Susanna.

The Music: Exsultate Jubilate

2011-01-17T18:50:00.005-06:00

In the year 1772 when Mozart was 17, he and his father, Leopold, traveled to Italy where he was commissioned to compose an opera (Lucio Silla), for the theater in Milan. It was there that Mozart was introduced to an amazing castrato (adult male soprano), named Venanzio Rauzzini, whom young Mozart said "Sings like an angel". Mozart composed his motet Exsultate Jubilate especially for Rauzzini and it was premiered on 17 January 1773 in Milan.

Only a few years later, Rauzzini moved to England and became a noted and respected voice instructor. When Nancy Storace turned 11 years old, her father turned her vocal instruction over to Rauzzini who, after hearing that some damage had been done to her voice (most likely due to over-singing and too much intense performing at such a young age), forbade her to perform for a year while he worked with her to undo the damage.

Rauzzini finished out his life and career in England and died in Bath in April of 1810 at the age of 63. Nancy Storace and her then common law husband, the English tenor, John Brahm (who had also been a student of Rauzzini's), erected a stone plaque in his memory.

The following is the Alleluia from Mozart's Exsultate Jubilate. Sung by male soprano Michael Maniaci.

The Gift

2010-12-12T11:34:00.008-06:00

In the fall of 1786, Nancy Storace announced to the Bergtheater management that she would be returning to London to fulfill a contract that her brother, Stephen, had arranged (without her knowledge), over the previous summer. When Mozart learned of this, he began immediately to make plans to travel with Nancy, Stephen, their mother, Elizabeth, Michael Kelly, his English pupil, Thomas Atwood, and the young English nobleman (who had been residing in Vienna during his grand tour), Harry Vane (Lord Barnard), with them to London, where he hoped to gain a commission for some operas at the King's Theater. His plans were thwarted, however, when his wife, Constanze, who was pregnant with their third child, refused to allow him to go without her. Mozart wrote to his father, Leopold, (who lived in Salzburg), and asked if he would take the two children until he and Constanze were settled in London. He promised to make arrangements for a wet nurse for the baby as well as a nanny for little Karl. The request was sent shortly after the birth of their son, Johann Thomas Leopold, however, before Mozart received Leopold's reply, little Thomas died of a choking cough. Leopold's reply was a cold, scathing refusal. So it was with a heart heavy with grief, disappointment and discouragement that Mozart delivered the news to Nancy and his other English friends that he would not be traveling back with them to London.

The following December (1786), Mozart composed an aria (a "Scena con Rondo"), for Nancy and presented it to her as a gift (presumably for Christmas). The text was taken from his beloved opera Idomeneo and was really a vocal/piano duet, the piano part composed for him to play. It was his intentions that Nancy sing it at her Viennese farewell concert, which was scheduled for the night before the group's departure in February of 1787. In his thematic catalog, dated 27 December 1786, Mozart made the following personal entry next to the musical incipit of the aria: Für Mlle. Storace und mich (For Mademoiselle Storace and me). This is the only personal reference found in Mozart's thematic catalog.

The following is the scene from So Faithful a Heart where Mozart presents his gift to Nancy:

After supper, they all retired to the salon for a special presentation, for Mozart announced upon his arrival that he had a gift to give Nancy before he left for Prague. He motioned Nancy to step forward and join him at the fortepiano, where he sat, opening the aria. Knowing her excellent sight singing capabilities, he invited her to read through it with him in front of the other guests.

As she quickly leafed through the manuscript, she immediately recognized the text, and turned to him with tears brimming in her eyes. “I can’t believe you did this,” she whispered to him.
Mozart smiled sheepishly and replied softly, “It’s everything I wish to say to you, Wanze.” He silently mouthed the words to her in English, “I adore you, little bug.” He then played the opening measures of the recitative and she began to sing.

You ask me to forget you?
You advise me calmly to forget you and love another
and want that I still live?
Ah, No! I would rather die!
Come death! I wait for it courageously!
To seek consolation from another,
to give my love to another only fills my heart with dread!
Cruel suggestion! Ah! My despair will kill me.
Do not fear, my love will never be changed.
Faithful I shall always remain.
But my affliction has caused me to falter
and now my soul from grief must flee.
Are you sighing? O woe outpouring?
But all is vain to one who is begging.
O Heaven, I cannot express it!
Pity me, Heaven, see my anguish,
see the grief due to my affection!
Has ever such torment plagued so faithful a heart?
Has such doom or dejection ever beset such a loyal heart?
Hateful galaxies! Vile constellations!
Why should you beset me with such sorrow? Ah, why?

She thought that when he’d composed the role of Susanna, it was the ultimate in his public expression of his affection for her, but now this. Not even the tender, Deh vieni non tardar, which they had always considered their special aria, could compare. The music was passionate and tender all at once, and the piano part that he had composed for himself to play as a duet with her vocal line, wrapped itself around the vocal melody as a lover wrapping himself around the object of his devotion. She could hardly wait for her concert when they would perform it with the orchestra and she would be able to hear his piano line standing out from the orchestral accompaniment, mingling with hers in a public, musical declaration of what had taken place in their hearts and in their most intimate moments, behind closed doors.

After they finished the last bars, he stood and handed her the manuscript. She read the dedication aloud, “From your servant and friend…” and she threw her arms around his neck. He wrapped her in his embrace, the two of them remaining in one another’s arms for several moments as the small group of onlookers sat silently and watched, many of them moved to tears by what they had just heard and seen.

In Memoriam: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

2010-12-05T06:56:00.000-06:00

In loving memory of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, born January 27, 1756, died December 5, 1791. We will remember you always.

The Music: Sull'aria or The Letter Song from Le Nozze di Fiagro

2010-11-20T14:24:00.003-06:00

One of the most beloved and delightful scenes in Figaro has to be when the Countess sits Susanna down at her desk and has her pen out the note that she will slip to the Count during the wedding festivities later on. Note three things that this implies: 1) Susanna is an educated servant; she can read and write, and 2) the Countess is conspiring in a plot against her husband with a servant, in order to trick him, and 3) they are both women in the process of outwitting the men.

These were all very revolutionary ideas in the 18th century and completely debunks the notion that Mozart and da Ponte removed the "offensive politics" from the story or that Mozart was a misogynist. Mozart's favorite story plots always involved strong, intelligent women undoing the men.

Lyrics and translation:

Sull'aria . . .

On the breeze . . .

Che soave zeffiretto . . .

What a gentle zephyr . . .

Zeffiretto . . .

Zephyr . . .

Questa sera spirera!

Will sigh this evening!

Questa sera spirera . . .

Will sigh this evening . . .

Sotto i pini del boschetto.

Beneath the pine grove.

Sotto i pini?

Beneath the pines?

Sotto i pini del boschetto . . .

Beneath the pine grove . . .

Ei gia il resto capira.

He will understand the rest.

Certo, certo il capira.

Certainly, he'll understand.

Ei gia il resto capira.

He will understand the rest.

Canzonetta sull'aria . . . etc.

Little tune on the breeze . . . etc.

The Music: Das Lied der Trennung (The Song of Parting)

2010-10-30T18:31:00.001-05:00

In May of 1787, only three months following Nancy's departure from Vienna to return to London, Mozart composed this Lied based on a text by the German poet, Klamer Eberhard Karl Schmidt (1764-1824). It wasn't difficult at all to discern who Mozart had in mind when he chose this particular text.

God's angels weep when lovers part,
how can I go on living,
o maid, without you?
A stranger to all joys
henceforth I live to suffer!
And you, and you?
Possibly forever Luisa will forget me!
Possibly forever she will put me out of her mind!

Awake and in my dreams
I will quote Luisa's name;
professing her name
be a service for me;
I will even profess and praise it
when I am with God.
And you, and you?
Possibly forever Luisa will forget me!
Possibly forever she will put me out of her mind!

I cannot forget her,
here, there, everywhere
the burden of love pursues me
by the squeeze of her hands.
I tremble with longing for her,
and find myself forsaken!
And you, and you?
Possibly forever Luisa will forget me!
Possibly forever she will put me out of her mind!

I cannot forget her;
this heart, separated from her,
seems to beg me with sighs,
"My friend, remember me!"
Alas, I will remember you
until they lay me in the grave.
And you, and you?
Possibly forever Luisa will forget me!
Possibly forever she will put me out of her mind!

Oblivion robs within hours
what love bestows within years.
Like the turn of a hand
such is the turn of a heart.
When new courtships
have supplanted me in her heart,
o God, then Luisa will possibly forget me forever.

Alas, remember our parting!
That tearless silence,
that throbbing of the heart
may weigh you down
like a burdening nightmare;
will you think of someone else,
will you forget me some day,
forget God and yourself?

Alas, remember our parting!
This token, bitten amid kisses
onto my mouth
may judge me and you!
With this memento on my lips
I will come in the witching hour,
to be you a warning,
that Luisa forgets me,
that she puts me out of her mind!

Nancy Storace: A survivor of domestic violence

2010-10-28T19:14:00.002-05:00

Since October is Domestic Violence Awareness month, I thought it appropriate to share a section from So Faithful a Heart which deals with the violence that Nancy suffered at the hands of her husband, John Fisher (a marriage that was arranged by her mother to supposedly further her career). Nancy was only 18 years old at the time. Nancy survived the ordeal, and eventually Fisher was banned from Vienna by Nancy's employer, Joseph II, the Emperor of Austria.

John Fisher was a tall, slender, handsome man with cool, slate blue eyes, a head full of dark, thick hair with slight graying at the temples, and an austere, almost noble bearing. He was forty-one years old when he came to Vienna, nearly three times Nancy’s age. An old friend of the Storaces from their theater days at Vauxhall, Fisher had served as the principal violinist when Stefano was the director of the orchestra there. When he came to Vienna on sabbatical from Oxford, he immediately found Nancy and her mother with the intent to re-establish ties with his old friends. Nancy’s fame, especially her good standing with the Emperor, could prove lucrative for him.

Nancy didn’t remember him, for she was far too young at the time that he and her parents were friends, but she’d heard her mother speak of him on several occasions, and always very fondly. She had mentioned that he had a tendency toward self-importance and pontification, believing everyone was entitled to his expert opinion whether or not they asked for it, but most generally people shrugged it off. What she didn’t know was that after he was widowed only shortly before he came to Vienna, he had taken to strong drink as well as to whoring and had earned a reputation in Oxford as a drunkard and a man of violent outbursts. What no one knew was that this sabbatical was forced by the university heads. Perhaps some time away would cool his temper and save his tenure.

It was a cruel stroke of fate that Nancy’s first passionate encounter, the one that would usher her into womanhood and leave her feeling beautiful, respected, and loved, would be followed by the most brutal and humiliating experiences of her life. The man whom Nancy promised wasn’t as bad as the gossipmongers claimed turned out to be her worst nightmare.

The abuse began immediately. In fact, Fisher turned into a different person the instant they took their vows. As soon as they arrived home he began barking out orders to the maids to have his things moved into Nancy’s bedroom.
“Schnell!” he shouted as the young maids went running, hauling his heavy belongings through the apartment. “Things are going to change around here! No more of your indolence, or your backtalk, you German swine!”

When one of the maids dared to raise an objection, he replied with a box on the ears, and it wasn’t unusual for him to pick up a nearby chair, a vase, or anything within his reach and hurl it at the offending girl. Elizabeth took to hiding in her room, never daring to raise an objection however much she regretted the match she had orchestrated. Of course he never laid a finger on her, but Nancy and her poor maids didn’t fare as well.

The first beating took place only two days after their wedding, when Nancy and Michael came back to the apartment after going to the Milano with other members of the company following a performance. They were laughing over his inebriated state and Michael, in a fit of drunken gaiety, buried his face in Nancy’s bosom. Nancy pushed him off of her, taking his arm and walking with him up to his own apartment, where she helped him get settled in for the night so he could sleep it off. When she returned to her own apartment, Fisher met her at the door with a leather strap in his hand and hit her with it, calling her a whore.

By the middle of April word of the beatings had gotten out to the Viennese gossipmongers, for Nancy had been taken out of several performances due to her injuries. They knew it was only a matter of time before Rosenberg grew impatient with Nancy’s frequent absences. She did the best she could to keep up with the grueling rehearsal and performance schedules, which were especially busy that spring and summer. She wasn’t going to allow herself to be replaced if she could help it. If nothing else, Nancy was determined.

Fortunately there were some weeks spent at Laxenburg, the Emperor’s summer palace and hunting grounds, where Fisher, being a spouse, wasn’t invited. Nancy enjoyed a little respite then and was grateful for the time away from both work and her husband. Upon her return to Vienna, however, she found the situation at home was as bad, or worse, than before.

She hadn’t seen Mozart the entire spring or summer, for after the night when she returned late with Michael, she was afraid to go out to the casino or to the Milano. It didn’t matter how early or late she returned, though, because Fisher always found a reason to be angry with her, so she was subject to his foul moods on a daily basis.

When he dragged her into their bed and forced her to submit to her conjugal duties—and unspeakably vile debaucheries—she closed her eyes and escaped to a place where she was loved and adored, and treated with respect and tenderness. She imagined being with Mozart in a lush, expansive garden with trees and a softly flowing river, lying in the grass. There, he made tender love to her on the daisy-strewn lawn, the birds and the breeze their only music, and the sky their only witness.

There were also times when she felt a sense of overwhelming guilt over her thoughts of him. What if she really was like other actresses and nothing but a common whore? Sometimes she believed that Fisher’s treatment of her was penance for her sin of loving a married man. Fisher always called her a whore; what if he was correct? And although she was neither a Catholic nor religious, she sometimes walked to St. Michael’s to sit in one of the back pews where no one would see her, and pray to God to forgive her for loving a man who belonged to someone else.

Happy 245th Birthday, Nancy

2010-10-27T00:00:00.001-05:00

Anna Selina "Nancy" Storace

27 October 1765 to 24 August 1817

Mozart's Original Susanna

World Class Tenor, Arnold Rawls, in Recital

2010-10-24T07:40:00.001-05:00

World Class Tenor, Arnold Rawls, will be in recital at Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, Oklahoma, on Tuesday, October 26th, at 7:30. He will be singing selections from Verdi & Puccini.

"When tenor Andrew Richards cancelled due to indisposition, Arnold Rawls (who was scheduled for three performances) took over the role of the Egyptian warrior Radames for the entire run. Rawls possesses a firm, pliant lyric tenor with ringing high notes that easily dominated the ensembles. His Celeste Aida was distinguished by sweetness of timbre and emotional fervor." (There is a long history of lyric tenors singing this role - Bergonzi, Gigli, Bjoerling. Rawls follows that tradition.)
- Entertainment News & Views

Arnold and I were dear friends & classmates at OBU, and I'm proud to announce this event. I'll also be presenting a signed copy of my book So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart to Arnold, who has graciously offered me a space at his CD sales table to take orders for my book.

>

The Music: Zeffiretti lusinghieri from Mozart's Idomeneo

2010-10-20T21:47:00.000-05:00

During the Lenten season of 1786, while Le Nozze di Figaro was in rehearsal, Nancy sang the role of Ilia in Mozart's "Idomeneo", in a concert performance at Palais Auersperg, in Vienna. The following is an excerpt from Chapter 12 of So Faithful a Heart:

It was a frigged January afternoon as Mozart sat in the music room of his apartment at his fortepiano, rehearsing with Nancy, Ilia's Act Three aria, in which she asks the breezes to carry her confession of love to Idamante, who has gone to battle the sea serpent. The warmth of Nancy's voice seemed to soften the chill in the air which had invaded the room from outside, and he didn't seem to notice the white puffs of steam that poured from her mouth as she exhaled.

Zeffiretti lusinghieri, Deh volate al mio tesoro: E gli dite, ch'io l'adoro, Che mi serbi il cor fedel. (Gently caressing breezes, fly to my beloved. Tell him that I adore him and keep him faithful.)

"That's it, Nancy! Smoooothly...yes...yes," he coached as he raised his hand in the air. "Lovely...hold that now...crescendo...now let it trail off...yes!" He stopped playing and sighed, "Oh how I wish you could have been my original Ilia! How Munich would have adored you, Nancy!"

The Video Trailers

2010-09-30T00:12:00.004-05:00

Introducing the new video trailers for So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart.

Review of "So Faithful a Heart" by Eliza Knight at History Undressed

2010-08-18T23:48:00.001-05:00

I have just finished reading Ms. Knight's review and I admit that I'm sitting here, blown away. I knew that this story was riveting, touching, emotional, and compelling, but I continue to be humbled by the response it gets from readers. Thank you, Ms. Knight. I'm pleased that this beautiful story touched you.

People: Antonio Salieri: The real man, not the myth

2010-07-05T13:42:00.002-05:00

It is unfortunate that the film Amadeus, based on the play by Peter Schaffer, has created so many unseemly myths regarding the person and character of Antonio Salieri. Actually, these myths weren't created by the film so much as brought back into light for the 20th century audience, as the myths originated with the Russian poet, Alexander Pushkin in his dramatic poem, Mozart and Salieri. However much people like to demonize the poor man, history tells us that he was probably one of Mozart's greatest admirers. The difficulties experienced in their relationship were probably due to the overall mistrust of the Italians by the local German musicians, which was not at all undue or unfounded.

Emperor Joseph II did a great disservice to his fellow Germans by going with what was more fashionable when he changed his National Theater into one which played Italian Opera Buffa (Italian comic opera), exclusively. If the local composers and singers couldn't adjust to the new style, they fell from favor, especially when he hired a new crop of Italian singers, composers, and an Italian librettist (Lorenzo Da Ponte), as his court musicians. Local singers like the extremely popular Aloysia Weber Lange often became persona non grata and had it not been for the fact that the popular Viennese singer, Catarnia Cavelieri (who changed her name to create a new Italian image), began to study with Salieri (as well as became his mistress), she would have fallen by the wayside into the pile of German outcasts as well.

The following biographical information is from the Wikipedia article on Antonio Salieri:

Salieri was born August 18th, 1750 in Legnago, Italy. He studied the violin, the organ and the harpsichord in his childhood. He was orphaned early on and at the age of 15 he went to Venice under the patronage of the Mocenigo family. He studied the voice with Pacini and composition with Pescetti. In Venice he met composer and teacher Florian Leopold Gaßmann, who took him under his care and gave him a proper education. Eventually, they moved to Vienna. While attending concerts and musical gatherings with Gaßmann, Salieri became fast friends with the Emperor.

He slowly worked his way into the musical world and began to participate in varied and abundant musical gatherings for the Emperor. He continued his close friendship with the Emperor and performed him many favors, including daily music lessons. The Emperor also helped Salieri with the securing of a wife, whose father objected to Salieri due to the fact that the composer only made 100 ducats as court conductor. Hearing this, he raised Salieri's stipend to 300 ducats, and in return Salieri took over some of the duties of Kapellmeister Bonno, who was in his sixties and experienced poor health due to age and obesity.

Antonio was one of the "new school" opera composers and helped forge a new path for others to follow. In his career he composed over forty operas, most notably Tarare, Axur, re D'ormus, Les Danaides, Falstaff, La Grotta di Trofonio, Armida and La Locandiera. His large list of students includes musical greats such as Liszt and Beethoven.

He succeeded Bonno as Kapellmeister in 1788. He was President of the Tönkunstler Societät (a society of musicians' widows and orphans founded by Gaßmann in 1771) until 1818. He was also awarded a gold medal for civic valor on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of his stay in Vienna.

The biographer Alexander Wheelock Thayer believes that Mozart's suspicions of Salieri could have originated with an incident in 1781 when Mozart applied to be the music teacher of the Princess of Württemberg. Salieri was selected instead, because of his reputation as a fine voice instructor. In the following year Mozart again failed to be selected as the Princess's piano teacher.

Later, when Mozart's forthcoming Le Nozze di Figaro was not well received by Emperor Joseph II, Mozart blamed Salieri. "Salieri and his tribe will move heaven and earth to put it down", Leopold Mozart wrote to his daughter Nannerl. But at the time of the premiere of Figaro, Salieri was busy with his new French opera Les Horaces and was too busy to be involved in the court politics surrounding Figaro. Thayer believes that the intrigues surrounding the failure of Figaro were instigated by the poet Giovanni Battista Casti against the Court Poet, Lorenzo da Ponte, who wrote the Figaro libretto. In addition, when da Ponte was in Prague preparing the production of Mozart's setting of his Don Giovanni, the poet was ordered back to Vienna for a royal wedding for which Salieri's Axur, Re d'Ormus was to be performed. Obviously, Mozart was not pleased by this.

There is, however, far more evidence of a cooperative relationship between the two composers than one of real enmity. For example, Mozart's widow appointed Salieri to teach their son, Franz Xaver, and when Salieri was appointed Kapellmeister in 1788, he revived Figaro instead of bringing out a new opera of his own. In addition, when he went to the coronation festivities for Leopold II in 1790 he had no fewer than three Mozart masses in his luggage. In the late summer of 1785, Salieri and Mozart composed a cantata for voice and piano together, entitled Per la ricuperata salute di Ophelia, which celebrated the happy return to the stage of the famous singer Nancy Storace. This cantata has been lost, although it was published by Artaria in 1785. Mozart's Davide penitente K.469 (1785), his piano concerto in E flat major K.482 (1785), the clarinet quintet K.581 (1789) and the great symphony in G minor K.550 were all premiered at the suggestion of Salieri, who conducted a performance of the G minor symphony in 1791, the year of Mozart's death. In his last surviving letter from October 14th 1791, Mozart tells his wife that he collected Salieri and his [Salieri's] mistress in his carriage and drove them both to the opera, and about Salieri's attendance at his opera Die Zauberflöte K 620, writing enthusiastically: "He heard and saw with all his attention, and from the ouverture to the last choir there was no piece that didn't elicit a bravo or bello out of him..."

Salieri fathered eight children and by all accounts was a decent man. He died in a state of delirium in a mental asylum in Vienna in 1825 at the age of seventy-five. On his death bed he begged loyal pupil Beethoven to tell the world that he was innocent of the crime of Mozart's death. Oddly, Salieri confessed to the poisoning days earlier, but his physicians reported that Salieri was delusional and probably suffered from advanced syphilis.

...the only thing I love in vocal music is truth, that truth which the incomparable Gluck makes me feel so profoundly throughout and in every detail of his Tragedies, and which I have felt on hearing works of other genres by a few other composers; so I strive to bring truth to all those of my operas which deserve such care...

Antoino Salieri to Carl F. Cramer, Vienna 20 July 1784

REGARDING THE FILM, AMADEUS

Some of the myths created by the film are the following:

a. Mozart and Salieri were arch enemies.

b. Salieri was jealous of Mozart's talent.

c. Mozart had an affair with Catarina Cavallieri, (who was actually Salieri's mistress). It is far more likely that Mozart's affair was with Anna "Nancy" Storace, who was his original Susanna in Figaro.

d. Salieri tried to sabotage Figaro. (He wasn't even in Vienna when Figaro was being staged. He was in Paris staging Axur.)

e. He murdered Mozart.

f. Mozart was an immature, giggling, drunken, ninny.

g. Salieri kept Mozart from getting a post with the Emperor.

h. Salieri was present when Mozart died.

i. Salieri had a hand in the penning of Mozart's Requiem.

The following is the delightful Cavatina originally sung by Nancy Storace in Salieri's La Grotto di Trofonio.

The 18th Century: Meanwhile, back in the American colonies...

2010-07-04T09:06:00.005-05:00

The plot of So Faithful a Heart takes place primarily in Vienna in the early to late 1780s. While Nancy was a British subject, born in London in October of 1765, she probably knew of and cared very little for the politics of the time. The American colonies were far across the Atlantic, and the problems and conflicts brewing over there were His Majesty, King George's concern. In July of 1776 she was only ten years old, and only starting to focus her energies on her singing career while her brother, Stephen, who was supposed to be studying composition at the music conservatory in Naples, was actually cavorting about, and getting into trouble in Italy with a Welsh painter.

Back in Salzburg, twenty-year-old Mozart was getting ready for a performance of his Haffner Serenade in D, which was commissioned by the prominent Haffner family of Salzburg. Employed at the time by Prince Archbishop Coloredo, of Salzburg, Mozart was pretty much hating his life. He was young, salty, well-traveled and ready to get out from underneath the thumbs of both the Archbishop and his father. Two years later, he would be in Paris with his sick mother, and on the 4th of July 1778, mourning her death and wondering how he was going to break the news to his father and sister, who were both back home in Salzburg.

Neither Nancy Storace nor Mozart realized the implications of that 4th of July in 1776, and the impact that it would soon have upon them and the entire world, for good or for ill. Although both of them were a part of the generations of The Enlightenment, the concepts of liberty, equality, and freedom were still very distant and unrealized, especially for Mozart who was still enslaved within a theocratic feudal system. They would both live to see the American Revolution and for Mozart, only the beginnings of the French Revolution (which had dire consequences for his Austrian Princess, Maria Antonia, who was then, Queen Marie Antoinette of France), but it would still be generations beyond them before the full impact of it all would be felt.

You know you've got something special when...

2010-06-29T00:38:00.001-05:00

a reviewer comes to you and says that they've heard a lot of good things about your book and they ask you if they can review it!

There are two blog reviews scheduled for this summer--one by Eliza Knight at History Undressed and the second by Martina Kunz at She Read a Book. Check back later for dates and links! In the meantime, if you've not yet read So Faithful a Heart, there's no time like the summer for sitting in your favorite chair or lawn chair with a good book! It's available for purchase at all of the most popular online retail outlets. Check the column on the left of this blog for the link to your favorite online bookstore! And if you have read it and enjoyed it, I would most certainly appreciate it if you would go to one of the online outlets and leave a short review!

Places: Vienna: The Prater

2010-06-23T19:57:00.002-05:00

In 18th Century Vienna, the Prater, a park in the Leopoldstadt, was the center of all sorts of social activities, entertainments, and gatherings. There were several coffee houses, restaurants, casinos, taverns as well as large expansive lawns and ponds with boats. Horse racing was a center attraction on the Hauptallee (the main avenue), as well as booths and pony rides during Winter Carnival. It was a favorite leisure attraction for both young and old, courting couples, as well as families. It was while Mozart and Constanze (his wife of only two days), were strolling along the Hauptallee, walking their little dog, that Emperor Joseph stopped and conversed with them and congratulated them on their recent marriage.

The following history is from Wikipedia:

The Wiener Prater is a large public park in Vienna's 2nd district (Leopoldstadt). The Wurstelprater amusement park, often simply called "Prater", stands in one corner of the Wiener Prater and includes the Wiener Riesenrad.

The area that makes up the modern Prater was first mentioned in 1162, when Emperor Friedrich I gave the land to a noble family called de Prato. The word "Prater" was first used in 1403, originally referring to a small island in the Danube north of Freudenau, but was gradually extended to mean the neighbouring areas as well. The land changed hands frequently until it was bought by Emperor Maximilian II in 1560 to be a hunting ground. To deal with the problem of poachers, Emperor Rudolf II forbade entry to the Prater. On April 7 1766, Emperor Joseph II declared the Prater to be free for public enjoyment, and allowed the establishment of coffee-houses and cafés, which led to the beginnings of the Wurstelprater. Throughout this time, hunting continued to take place in the Prater, ending only in 1920.

In 1873, a World Exhibition was held in the Prater, for which a large area of land was set aside, centered on the Rotunda, which burnt down in 1937. This land now houses the Messegelände (exhibition centre).

In 2004, major renovations to the Wurstelprater began, and a new underground railway line was finished and brought into service on May 11, 2008, which includes three stops along the Prater (see Vienna U-Bahn). The railway station Praterstern has been in operation for a long time and is only a few dozen metres away from an entrance to the park.

The overall area of the park has also been reduced by the building of the Ernst-Happel-Stadion (Austria's national stadium), the Südosttangente (Austria's busiest piece of motorway) and racecourse.

From Chapter 10 of So Faithful a Heart:

The hot July sun bore down on the lawn as Mozart and his little family lazed under a large Linden tree near a pond at the Prater. The park was abuzz with activity: children playing games on the lawn, mothers pushing their infants in prams, couples sitting on blankets, eating Italian ices, roast chicken, fresh strawberries, and fresh mozzarella cheese with basil on sliced tomatoes, drizzled with olive oil.

Constanze watched as baby Karl, who was a little over ten months old and who was already beginning to toddle, pulled himself up on the lawn and tried to chase the butterflies that flitted by, only to fall onto his backside when his chubby little legs couldn’t carry him fast enough. This was the indolent summer Mozart had promised himself and his family and he was enjoying it to its fullest with no guilt or remorse. As he lay upon the blanket in his stocking feet, having kicked off his shoes, he read, another luxury that he’d promised himself.

This is the Rondo movement from Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A major. I chose it for this post because, to me, it evokes a cheerful stroll through the park.

People: Constanze Weber Mozart: The perfect wife?

2010-06-20T10:35:00.008-05:00

Constanze Mozart (born Constanze Weber) (5 January 1762 in Zell im Wiesental, Germany – 6 March 1842 in Salzburg, Austria) was the wife of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

I don't wish to go into the biographical aspects of Constanze's life in this post, mainly because it would just be boring. Her biography is readily available in other places on the web. (If you're interested, the Wikipedia article on her is quite good, although it leans heavily in her defense.) You can also read about some of the controversy surrounding Constanze in her handling of Mozart's last work (uncompleted), his Requiem in D minor, in this Wikipedia article.

Much controversy has existed throughout the last two-hundred years over the relationship that Mozart had with his wife, Constanze. From the personal testimonies of those who knew the Mozarts in the last few years of Mozart's life, the marriage seemed to be strained, at best. There are many conflicting and confusing reports, many of them originating from the Mozarts themselves. Constanze's own testimony from years later is difficult to trust, for most of it was given years after Mozart's death under the auspices of her second husband, Georg Nissen, who was actively working to clean up Mozart's sullied reputation, as he was working on Mozart's biography. It is believed, with much certainty, that Constanze and Nissen destroyed most of Constanze's letters to Mozart, as well as many of Mozart's to her, only keeping those that held her in a favorable light. And of the ones that were kept, certain words and entire paragraphs have been blacked out.

It is no secret to anyone who has studied Mozart's life, that his father, Leopold, despised Constanze, and in the early months of their marriage, Mozart made a concerted effort to convince his father that Constanze would make a good wife for him. Leopold's reasons for disliking Constanze were based on his belief that the Weber family were opportunists who were only looking for monetary gain and that marriage and obligation to her would only drag him down and keep him from reaching his full potential.

In the early years of their marriage, shortly after the birth of their first child, Mozart and Constanze took an extended trip to Salzburg. The trip had two purposes: The first, for Mozart to meet with a librettist who was working on an Italian libretto for Mozart to compose an opera for Emperor Joseph's new Italian opera company, and the second, for Leopold and Nannerl (Mozart's older sister), to meet Constanze and possibly form a better opinion of her. Leopold knew that while Constanze was the daughter of a music copyist and had a solid musical education, she was out-shined by her older sisters, Josepha and Aloyisa (the latter with whom Mozart had a love affair a couple of years earlier and who later scorned him). Constanze was, for the most part, largely uneducated and common, and Leopold considered her a poor and uneven match for his brilliant, highly educated, well-traveled, and worldly son. So while they were in Salzburg, Mozart created an opportunity to show off Constanze's musical abilities by dragging out bits of an unfinished mass and adding more to it, creating a portion for Constanze to sing her herself, and dedicating it to her. Mozart's Great Mass in C minor has gone down through history as one of his greatest sacred works, some believing it to be even greater than his Requiem. Although many have believed that the entire soprano solo was composed for Constanze to sing, clearly it is not, for most of the solo sections in this mass, especially in the opening Kyrie, would have been entirely too difficult for her to manage. It is most likely that Constanze sang only the Et Incarnatus est, which while one of the loveliest and most lyrical sections in the entire mass, is not nearly as technically demanding as the rest.

Together, the Mozarts had six children, of which only two survived infancy into adulthood. Mozart never knew his sons, Karl and Franz (whom Constanze later named Wolfgang, Jr. and called "Wowi", pronounced VOH-vee), as adults as Karl was only seven and Franz only months old when their father died on 5 December 1791. Clearly the sheer number difficult pregnancies which Constanze endured in the nine years they were together, as well as the steady stream of dead children, put a strain on the marriage. It was during Constanze's fifth pregnancy that she developed an infection in a vein in one of her feet, most likely due to a swollen varicose vein that she may have injured by bumping her foot on some furniture. As a result, she was sent to the spa in Baden to take the waters. It was after this initial trip to Baden that Constanze started making frequent trips there alone, although she had made a full recovery from the ulcerated foot. She spent weeks at a time separated from her husband and rumors began to spread that she was having an affair with a Lieutenant who also frequented the spa. In one letter that Mozart wrote to his wife (obviously one of the ones that Constanze and Nissen didn't realize still existed after Mozart's death or it would surely have been destroyed), he told her that he had been hearing the rumors and he begged her to be "discreet". And despite their obvious financial woes at the time, neither Constanze nor Mozart seemed to be concerned nor discontent with the fact that she spent so much time there, and that they had to finance and maintain two separate households for the better part of the last two years of Mozart's life.

Finally, in October of 1791, when Mozart became ill with a strep infection that had been going around Vienna, Constanze had to be summoned from Baden to care for her husband. Mozart never fully recovered from the infection, for it was only a few weeks later, in mid-November that he took to his bed with his final illness and died only two weeks later. Constanze was not in the same room with her husband when he died (although years later, she wrote in a statement that she dated 5 December 1791 that she had been with him in his final hours), but it was her younger sister, Sophie, who held him in her arms in those final, terrible and feverish moments. Constanze was not in attendance at his funeral. Later, when she accidentally knocked one of the copies of his death mask off of a table and shattered it, Constanze claimed that she didn't care about that "ugly old thing" anyway.

The following is a scene from Chapter 10 of So Faithful a Heart.

He turned his head to watch Constanze as she sat on the lawn playing with their son, holding him in her lap and kissing his fat little fingers. She was a good wife and a good mother, and he cared for her a great deal, but she’d never ignited his soul. She was pretty enough with her large dark brown eyes and thick, straight, dark hair that hung like a drape. She was charming and sweet, with a playful sense of humor, very like his. But after he met Nancy, he found it difficult not to compare them and find his wife lacking.

He thought back to the days when he’d rented a room from Constanze’s mother not long after he’d arrived in Vienna and split from Archbishop Colloredo’s service. Frau Weber saw opportunity to still bring Mozart into the family after the break-up with Aloysia and she manipulated things in such a way that he and Constanze often found themselves in tempting and compromising situations. Then when they finally succumbed and went too far with their petting, she forced him into a contract of marriage with her daughter, threatening to ruin him if he refused. He married Constanze in August of 1782 and Nancy arrived in Vienna the following January.

“I shouldn’t have married,” he thought with regret. “If only I had waited six months.”

He had never known a woman like Nancy. She was independent, intelligent, educated, and outspoken. She possessed a wicked sense of humor, which played itself out beautifully both on the stage and off, with an air of confidence and strength that he had never observed in any woman he’d ever known. To him, she was a woman who thought like a man and that fascinated him. Then when they became friends he discovered the many things that they had in common, not the least being their mutual love and dedication to music. She was his musical peer in many respects and that was her greatest appeal.

“How could I have resisted her? I’m only a man,” he thought as he picked up the book, opening it to where he’d left off.

Things: 18th century women's shoes

2010-06-19T09:36:00.000-05:00

Women's shoes in the 18th century were made for both fashion and function. Working class women had to wear shoes that were more durable as well as comfortable because of the amount of time each day that was spent on their feet. For the noble and/or wealthy woman, shoes were as much of a fashion statement as any other aspect of their clothing, and were not primarily for function or comfort as much as aesthetics. Dancing shoes, of course, had to be comfortable as well as fashionable.

Women’s shoes in the 18th Century were divided into three categories: mules, or backless slippers, shoes, or closed foot gear, and pattens, outdoor shoe coverings which protected delicately made shoes. They had sharply pointed toes and high curved heels. Buckles were also a central attraction on women’s shoes. They were almost unchanging in shape (only narrowing the curved heels) from 1700 to 1780, when shoes took a dive to low heeled slippers. By the late 1790’s, heels disappeared entirely and the soft, flat, square toed slipper which dominated the next 50 years of women’s shoes had appeared.

Information: The Costumer's Manifesto

The 18th Century: Social Dance

2010-06-16T20:05:00.001-05:00

There are several scenes in So Faithful a Heart where social dancing takes center stage. Both Mozart and Nancy Storace were known as excellent dancers and were often seen at the balls and dances which were held in Vienna's many dance halls and court ballrooms.

The following paragraphs describe the development of social dancing in late 18th century Europe. (Taken from Dance Instruction Manuels-Late 18th Century Social Dance)

"In the late eighteenth century there was a departure from the complicated and often technically difficult danses à deux and a movement toward larger group dances, specifically figure dances called contredanses (also spelled contredances). Usually, but not always, these dances were designed for four couples facing in a square. Feuillet notation, which so beautifully aided dancers in learning the early Baroque dance repertory, was not efficient for notating the larger group dances.

Execution of the contredanse (known throughout France as the contredanse francaise) involved dancing a specific sequence of figures. Additional figures, called changes, usually twelve in number, alternated with the main figure of the dance--and the dance concluded when all the changes had been performed. These figure dances, called cotillon in England and the United States, were often performed with two- or four-bar step combinations, as were contredanses.

When Marie Antoinette arrived in Paris as queen to Louis XIV in 1774, she brought Viennese dances, including the contredanse allemande. It was performed in much the same manner as the contredanse francaise, except that at least one figure required partners to turn while changing arm positions. Both forms of contredanse were performed in France until the Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century (1789-1799)."

The following is a dance sequence taken from Chapter 13 of So Faithful a Heart.
When they arrived at the palace, they were announced as they entered the ballroom, and greeted by the Emperor and his guests of honor. Mozart puffed up with pride as His Majesty complemented both of them, once again, on the successful opening of Figaro, and then he escorted his lovely Susanna to the middle of the floor to begin the allemande.

The ballroom at Laxenburg was decorated in typical ornate Baroque fashion, the walls lined with white Corinthian columns sporting gold sconces with heavy lead crystals hanging from each globe. The wall panels were ornately gilded on the edges and painted with lush, pastoral scenes in soft pastels, of lovely young men and women dancing and playing flutes and guitars. The ceilings were frescoed with pastel pink and blue skies and puffy white clouds with fat cherubs perched upon them, peering down to gaze upon the dancers on the floor below. Two enormous and ornate crystal chandeliers hung from the ceilings, illuminating the entire room with the bright but soft glow of the hundreds of candles contained in each of them.

All eyes were on Mozart and his pretty partner as they bowed and curtseyed to each another, and began to dance. As they fell into two lines, the ladies on one side and the gentlemen on the other, they turned shoulder to shoulder and stepped forward in sync several steps, before facing one another as the gentlemen took their partners by the hand and twirled them gracefully until they ended up on the opposite side. Then they all stepped to one side, the gentlemen to the right and the ladies to the left and, extending their hands across the divide, they took the hand of the lady or gentleman in front of them and made a skip-hop step to the right. Then the left-over lady and gentleman on the opposite ends skipped into the divide and took one another’s hands and faced forward to promenade down the middle of the two lines, each couple following suit until they were back in their original places with their original partners. Each time Nancy returned to Mozart, she beamed with delight.

Dance scenes from the 2005 film, Pride and Prejudice.

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Places: Venice, Italy: Teatro San Samuele

2010-06-13T11:42:00.004-05:00

The Teatro San Samuele, Venice was one of opera 's most prestigious among those active in the canal city (seven in all), during the eighteenth century . It was built in 1656 on commission from the Grimani family and was primarily intended for dramatic productions, and later, during the following century, operas and ballet.

Destroyed by fire in September 1747, it was rebuilt by the Grimani family who moved serious opera productions to the new and more elegant Teatro San Benedetto (St. Benét), and reserved the San Samuele stage for the productions of the new, and more fashionable opera buffa (Italian comic opera). The theater was rebuilt in record time and reopened in May of 1748. The stages were reduced from six to five orders but the original structure remained unchanged.

In the fall of 1782, Nancy Storace arrived in Venice, where she performed primarily in opera buffa productions on the San Samuele stage. It was while she was engaged there, that she was discovered by an emissary of His Majesty, Emperor Joseph II of Austria, and was hired as the prima buffa (first comedienne), of the Hofburg Theater stage (The Burgtheater), in Vienna. Nancy's last appearance in Venice was in Antonio Salieri's La scuola de'golsi, in which she appeared as the Contessa, during Carnival of 1783. It was shortly after, that she arrived in Vienna, and premiered on the Burgtheater stage in another production of Salieri's La scuola de'golsi, directed by Salieri, himself. By this point she was regarded as the most popular and highest-paid performer of her kind in all of Europe.

The following is a list of productions in which Nancy starred during tenure at Teatro San Samuele.

La pescatrice fedele by Pasquale Anfossi at Teatro San Samuele, Venice during Winter 1782-Spring 1783
I puntighi by Felice Alessandri at Teatro San Samuele, Venice during Winter 1782-Spring 1783
Il filosofo immaginari by Giovanni Paisiello at Teatro San Samuele, Venice during Winter 1782-Spring 1783
Le vendemie by Giuseppi Gazzaniga at Teatro San Samuele, Venice during Winter 1782-Spring 1783
La scuola de'golsi by Antonio Salieri, starring as La Contessa at Teatro San Samuele, Venice during Carnival 1783

Ah sia gia de' miei sospiri - La scuola de' gelosi - By Antonio Salieri, Sung by Mezzo Soprano, Cecilia Bartoli

The Music: Plasir d'amour

2010-06-07T21:14:00.006-05:00

In one very tender scene from So Faithful a Heart, Nancy's brother walks in on her to find her playing her guitar and singing a very popular tune of the time. It was composed in 1780 by Jean Paul Égide Martini, (with whom Mozart studied for a short time when he was 14 years old while he and his father were touring in Italy), entitled Plasir d'amour (The Joys of Love). In the 20th century it was recorded by several pop ballad artists including Joan Baez in 1961, and Nana Mouskouri in 1997.

I listened to several recordings of the piece and I was never able to find one that I liked altogether, so I settled on the Mouskouri recording, which incorporates a more modern orchestration, but captures the mood and the spirit of the piece better than any other recording I could find. She sings it in the original French, so I have provided the English translation below.

The pleasure of love lasts only a moment The pain of love lasts a lifetime.
I gave up everything for ungrateful Sylvia,
She is leaving me for another lover.
The pleasure of love lasts only a moment,
The pain of love lasts a lifetime.
"As long as this water will run gently
Towards this brook which borders the meadow,
I will love you", Sylvia told me repeatedly.
The water still runs, but she has changed.
The pleasure of love lasts only a moment,
The pain of love lasts a lifetime.

Stephen Storace, Part II

2010-06-06T00:00:00.002-05:00

(This post is continued from June 5th, 2010.)

Both Nancy and Stephen found temporary work at the King's Theatre in London, but they found the atmosphere there inhospitable to them due to a group of native Italian musicians who were already well-established there. Nancy had returned to London with what she believed to be a secure agreement with Emperor Joseph to return to Vienna for the 1788/89 season, with the opportunity, perhaps, to extend her contract there for another four years. However, due to the escalations with Austria's war with Turkey, the contract fell through over a cut in her salary. She was offered half the salary she had been making when she left Vienna, so she politely refused. They both finally moved in 1789 to the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, which at this time was under the management of Richard Brinsley Sheridan. They were also heavily involved in working towards a commission for Mozart to come to London to compose and direct some Italian comic operas, as Mozart had expressed a strong desire to come with them to England when they returned in early 1787. His plans to return with them were thwarted, however, due to a series of tragic and unfortunate events, including the death of one child, as well as his father's refusal to care for his older, remaining son, Karl. And although they were eventually successful in obtaining a commission for Mozart, which was delivered to him in late 1790, he was unable to accept it. He died only a year later.

Stephen found his first big success at Drury Lane with an operetta (in the style of the German Singspieler with music and spoken dialouge), in the new "romantic" style of ghost-stories, gothic horror, and romance entitled, The Haunted Tower. It was a box-office sensation, selling-out for 50 nights in succession. No little part of the success was the performance of Michael Kelly in the male lead role. Up to this time, high notes in the male parts in the theatre had been crooned falsetto by performers who were more actors than singers. Kelly's aria to the ghost of the Haunted Tower - "Spirit Of My Sainted Sire!" included a top Bb which he took in full voice in the Italian style, and proved such a success that at most performances it was encored in full. This aria outlived the rest of Storace's output by decades, and was still being reprinted in parlour songbook anthologies for the amateur tenor a century later.

His next big success was with another operetta entitled No Song, no supper, which again, starred the Irish tenor, Michael Kelly, along with his sister, Nancy. No song became even more successful than The Haunted Tower, outselling it by almost double, and was the opera that closed both the careers of Michael Kelly and Nancy Storace on the same night in 1808.

1792 saw Storace produce the boldest of his operatic projects, Dido, Queen Of Carthage, with a libretto by Prince Hoare after Metastasio's Didone abbandonata. This was the only all-sung opera Storace produced in English - all his other works had spoken dialogue between the musical numbers. His sister regarded it as Stephen's finest work. However, for whatever reason, the piece proved unpopular with the public, and was withdrawn after a short run. The music was not thought worth printing commercially, with the result that not a note of this opera now survives, nor were any solo numbers from it printed separately.

Storace's final work was Mahmoud, Prince of Persia, but he never saw the premiere. He caught cold at rehearsals for "The Iron Chest", and died on the 15th or 16th of March 1796. Nancy Storace organised that the unfinished work was completed (Kelly claims to have had a hand in doing so, but it is more likely that he paid other hands to do it, since he freely admitted he couldn't read the bass clef. Most likely the work was finished and orchestrated by the Orchestra Leader, John Shaw, who was Kelly's collaborator on all his later projects). The work was given as a Benefit Performance for Storace's widow. "Mahmoud" survives, but it is clear that the completed version was very makeshift.

Although Storace's works were popular in their time, their failure to endure in performance is in part due to the financial caution of his employer, Sheridan. A legendarily shrewd man with money, Sheridan refused to allow any copies of the Storace's works to be circulated, for fear of pirate versions being performed from which no royalties would be paid. In fact history shows that Sheridan's best attempts failed, and pirated versions of Storace's works were playing in New York by the end of the century. However, it is assumed that the carefully-guarded scores and parts perished in the Drury Lane Theatre Fire. Only one opera survives complete in score and parts - "No Song, No Supper" (published in Musica Britannica editions, edited by Roger Fiske). The other works survive only in piano + voice vocal scores issued by Storace's publishers, Longman & Broderip. (A number of these scores were reprinted by Kalmus Edition in the 1970s in the USA, but all have been deleted and no details are available from Kalmus). The surviving vocal scores have clearly been prepared by an expert hand, and are extensively "cued" with the orchestral parts in smaller notes - it seems possible that Storace himself, or one of his closer assistants, must have prepared these vocal scores. There are, to date, no commercially-available recordings of any of Storace's operas. Storace is not known to have written any exclusively instrumental music, other than the overtures for his operas.

The character of Storace's music is preeminently English; but his early intercourse with Mozart gave him an immense advantage over his contemporaries in his management of the orchestra, while for the excellence of his writing for the voice he was no doubt indebted to the vocalization of his sister Ann (Nancy) Storace.

It is because of the works of Stephen Storace that we have what is known today as the Broadway Musical, for as the German Singspieler, made popular by Storace in England, gave way to the English operetta, greatly popularized by the late 19th century team of Gilbert & Sullivan, it made it's way to the United States, primarily to the New York Theater district where it evolved into the Broadway musical style.

The following is a soprano/tenor duet composed by Stephen Storace, most likely sung by his sister Nancy, and the Irish tenor Michael Kelly.

People: Nancy's brother, Stephen Storace, Part I: Early Career & Vienna

2010-06-05T07:32:00.002-05:00

There were very few, if any men in Nancy's life with whom she was more close than with her brother, Stephen. Stephen was born in London in the parish of St. Marylebone on April 4th, 1762. His father, Stephano, who met the Mozarts when they traveled to England in 1764-65, was impressed with the manner in which Leopold Mozart was educating his two young musical prodigies, Wolfgang and Nannerl, and decided to educate Stephen (and later Nancy), in the same manner. He gave Stephen instruction in the violin, harmony, composition, and keyboard and then later, as he mistrusted the quality of musical instruction available in London, he sent Stephen to Naples, to study at his alma mater, the Conservatorio di Sant' Onofrio when Stephen was around twelve years old. While in Naples, Stephen met the Welsh artist/painter, Thomas Jones and neglected his musical studies to go on several expeditions with him throughout Italy. While traveling with Jones, Stephen got himself into some mischief that prompted Stephano to make the decision to travel back to Italy, along with then twelve-year-old Nancy (who was already an up-and-coming starlet on the musical stage), and his wife Elizabeth. He hoped to launch Nancy's stage career as well as bring his son back into line. It was while the entire Storace family was in Italy (sometime in 1780 or 1781), that Stephano Storace passed away and was buried in his hometown of Naples. Some months later, Stephen decided to return to England (most likely to settle his father's affairs there and perhaps to escape the nagging of his mother), and left his sister, Nancy, and mother in Italy to continue the promotion of Nancy's stage career.

In the fall of 1783, Nancy was summoned to Vienna, the capital of Austria, and the seat of the then Holy Roman Empire, by Emperor Joseph II, to serve as the prima buffa (first comedienne), of His Majesty's newly-formed Italian Opera company. Nancy arrived in Vienna with her mother, Elizabeth, in January of 1784 and was an immediate success. However, she ran into some personal turmoil when Elizabeth (most likely prompted by her desire to return home to England), arranged a marriage between Nancy and the English violinist/composer, John Abraham Fisher, who was in Vienna on sabbatical from Oxford University. Fisher was monstrously cruel to Nancy and beat her mercilessly, prompting the Emperor to banish Fisher from the city. Fisher left Vienna and returned to England sometime in the early fall of 1784 and Stephen, prompted by a commission from the Emperor for an opera in Italian (most likely obtained by Nancy), came to Vienna sometime in December of that same year. It was during this time that he may have begun to study with Mozart, who became a great influence on his musical composition, as well as a good friend, from that point on.

(The following is a large section that I rewrote and edited extensively for the Wikipedia article on Stephen Storace.)

Stephen produced his first opera, Gli Sposi malcontenti, at Vienna, on 1 June, 1785. The premiere, however, was marred by further scandal involving his sister, who was singing the prima buffa role - she collapsed on-stage in mid-aria, causing the performance to be abandoned. Nancy was pregnant during the premiere of the opera and gave birth to a baby girl a few weeks later. The child was given to a foundling home by Elizabeth Storace, who claimed that it belonged to Nancy's estranged husband, John Fisher, who had been banished by the Emperor some months earlier for beating Nancy. Elizabeth Storace claimed that they didn't care if the child lived or died. The child died in the foundling home a month after she was born. Nancy's return to the stage four months later, was marked by the performance of the Cantata per la ricuperata di Ophelia, composed specially for the occasion by a trio of composers - Mozart, Salieri, and the unknown "Cornetti" (which may have been a pen-name for Stephen). Sadly this rare example of a Mozart-Salieri collaboration has been entirely lost. In Vienna, the Storaces made the acquaintance of Mozart, in whose Le nozze di Figaro Nancy sang Susanna at the premiere, and Kelly sang Don Curzio. The "English circle" in Vienna also included the composer Thomas Attwood. In Vienna Stephen produced a second opera, Gli equivoci, founded on Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors.

There is no clear explanation why the Storaces abandoned Vienna at the height of their success there. The reasons are suggested to be more personal than professional. Certainly the Emperor spoke of her with great admiration, even using her abilities as an arbitrary unit of currency - "I'd not give you a Storace for it!". Quite possibly Nancy was under pressure from Elizabeth, who was not at all happy in Vienna, and wished to return to England with both of her children in tow. Nancy left Vienna in February of 1787, along with her "entourage" of Michael Kelly, her brother, and Thomas Attwood. Buoyed-up by their success on the Viennese stage, the coach-party which left for London could not have imagined they would find themselves rejected and unwanted in there, where their names were quite forgotten after such a long absence. Stephen was remembered - if at all - as an infant prodigy violinist at Vauxhall Gardens, and found it very hard to secure paying work without the cherubic charm of youth behind him, and moreover as an unknown composer.

The following, from Stephen's opera The Doctor and the Apothecary, was composed for Nancy in the spring of 1787, shortly after their return from Vienna to London. It clearly shows a strong Mozart influence.

Part II, tomorrow!

Back to it and an exciting announcement!

2010-05-31T12:26:00.001-05:00

I must apologize for the lack of posts over the last several weeks, however, on May 12th I was admitted to the hospital with a badly infected gallbladder and had emergency surgery the next morning. It has taken me a few weeks to recover and gain not only my strength back, but my concentration as well. In the meantime, I have appreciated all of the prayers, thoughts, and well-wishes and I promise that this week I'll be resuming my regular posting schedule.

With that said, on the morning that I was admitted to the hospital, I received an email from Eliza Knight at History Undressed, expressing her desire to review So Faithful a Heart and post an author interview on her blog. Despite my 102 degree temp, I quickly answered her email and ordered a copy of my book to be sent to her address. After I got out of the hospital, I emailed her and asked if she had received it and she replied that she had and that the review and interview would be posted in July! I'm truly excited about this because Eliza is a well-known author of historical fiction, as well as an editor and chair person for several historical fiction romance contests. This will be a tremendous boost for my novel. In the meantime, if you've not yet read, So Faithful a Heart, it is now available on Amazon.com. And for those of you who have, PLEASE go to my Amazon page and post your reviews!

It's great to be back!

So Faithful a Heart now AVAILABLE ON AMAZON!

2010-05-11T22:16:00.000-05:00

So Faithful a Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart is now available from Amazon.com! You can get there by clicking the link on the left side bar or by going HERE. It is also available internationally for the first time!

The details aren't merely the icing, they're the whole cake!

2010-05-08T14:22:00.002-05:00

I spent over ten years in research in preparation for writing So Faithful a Heart. The idea to write an historical fiction novel on the subject of the love between Mozart and Nancy Storace was born out of the subject for my master's thesis which was on Nancy Storace, her life, career, and relationship with Mozart. After I finished graduate school, I continued doing more in-depth research about Mozart and Nancy as well as 18th century European culture, fashion, society, marriage, religion, music, literature, art, politics, and general history. I studied the languages, terms, attitudes, customs and class structures in order to gain a deeper insight into the characters and the things that motivated them. I wanted my characters to be as real, believable, and accessible as possible and at the same time not simply be 21st century people with 21st century attitudes in an 18th century setting.

I'm sure many of you have had experiences when you learn that someone, perhaps younger than you, perhaps not, has been watching you and gleaning from your life, your work, and your actions without your even realizing that they've been doing so. This has been the case with a young woman who, when I was a grad student, was an undergrad in the same department. A few years later we were reunited through a choral group in which we both sing in the alto section, and then after that we became friends on Facebook.

A couple of months ago she purchased a copy of So Faithful a Heart and read it, and then when I opened this blog, she became a regular reader of it, too. A few days ago, when I posted a link on Facebook to another blog entry, she commented on the link that she loved this blog and that she enjoyed getting to read more of the "behind-the-scenes" information and research that went into the writing of So Faithful a Heart. She said one thing in particular that really touched me and affirmed that the painstaking research and trouble I took to gather as many details as possible wasn't for naught.

I love that you know the world your book is set in, inside and out. I love when I am confident that fiction authors know more about their created worlds than their audience does. You KNOW what's around every corner, who's involved with whom, and what's going on behind the scenes. Immersion is awesome. Details aren't the icing on the cake for me--they ARE the cake.

Thank you, Rebecca. Readers like you make it all worth it!

Places: The Viennese Cafe

2010-05-06T07:49:00.002-05:00

In So Faithful a Heart, I feature a cafe that was popular among the theater goers called the Milano, where Mozart and Nancy, as well as their friends and colleagues go to relax and socialize after rehearsals and performances. The Milano was a very popular cafe, located on the Kohlmarkt, in the building which is now the popular Kaffeehaus and bakery, Demel.

The following history is from Wikipedia.

Legend has it that soldiers of the Polish-Habsburg army, while liberating Vienna from the second Turkish siege in 1683, found a number of sacks with strange beans that they initially thought were camel feed and wanted to burn. The Polish king Jan III Sobieski granted the sacks to one of his officers named Jerzy Franciszek Kulczycki, who started the first coffee house. After some experimentation, he added some sugar and milk, and the Viennese coffee tradition was born. This achievement has been recognized in many modern Viennese coffeehouses by hanging a picture of Kulczycki in the window. Another account is that Kulczycki, having spent two years in Ottoman captivity, knew perfectly well what coffee really is and tricked his superiors into granting him the beans that were considered worthless.

Vienna's first coffee house was opened by the Greek Johannes Theodat in 1685. 15 years later, four Greek owned coffeehouses had the privilege to serve coffee.

The new drink was well received, and coffee houses began to pop up rapidly. In the early period, the various drinks had no names, and customers would select the mixtures from a colour-shaded chart.

The heyday of the coffee house was the turn of the nineteenth century when writers like Peter Altenberg, Alfred Polgar, Karl Kraus, Hermann Broch and Friedrich Torberg made them their preferred place of work and pleasure. Many famous artists, scientists, and politicians of the period such as Arthur Schnitzler, Stefan Zweig, Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt, Adolf Loos, Theodor Herzl, Alfred Adler, and even Leon Trotsky were constant coffee house patrons. In Prague, Budapest, Cracow, and Lviv (Lemberg) and other cities of the Austro-Hungarian empire there were also many coffee houses according to the Viennese model.

From 1950, the period of "coffee house death" or Kaffeehaussterben began, as many famous Viennese coffee houses had to close, perhaps due to the popularity of television or the appearance of modern espresso bars. Nevertheless, many of these classic Viennese spots still exist, and tourism and a renewed interest in their history have prompted a comeback.

On a personal note: A review from the not-so-distant past

2010-05-04T07:54:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I received a letter from a dear friend who had just finished reading So Faithful a Heart. This friend was actually my undergraduate voice professor and in a very tangible way, the one who "started it all", years ago, when he assigned me Susanna's Act IV aria from Le Nozze di Figaro. From that point on, I was hooked, and now, over thirty years later, it has culminated in this novel. I don't think that either he or I ever dreamed that something like this would be born from his assigning me a standard piece for soprano, but here it is. I just wanted to share a little of what he wrote in his letter.

The time and energy to produce a work so well researched and so entertaining is a credit to you and your partner. It was very difficult to separate hard facts from the beauty and engaging presentation of the story. I think you truly caught the spirit of the time and the characters. The book is a good read. I'm glad that you included the romance of the story..it helps us understand the human side of people we admire and adds another dimension to their incredible lives. It must be a very rewarding feeling to have completed such a challenging project.

But my favorite line of all came at the very end.

Take care of yourself and keep in touch. I'm very proud of you.

Thank you, Mr. Brown.

The 18th Century: Women

2010-05-02T21:04:00.004-05:00

The 18th century brought with it the beginnings of a new era for women as some of the more progressive nations in Europe began to regard women as more than property. However, progress was slow, and even though some new ideas regarding a woman's rights as an individual came into play, it took another two-hundred years before women in western society were considered equal citizens with men in most western nations.

Modern society has a tendency to romanticize life in the 18th century, especially for women, but for most women it was far from the happy ending that is found in the typical Jane Austen novel. All girls were the property of their fathers until they married, when they became the property of their husbands. If a father died leaving unmarried daughters, then they were most generally at the mercy of another male relative, or sometimes a male friend who became their ward. Rarely was a woman emancipated, and if she was, she was most generally looked down upon by society as a woman of questionable moral character. If a girl married, it was usually between the age of 16 and 19. If she entered her twenties unmarried, her prospects for marriage were considered slim. If she reached the age of 25 and was still unmarried, she was considered a spinster, and her prospects for marriage were nearly impossible. Keeping in mind that the mortality rate for women in childbirth only increased as a woman aged, marriage became impractical and dangerous at a certain point. She became more valuable to her father, who by that time, was often a widower and needed her companionship and services as a homemaker and often as a surrogate mother to her younger siblings.

Most women in the 18th century were uneducated. Only girls of the middle and upper working classes and nobility were fortunate enough to learn to read and write, speak several languages, play instruments, and learn the art of becoming a "lady". Educating a woman cost a tremendous amount of money and therefore the investment was never for her personal edification, but was made in order to make her more appealing and attractive to a future husband.

Here is a link to an interesting, interactive website entitled Make Your Way As A Woman In Eighteenth-Century England. It begins with the following scenario:

You are a woman in 18th -century England. This is a tumultuous time in history. The population is rising and urbanization is changing the way that people live and work. But this is part of your environment. You are a white, 21-year old woman who hails from modest, middle-class parents. You live in a small village outside of London, but you have never traveled there. You work hard with your parents in keeping the household running.

You hear a knock at the front door. You recognize the voice of Mr. Snodgrass Bumfrey talking to your father. Mr. Bumfrey is a merchant who will soon inherit a shop in this village from his ailing father.

Do you remain and allow your father to present Mr. Bumfrey to you as your future husband or take your meager savings and slip out the back door to make a new start in London?

As you follow the prompts, it will take you through the typical scenarios of a woman's life in that period in England.

Things: 18th century women's undergarments

2010-05-01T07:30:00.001-05:00

The chemise, or shift was the basic women's undergarment from the middle ages to 1900. For most of the 18th century the shift had a drawstring neck and arms with a hem at mid-calf or just below the knees. Ruffles could be added to the neck and sleeves.

18th century stays or corsets were lightly or fully boned and created a conical shape, while flattening and lifting the bustline. There are two major styles of stays in the 18th century. The first are formal stays, which were cut very high in back and have shoulder straps to limit mobility and ensure perfect posture and great bust support. The second are working stays, which are cut lower in back and have removable or no shoulder straps. These allowed for greater mobility and provide excellent lower back support.

Stays were considered so essential to a women's wardrobe that there were charity funds throughout England and the Colonies to provide women with stays. The term "loose woman" refers to prostitutes who left their stays unbound, or women too poor to own stays.

Jumps were soft, front-lacing stays that were worn during manual labor like washing or farming, in very rural areas, or when a woman was pregnant. They had four bones, two in the front and two along the sides. Sleeves could be laced on through eyelets or left off entirely.

Panier supported skirts first appeared in England in 1709 and in Paris in 1718-19. Over the years there were many variations. In England paniers were sometimes called improvers.

An important style change occurred about 1772 when the overskirt became drawn up by invisibly placed inner tapes producing a ruched festoon bustle. It was called the polonaise skirt and was supported by special basket hoops. Basket paniers could be made into large pockets or left open at the bottom. It was said that the fashion arose when maids picked up the sides of their Panier skirts and pushed them into the pocket slit openings to enable them do their work more easily. The drawn up skirt revealed the petticoats and these then became an important fashion. The chest was forced forward and gave a pouter pigeon effect.

Hip pads were a poor or working woman's solution to paniers, and were worn for informal occasions by wealthy women. They add some extra volume to the hips without getting in the way of washing, cooking or gardening.

Petticoats were worn under the stays for warmth, and for modesty when wearing hoops. Under-petticoats were made from warm, utilitarian fabric. Sometimes a decorative hem was added to match or complement the outer petticoat and gown.

Stockings were made from silk, cotton, or wool, and were tied just above the knee with a satin ribbon, cord, or soft leather strap.

In Susanna's Act II aria from The Marriage of Figaro, she makes fun of Cherubino as she dresses him up like a girl.

People: Baroness Martha Elisabeth von Waldstätten & Mozart's Red Coat

2010-04-28T20:42:00.000-05:00

In the year 1781, when Mozart first arrived in Vienna, he was introduced to a Baroness who lived in the Leopoldstadt, (a suburb of Vienna), and who was thirty-seven at the time. Elisabeth Waldstätten was estranged from her husband, whose estate was not far from Vienna in the village of Klosterneuburg. The Baroness, who was an excellent pianist took an instant liking to Mozart and invited him to her home in the Leopoldstadt to celebrate his name day, which was on October 31st. That evening when everyone was getting ready for bed, he was surprised to hear out his window, six musicians playing his Serenade for Winds (K. 375). They had been paid-for and sent by the Baroness as a gift for Mozart's enjoyment.

The Baroness was known for "educating" young women--sort of a private finishing school--in her home in the Leopoldstadt. In the following months, after Mozart's then fiancé, Constanze Weber, quarreled with her mother, Mozart took her to the Baroness' to live for several weeks. Then, in August of 1782, when Mozart and Constanze were married, it was the Baroness who hosted their wedding dinner in her home. It was also the Baroness to whom Mozart wrote of a lovely red coat that would go elegantly with some fine mother of pearl buttons with gold stones.

"I really must have a coat like that, as it's worth it just for the buttons that I've been hankering after for some time ... They're mother-of-pearl with some white stones around the edge and a beautiful yellow stone in the centre."

The Baroness had the coat made as a gift for Mozart.

Mozart wrote to his father, Leopold, of the Baroness Waldstätten, and in the spring of 1785, when Leopold visited his son and Constanze, in Vienna, he met the Baroness and grew quite fond of her.

In So Faithful a Heart we see Nancy, Mozart, and the tenor, Michael Kelly with the Baroness at her husband's estate in Klosterneuburg, where it would not have been out of the ordinary for her to have stayed when her husband was away.

The Music: Handel, Lascia Ch'io Pianga from Rinaldo

2010-04-25T08:28:00.001-05:00

In Chapter Six of So Faithful a Heart a poignant moment occurs between Nancy and Wolfgang when she sings Handel's Lascia Ch'io Pianga during an impromptu concert in the Baroness Waldtstätten's music salon at her estate in Klosterneuburg.

“It’s your turn, Nancy, dear. We’ve not heard from you yet,” Elisabeth said as she slipped her arm through Nancy’s and led her to the harpsichord.

Mozart turned and walked to the wine table to pour himself another glass as Michael moved from the fortepiano to take a seat to listen.

“Why don’t you sing that ravishing little aria that you sang for me the other day?” she suggested as she gracefully positioned herself at the keyboard. “I’ll accompany you.”

“What was it you sang, Nancy? We’d love to hear you perform it for us,” Michael said cheerfully as he made his way to a comfortable, overstuffed settee.

Mozart, who stood with his back turned, teased, “It’s probably a bawdy little pub song that she learned back in England!” But almost before he could finish his sentence, the Baroness began to play. He stood motionless as he heard the opening notes and instantly recognized the introductory chords of the continuo. He was overtaken with emotion as he remembered the day at the Baron van Swieten’s home when he suggested to Nancy that one day she should sing this aria for him, for it was on that day he realized he had begun to fall in love with her.

“Lascia ch’io pianga, mia cruda sorte…”

He turned around, his gaze intense and fixed upon her.

“…e che so spiri, la liberta!” Her voice was plaintive and full of longing. She understood perfectly well the suffering of which she sang. “Let me weep over my cruel fate, for I long for freedom. I pray for mercy for my sufferings!”

Mozart stood transfixed, overcome with tenderness for this young woman who stole his heart in that very moment.

“Il duolo ingfranga, queste ritorte, de miei martiri, sol per pieta!"

Their gaze met across the divide as she sang to him.

“Have pity! Shatter my chains out of mercy for my suffering!”

When she finished there was only silence. She had ripped her heart from herself and held it out for everyone in the room to see. Finally Michael broke the silence by quietly suggesting to the Baroness that they take a turn around the rose garden, leaving Mozart and Nancy alone in the salon.

Nancy, who remained stationed by the harpsichord, watched intently as Mozart sat his wine glass on the table and silently crossed the room toward her. As he drew nearer, she saw the tears that pooled in his eyes and her heart began to race once again as she felt the blush return. He stood close to her, barely breathing, and gently enveloped her in his arms, pulling her to him. She wrapped her arms softly around his neck and closed her eyes as he kissed her tenderly on the forehead. There they stood silently, for several moments holding one another in their arms. Then, without a word, he took her by the hand and led her out of the salon, into the great hall and up the stairs to her bedchamber, quietly closing the door behind them.

Places: Klosterneuburg, Austria

2010-04-24T09:13:00.002-05:00

Another one of the places featured in So Faithful a Heart is the estate of Baroness Elisabeth Waldstätten , which was located just outside the village of Klosterneuburg, about five miles north of Vienna. Located in the hilly wine country, Klosterneuburg is home to a large Augustinian Monastery that was established in 1108.

Klosterneuburg was founded by Margrave Leopold III and developed in conjunction with its famous monastery. Leopold III and later Leopold VI (the latter only during part of his reign) had their residences there. From 1938 to 1954, it constituted the 26th district of Vienna. Today, it is a site of industry and a suburb of Vienna. The well-known Essl Museum of contemporary art is also on display in the town.

On a hill rising directly from the banks of the Danube stand the buildings (erected in 1730–1834) of the Augustine canonry, founded in 1114 by the Margrave (Saint) Leopold III of Babenberg, the patron saint of Austria. This order is one of the oldest and richest of its kind in Austria; it owns much of the land upon which the north-western suburbs of Vienna stand. Among the points of interest within it are the old chapel of 1318, with Leopold's tomb and the Verdun Altar, dating from the 12th century, the treasury and relic-chamber, the library with 30,000 volumes and numerous manuscripts, the picture gallery, the collection of coins, the theological hall, and the winecellar, containing an immense tun like that at Heidelberg. There are some excellent vintners in Klosterneuburg, but today the city is tightly linked to Vienna and houses some of the most affluent citizens of Lower Austria.

Information source: Wikipedia

I found a video on YouTube made by a couple traveling in Austria. It features some lovely images of the village and Monastery.

The 18th Century: Freemasonry & the Age of Enlightenment

2010-04-22T21:52:00.000-05:00

The early part of the 18th century was known as the Age of Reason, for it was during this period that great advances in science and philosophy began to overcome much of the superstition found in religion. And although people were reluctant to give up their traditional Christian beliefs, they began to come into open conflict with the church over matters of faith vs. reason. By the late 18th century the Age of Enlightenment was in full play with its philosophies of equality, liberty, and justice and out of these radical new ideas and philosophies were born both the American and French Revolutions. Philosophers and poets like Goethe and Rousseau espoused these new philosophies, and playwrights such as Diderot, Beaumarchais, and Voltaire brought us comedies with the lower class servants overcoming the tyranny of the nobility, and outwitting and triumphing over their feudal Lords.

One of the most prominent and misunderstood movements of the 18th century was the fraternal order of Freemasons. Freemasonry espoused all of the philosophies and ideals of the Enlightenment and encouraged its members to pursue lives filled with integrity, honesty, and love for all humankind. However, because they were a secret society, they were often misunderstood and persecuted, most especially by the Catholic Church, whose theocratic power was slipping as the principles of liberty and equality began to take hold of Europe. Some of the most famous and influential men of the 18th century were Freemasons including Voltaire, John Locke, Haydn, Mozart, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, John Paul Jones, and Paul Revere, to name only a few.

You can find an exhaustive history of Freemasonry at the Wikipedia History of Freemasonry site.

The following is the Mozart Masonic Cantata, Dir, Seele des Weltalls, O Sonne.

To you, soul of the Universe, o sun.

We dedicate the first

Of the festive songs!

O Mighty One! Without you we would not live,

From you alone we receive fertility, warmth and light!

Things: 18th Century Wigs & Hairstyles

2010-04-21T21:15:00.003-05:00

At the beginning of and clear through to the mid 18th century, wigs were the height of fashion and were a statement of status, wealth, and prestige. Wigs were worn by the nobility whenever they appeared in public and by the time they hit their peak of fashion, women's wigs became quite ornate and even outlandish, sometimes sporting model ships and even real bird's nests. However, by the late 1770s and early 1780s, wigs began to fall from fashion, with young men and women preferring to style and powder their own hair. Wigs then, were only worn at high court functions, and were far less garish and outlandish. By the end of the century the wig had fallen completely out of fashion and men were beginning to cut their hair in shorter styles, while women's hairstyles modeled the styles found on the statues of the women of ancient Greece and Rome.

The tail that hung from the back of both men's and women's hairstyles and wigs was called a queue (pronounced cue), and for men, was symbolic of the length of their...well, you know. Mozart was known for his long, thick hair that hung clear to the middle of his back. Mozart's queue was generally clubbed and bound tightly with a black satin ribbon. When he was employed by the Prince Archbishop Colleredo of Salzburg, he was required to wear a white wig with the queue hidden in a black satin tie bag whenever he was at court, or when he played the organ in the cathedral.

In the 1780s a high tariff on wig powder went into effect, causing people to abandon both the powdering of wigs as well as the powdering of their own hair, and thus gave way to a more natural look in both men's and women's hairstyles. Instead of ornamenting their hair, they ornamented their hats, which resulted in hats that were sometimes every bit as outlandish as the wigs had once been.

By the end of the century and on into the early 19th century hairstyles for both men and women became more natural and closer cut. If a queue was worn, it was a short pig-tail and even that disappeared completely by 1800. The Regency period in fashion sought to imitate the ancient Greeks and therefore fashions were scaled down completely and became much softer and more subdued.

People: Aloysia Weber Lange

2010-04-20T22:07:00.007-05:00

In So Faithful a Heart, I present Aloysia Weber Lange, who was Mozart's sister-in-law, as one of the main antagonists in the story primarily because when Nancy Storace first arrived in Vienna, Aloysia was the most popular singer in town. Aloysia would have felt a tremendous rivalry towards Nancy for fickle Vienna's loyalties quickly shifted from the local German singers to the new and more fashionable Italian singers.

The following is from the Wikipedia article about Aloysia Weber:

Maria Aloysia Louise Antonia Weber (c. 1760 – 8 June 1839) was a German soprano, remembered primarily for her association with the composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Born in either Zell im Wiesental or Mannheim, Aloysia Weber was one of the four daughters of the musical Weber family. Her three sisters were soprano Josepha Weber (1758–1819), who premiered the role of the Queen of the Night in Mozart's The Magic Flute; Constanze Weber the wife of Mozart; and Sophie Weber. Her first cousin was the composer Carl Maria von Weber.

Aloysia grew up in Mannheim and later moved to Munich in 1778, where she made her operatic debut. Her salary at the Court Theater was 1000 florins per year; her father made 600. The following year she was engaged to sing in the National Singspiel in Vienna, a project of the Emperor Joseph II; the family moved together to Vienna in September, where the father worked briefly as a ticket-taker, but died suddenly only a month after their arrival. Aloysia continued in a fairly successful singing career in Vienna over the next two decades.

On October 31, 1780, she married Joseph Lange, an actor at the Court Theater who was also an amateur painter (he later produced a well-known portrait of Mozart). Since she was the main support of her family at the time, Lange agreed to pay her mother the sum of 700 florins per year on a continuing basis, as part of her marriage contract.

She moved to the Burgtheater in 1782, singing Italian opera. This position lasted only eight months, as she soon became "persona non grata owing to disagreements over salary and role distribution as well as missed performances." She continued to sing, however, at the Kärntnertortheater as well as in occasional roles at the Burgtheater. In 1795, she went on concert tour with her widowed sister Constanze. As of that year, she ceased to live with her husband Lange.

She spent her old age in Salzburg, in order to be near her surviving sisters Constanze and Sophie, who had moved there.

She was for some time a love interest of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This was around 1777, when Mozart spent some time in Mannheim, where he had hoped (in vain, it turned out) to find employment. Mozart expressed a desire to marry Aloysia, though it is not clear exactly how serious his intentions were, or whether they were reciprocated.
Mozart left Mannheim for several months for Paris on an unsuccessful job search. On his way back to Salzburg, he passed through Munich, where Aloysia was by now employed. According to the tale told in Georg Nikolaus von Nissen's draft biography of Mozart written in collaboration with Constanze, who married Nissen after Mozart's death, Mozart and Aloysia had a rather unpleasant encounter:

"When he entered, she appeared no longer to know him, for whom she previously had wept. Accordingly, he sat down at the piano and sang in a loud voice, 'Leck mir das Mensch im Arsch, das mich nicht will,' — 'The one who doesn't want me can lick my ass.'"

The vulgar phrase in Mozart's song corresponds to the English idiom "kiss my ass", and occurs frequently in Mozart's letters.

Mozart himself moved to Vienna in 1781, and later that year was for a time a lodger in the Weber home. The father Fridolin had died in 1779, Aloysia had not left home at the time of her marriage, and the mother Cäcilia and the remaining three sisters were taking in boarders to make ends meet. Mozart fell in love with the third daughter, Constanze. When the two married in 1782, Mozart became Aloysia's brother-in-law. Apparently there were no long-term hard feelings, as Mozart wrote a fair amount of music for Aloysia to sing.

The following is an insert aria composed for Aloysia by Mozart entitled Vorrei spiegarvi, oh Dio!. It's easy to tell from the music what a kind of a voice Aloysia had and why she was such a popular singer. Mozart most certainly was fond of her voice, for he composed several of his most beautiful works for her.

The Music: Handel, But Who May Abide from Messiah

2010-04-19T18:50:00.003-05:00

In Chapter Three of So Faithful a Heart, Nancy is invited by the Baron von Swieten to sing for one of his Sunday musicales, to sing several of the soprano solos in Handel's Messiah.

"At the conclusion of the overture, Michael stood and began to sing the first recitative and the accompanying air, Every Valley, which was followed by the chorus, And the Glory of the Lord. Nancy and Michael were amused as the group, made up primarily of Viennese men and women, with the occasional Italian, struggled with the English pronunciations. On several occasions they would stop the music and defer to their English guests on how to correctly pronounce some of the more difficult words. Then after Nancy stood and gave her rendition of the air But Who May Abide, she was greeted with thunderous applause by the gathering, who were most notably impressed by her skillful manipulation of the difficult melismatic passages in the prestissimo section."

It is recorded that Mozart was in regular attendance at these Sunday musicales hosted by the Baron in his home. Van Swieten was a lover of fugues and therefore was greatly enamored of the music of both Bach and Handel. He was a great admirer of Mozart's and introduced him to the music of Bach and Handel, as well as hired him to accompany his Sunday afternoon musicales, which were held in van Swieten's large library.

The aria, But Who May Abide the Day of His Coming, is generally sung by bass in most contemporary performances, but Handel originally composed it to be sung by soprano. The following recording features soprano Lorraine Hunt with Nicholas McGegan and the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra.

Places: The Michaelerplatz

2010-04-18T20:59:00.006-05:00

The Imperial Square in Vienna, known as The Michaelerplatz, is where a great deal of the action takes place in So Faithful a Heart, for it was there where all of the government buildings and offices were housed, along with the Imperial Palace, known as The Hofburg, the Burgtheater (small building on the far right), and St. Micahel's Parish (which was the Imperial parish). Just across from the Hofburg, across the platz (square), was a small lane which housed all of the Imperial apartments, including the building which housed the apartments used by the Italian Opera Company, which is now 9 Herrengasse (Street of the Lords).

The original Burgtheater was built in 1741 by Empress Maria Theresa, and was the theater which Emperor Joseph II dubbed The German Theater, until he closed down the German Opera Company in 1783 in favor of the more fashionable Italian Opera Company, for which Nancy was hired as the original prima buffa (first comedienne). It was here that Mozart's Italian comic opera Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro), premiered on 1 May, 1786, in which Nancy sang the role of Susanna.

St. Michael's Church, dedicated to the Archangel Michael, is one of the oldest churches in Vienna, Austria, and also one of its few remaining Romanesque buildings. In the course of time, there have been many alterations, resulting in its present day aspect, unchanged since 1792. This church, close to the Michaeler wing of the Hofburg, used to be the parish church of the Imperial Court (it was then called called 'Zum heiligen Michael')

Over its long history, spanning more than eight centuries, this church has incorporated a medley of architectonic styles. The church is a late Romanesque, early Gothic building dating from about 1220-1240. There is a document, stating 1221 as the foundation date of the church, but this is most probably a 14th century forgery.

Number 9 Herrengasse was built from 1686 to 1689 for Count Mollard (Reichsgraf von Mollard). In 1760 it was bought by Count Franz Wenzel von Clary-Aldringen. Emperor Joseph II held his famous "round tables" here. It also housed the apartments in which some of the members of the Italian Opera Company resided, including Nancy Storace, Francesco Benucci (the original Figaro), and the Irish tenor, Michael Kelly. Since 2005 it is used by the Austrian National Library and houses the Globe Museum, the Department of Music and the Department of Planned Languages and Esperanto Museum.

The following is a duet from Act 1, scene 1 of Le Nozze di Figaro, which opened in the Burgtheater on 1 May, 1786.

Things: The 18th century guitar

2010-04-15T00:12:00.001-05:00

Just as our modern piano has come through centuries of evolution, so has the guitar. What we now know as the classical six-stringed guitar actually developed from the ancient lyre and has gone through many stages giving us a variety of different strummed stringed instruments that eventually culminated in a variety of modern instruments bearing the name "guitar".

Nancy Storace was quite accomplished on the guitar (the English version of the guitar at the time was called a "cittern"), and Mozart utilized her talents when he composed a guitar part for Cherubino's aria "Voi che sapete" in Le nozze di Figaro.

In the 18th century, the guitar was a chamber instrument, meaning that it was played mostly in the home in small gatherings of friends and/or family, therefore very little "concert hall" music was composed for the instrument. What pieces we have are mostly from the early 18th century Baroque period, as it was an extremely popular chamber instrument all over Europe.

The six-stringed classical guitar that we know today, came from Spain, and evolved from what was known as a "double string" guitar (or what we know as a twelve string).

The following is a bullet list of the guitar's progression. (Thanks to this website: Evolution of the 19th Century Guitar.)

Key Points:
-The 6-course guitar arose first in Spain in the 1750's, with double strings (same as today's 12-string guitar)
-Merits of single vs. double stringing was debated on 5 and 6 course guitars since at least the 1770's
-String improvements allowed cheap and readily accessible wire-wound basses in the 1780's
-Wire-wound strings cut into gut frets and necessitated metal frets
-Wire-wound bass strings were overpowering with double courses and required single courses for balance
-New styles of playing in the late 18th century necessitated a strong bass and clean articulation

-Fan bracing with 3-7 fans was used since the 1750's in Spanish guitars; it was not invented by Torres
-String lengths on Baroque and early Spanish 6-string instruments were longer than a concert Ramirez
-Treble clef notation replaced tablature in the 1760's
-Guitar pitch was raised to standard orchestral pitch with the adoption of treble clef notation
-The French Lyre guitar was a critical step toward the adoption of the 6-string guitar
-Single stringing was done initially by leaving half the string slots empty
-6-string guitars were around since the mid 1770's, but were not popular until the late 1790's
-The 18th century was not a period of musical decline. It was extremely active.

-Some players used fingernails and some did not throughout history; very few players (e.g. Sor) used no-nails
-The 5-course guitar remained popular in France until the 1820's and co-existed with the 6-string guitar
-The 12-string 6 double-course guitar remained popular in Spain until the 1830's and co-existed with the 6-string guitar
-The English and Germans played a form of cittern in the late 18th century and not the guitar
-The Italian guitar was single-strung, with 5-7 strings

The following video features Baroque guitarist, Paul O'Dette performing works by Santiago de Murcia (1685-1732) on baroque guitar at the New York Guitar Festival's third biennial Guitar Marathon at the 92nd Street Y's Kaufman Auditorium.

People: Mozart's greatest rival

2010-04-14T00:00:00.008-05:00

In Peter Shaffer's famous play, Amadeus, we are given the impression that Mozart's greatest rival was the court composer Antonio Salieri. However, this is a myth that has it's beginnings in a piece by the Russian poet and playwright, Alexander Pushkin, from his poetic drama Mozart and Salieri. In truth, Salieri was really no rival to Mozart at all, but instead, a friend and admirer of Mozart's who, if anything, only failed to present Mozart's music at court in order to preserve his own position with the Emperor.

Mozart's greatest and most bitter rival was the dashingly handsome Spanish composer, Vincente Martìn y Soler, who came to Vienna in 1785. It was Soler, who because he was angry that Mozart's new Italian comic opera, The Marriage of Figaro, was chosen over his piece, Una Cosa Rara, as the 1786 season opener, started an uprising against Mozart with certain members of the opera company and arranged most, if not all, of the cabals that occurred during Figaro's opening performance.

The following article was taken from Wikipedia.

Vicente Martín y Soler (May 2, 1754 – January 30, 1806) was a Spanish composer of opera and ballet. Although relatively obscure today, in his own day he was compared favorably with his contemporary, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, as a composer of opera buffa. He has been called the Valencian Mozart.

He was born in Valencia and studied music in Bologna under Giovanni Battista Martini. His first opera was Il tutore burlato (1775), an adaptation of Giovanni Paisiello's La frascatana, which in turn was based on a play of the same title by Filippo Livigni. He had the libretto translated into Spanish and adapted it into zarzuela form (adding spoken dialogue) as La Madrileña o el tutor burlado, under which title it was performed in Madrid during 1778.

In 1777, he travelled to Naples, where he composed for the Teatro di San Carlo. During this period, he worked with choreographer Charles le Picq to compose four ballets d’action: La Griselda (1779, derived from the libretto by Apostolo Zeno), I ratti sabini (1780), La bella Arsene (1781), andTamas Kouli-Kan (1781, an interpretation of Vittorio Amedeo Cigna-Santi's libretto). He also worked with Zeno on an opera seria, Andromaca, in 1780. In addition, he composed two mezzocarattere ballets, La sposa persiana (1778) and Il barbiere di Siviglia (1781, based on the play by Beaumarchais). At Naples he also worked with court librettist, Luigi Serio, on the composition of opera seria, producing Ifigenia (1779) andIpermestra (1780).

In 1785 he moved to Vienna, where he enjoyed great success with three operas composed to texts by Lorenzo Da Ponte, who was simultaneously collaborating with Mozart and Antonio Salieri. These three comedies were Una cosa rara (1786, based on the play La luna de la sierra by Luis Vélez de Guevara); Il burbero di buon cuore (1786, based on the play by Carlo Goldoni); and L'arbore di Diana (1787). He is credited with introducing, inUna cosa rara, the waltz to Vienna; and a melody from the same work is quoted by Mozart in the banquet scene in Act 2 of Don Giovanni (1787).

In 1788, Soler was invited to the Russian court at St. Petersburg, where he wrote three Russian language operas, The Unfortunate Hero Kosmetovich (1789, libretto written in part byCatherine the Great), Melomania (1790), and Fedul and his Children (1791, with Vasili Pashkevich). Moving to London for the 1795 season, he provided three more Italian language operas: La capricciosa corretta (libretto again by Lorenzo Da Ponte, partly adapted from Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew); L'isola del piacere and Le nozze de' contadini spagnuoli. On return to St Petersburg, he wrote his last opera, La festa del villaggio (1798).

He also wrote a number of tragic ballets during his residence as Court Composer there, including Didon abandonée (1792), Amour et Psyché (1793, based on Psyché by Molière, Corneille and Philippe Quinault), Tancrède (1799) and Le retour de Poliorcète (1799). He died, still in post, in 1806.

The 18th Century: The language of the fan

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In the 18th century, the hand fan was both utilitarian, as well as decorative. There were all kinds of fans, from the extremely plain paddle fans made from paper or wood, to the most ornate made of the finest silk and adorned with fine embroidery or painting.

A lady was never seen in public without her fan, for not only was it used as a device for cooling oneself, but it served as a means of discrete and quiet communication. Both men and women understood the "language of the fan" and used it to communicate some very private sentiments while in the midst of some very public places.

The following is a list of some of the most commonly understood fan gestures.

A fan placed near the heart: "You have won my love."
A closed fan touching the right eye: "When may I be allowed to see you?"
The number of sticks shown answered the question: "At what hour?"
Threatening gestures with a closed fan: "Do not be so imprudent"
Half-opened fan pressed to the lips: "You may kiss me."
Hands clasped together holding an open fan: "Forgive me."
Covering the left ear with an open fan: "Do not betray our secret."
Hiding the eyes behind an open fan: "I love you."
Shutting a fully-opened fan slowly: "I promise to marry you."
Drawing the fan across the eyes: "I am sorry."

Touching the finger to the tip of the fan: "I wish to speak with you."
Letting the fan rest on the right cheek: "Yes."
Letting the fan rest on the left cheek: "No."
Opening and closing the fan several times: "You are cruel"
Dropping the fan: "We will be friends."
Fanning slowly: "I am married."
Fanning quickly: "I am engaged."
Putting the fan handle to the lips: "Kiss me."
Opening a fan wide: "Wait for me."
Placing the fan behind the head: "Do not forget me"
Placing the fan behind the head with finger extended: "Goodbye."
Fan in right hand in front of face: "Follow me."
Fan in left hand in front of face: "I am desirous of your acquaintance."
Fan held over left ear: "I wish to get rid of you."

Drawing the fan across the forehead: "You have changed."
Twirling the fan in the left hand: "We are being watched."
Twirling the fan in the right hand: "I love another."
Carrying the open fan in the right hand: "You are too willing."

Carrying the open fan in the left hand: "Come and talk to me."
Drawing the fan through the hand: "I hate you!"
Drawing the fan across the cheek: "I love you!"
Presenting the fan shut: "Do you love me?"

~From All About Fans

The Music: La scuola de gelosi by Antonio Salieri

2010-04-12T00:00:00.001-05:00

In the opening chapters of So Faithful a Heart we learn that Nancy has just been hired by His Imperial Majesty, Joseph II of Austria, as the prima buffa (first comedienne), of his newly-formed Italian Opera Company. At the tender age of seventeen, Nancy travels from Venice (with her mother, Elizabeth, as her escort), to accept her position in the Austrian capital of Vienna. Upon her arrival she is given three days to rest and orient herself to her new surroundings before she is to report to the first rehearsals at the Burgtheater.

The opera that Nancy premiered was Antonio Salieri's La scuola de gelosi (The School of Jealousy), in which she took the role of the Countess Bandiera. The plot of the opera involves love intrigues, attempted seductions and provocations to jealousy between members of the three different social strata: the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie and the working class, which was typical for plots in the early to late 1780s.

For the Viennese premiere, Salieri composed a new grand aria especially for Nancy, entitled Ah sia gia de' miei sospiri. It is sung here by the great Italian mezzo-soprano, Cecelia Bartoli.

Places: Mozart's music room in the Figarohaus

2010-04-11T00:00:00.002-05:00

Of all the apartments in which Mozart resided while he lived in Vienna, the Figarohaus is probably the best-known. Originally known as the Camesina House, it was renamed the Figarohaus years later because this was the apartment where Mozart lived when he composed his famous and beloved Italian comic opera Le Nozze di Figaro.

The room that has been attributed as Mozart's music room had originally served as a small chapel for the noble Camesina family who originally built the house 300 years before Mozart. Years later, the building was sold and split into several apartments, cutting the chapel in half, but leaving the original marble walls and the ornate ceiling for which this particular room is famous.

Several scenes take place in this room in So Faithful a Heart, among them the scene where Mozart rehearses with Nancy for an upcoming Lenten concert performance of his opera Idomeneo, in which Nancy is to sing the role of Ilia.

It was a frigged January afternoon as Mozart sat in the music room of his apartment at his fortepiano, rehearsing with Nancy, Ilia’s Act Three aria, in which she asks the breezes to carry her confession of love to Idamante, who has gone to battle the sea serpent. The warmth of Nancy’s voice seemed to soften the chill in the air which had invaded the room from outside, and he didn’t seem to notice the white puffs of steam that poured from her mouth as she exhaled.

"Zeffiretti lusinghieri, Deh volate al mio tesoro: E gli dite, ch'io l'adoro, Che mi serbi il cor fedel." (Gently caressing breezes, fly to my beloved. Tell him that I adore him and keep him faithful.)

“That’s it, Nancy! Smoooothly…yes…yes,” he coached as he raised his hand in the air. “Lovely…hold that now…crescendo…now let it trail off…yes!” He stopped playing and sighed, “Oh how I wish you could have been my original Ilia! How Munich would have adored you, Nancy!”

The Figarohaus stands now as one of the most popular museums in Vienna. If you ever have the opportunity to travel there, you'll definitely want to put it on your list of places to see!

Things: Mozart's Fortepiano

2010-04-10T09:21:00.000-05:00

The piano that Mozart played upon wasn't like our modern pianos. Mozart's favorite piano, the one he had built in 1780 by the famous fortepiano designer/builder, Anton Walter, was considerably smaller and lighter than the modern piano. Mozart took it with him whenever he played a concert in Vienna.

The fortepiano has leather-covered hammers and thin, harpsichord-like strings. It has a much lighter case construction than the modern piano and, except for later examples of the early nineteenth century (already evolving towards the modern piano), it has no metal frame or bracing. The action and hammers are lighter, giving rise to a much lighter touch, which in good fortepianos is also very responsive. The range of the fortepiano was about four octaves at the time of its invention and gradually increased. Mozart (1756–1791) wrote his piano music for instruments of about five octaves.
~ Wikipedia

Of all of the Mozart piano concerti, this one is probably my favorite for a number of reasons, not the least being the wonderfully moody Adagio movement, composed in the languid and love-sick key of F-sharp minor. This is a wonderful recording, featuring John Elliot Gardner and The English Baroque Soloists, with Malcolm Bilson on the fortepiano. Now if you have a good ear for tuning and you're thinking that this sounds more like A flat than A major, you would be partially correct. During Mozart's time, the instruments were tuned to about A-435 or so, as opposed to the A-440 we are accustomed to today. It's somewhere around a quarter of a step lower than the A we use. However, there's something magical about the authentic effect from pieces from this era that are played on period instruments.

I'm posting all three movements of this incredible concerto simply because all three movements merit a listen. So sit back and enjoy.

The Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major (K. 488) is a musical composition for piano and orchestra written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was finished, according to Mozart's own catalogue, on March 2, 1786, around the time of the premiere of his opera, The Marriage of Figaro. It was one of three subscription concerts given that spring and was probably played by Mozart himself at one of these. The concerto is scored for piano solo and an orchestra consisting of one flute, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns and strings.

It has three movements:
Allegro in A major and common time.
Adagio in F-sharp minor and 6/8 time (in later editions, the tempo is listed as Andante).
Allegro assai in A and alla breve (in later editions, the tempo is listed as Presto).

The first movement is mostly joyful and positive with the occasional melancholic touches typical of Mozart pieces in A major.

The second, slow movement, in ternary form, is impassioned and somewhat operatic in tone. The piano begins alone with a theme characterized by unusually wide leaps. This is the only movement by Mozart in F sharp minor. The dynamics are soft throughout most of the piece. The middle of the movement contains a brighter section in A major announced by flute and clarinet that Mozart would later use to introduce the trio "Ah! taci ingiusto core!" in his opera Don Giovanni.

The third movement is a rondo, shaded by moves into other keys as is the opening movement (to C major from E minor and back during the secondary theme in this case, for instance) and with a central section whose opening in F sharp minor is interrupted by a clarinet tune in D major, an intrusion that reminds us, notes Girdlestone, that instrumental music at the time was informed by opera buffa and its sudden changes of point of view as well as of scene. ~Wikipedia

People: Emperor Joseph II

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Although Emperor Joseph never utters a word in So Faithful a Heart, he is mentioned often, and his presence is felt throughout. The Emperor played quite an important and influential role in both Mozart's and Nancy's lives. The following information is from Wikipedia.

Joseph II (Joseph Benedikt Anton Michael Adam; 13 March 1741 – 20 February 1790) was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. He was the eldest son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Francis I. He was thus the first ruler in the Austrian dominions of the House of Lorraine, styled Habsburg-Lorraine (von Habsburg-Lothringen in German). Joseph was a proponent of enlightened absolutism; however, his commitment to modernizing reforms subsequently engendered significant opposition, which eventually culminated in an ultimate failure to fully implement his programmes. He has been ranked, with Catherine II of Russia and Frederick II of Prussia, as one of the three great Enlightenment despots.

He married Infanta Isabella of Parma, in October 1760—a union fashioned to bolster the 1756 defensive pact between France and Austria (the bride's mother was the eldest daughter of the incumbent King of France) -- with whom he had his only child, Maria Theresa. Isabella died in 1763, and Maria Theresa in 1767. He was reluctant to re-marry; however, for political reasons, he married Maria Josepha of Bavaria in 1765. She died two years later from smallpox, and Joseph never re-married.

You can find the entire article linked here.

Although Mozart never served in Joseph's court, the Emperor was quite fond of him, and commissioned several operas from him, including the German-language opera Die Entführung aus dem Serail, two Italian comic operas, Le Nozze di Figaro, and Cosi fan tutte. Joseph II was regarded as "the musical king", and once said to Mozart in regards to his music, “Too many notes, my dear Mozart, and too beautiful for our ears.”

Joseph II died on February 20th, 1790, of tuberculosis, having never seen the last opera he commissioned from Mozart (Cosi fan tutte). His death was a tremendous blow to Viennese musicians, for the next emperor, his younger brother , Leopold II, had no appreciation or use for the arts and as a result, refused to fund them.

Places: Scholss Laxenburg

2010-04-08T00:00:00.003-05:00

One of the places featured most prominently in So Faithful a Heart is the Imperial summer estate of Laxenburg. Located about ten miles south of Vienna, the palace and grounds were built and developed by the Empress Maria Theresa and served as the Imperial Family's summer home. Maria Theresa's oldest son Josef II, regarded it as his favorite of all the Imperial estates.

Schloss Laxenburg was a generous palatial estate in the countryside, several miles outside of Vienna. Of all of Emperor Joseph’s estates, this was his favorite because contained within it were his finest hunting grounds, several lush gardens dotted with pavilions, small forests, wooded paths, a large, picturesque, pond with row boats, picnic grounds, spas, and green lawns which were ideal for all sorts of outdoor entertainment. In addition to the grounds was the palace, which housed a small theater, ballrooms, a large banquet hall, casinos, and several estate rooms. It sat just on the edge of a tiny village that boasted many fine shops, cafés, wineries and taverns, all designed to accommodate His Majesty, his retinue, and his noble guests. Whenever the Emperor took his summer recess, he generally brought his opera company along with several other musicians and performers who were housed in a row of luxurious apartments not far from the theater, and while there, were given free reign of the grounds and use of all the estate had to offer. It was a place of beauty, relaxation, indulgence, sensual pleasures and delights for the enjoyment of the Emperor and his honored guests.

When Steph and I were last in Vienna to be filmed for a documentary about Mozart for his 250th birthday, we spent nearly an entire day at Laxenburg, where we enjoyed the lovely grounds, as well as a picnic near, Diana's Temple, which is a large pavilion located about a mile from the main palatial complex. If you're ever in Vienna, take the opportunity to travel down to Laxenburg. It's not one of the more popular or well-known tourist spots, but it's well worth any trouble it might take to get there.

Handel's Let the bright Seraphim, from Sampson

2010-04-07T00:00:00.015-05:00

Because So Faithful a Heart is a novel about two musicians, music plays a huge role within the scope of the plot. I thought it might be interesting and helpful to do a series of posts about the music featured in the book, so that readers who might not be familiar some of the pieces could have a chance to hear some of the selections.

In chapter two, Nancy meets Mozart at a grand palatial reception designed to introduce the members of the Emperor's new Italian Opera Company. In addition to meeting Mozart, she also meets Aloysia Lange, Mozart's sister-in-law, who was, considered the best singer in Vienna at the time. Aloysia, who is already quite jealous over Nancy and the reputation she has already garnered throughout the city, receives her rather coldly.

“I hear you are to entertain us with a taste of your talent, Mademoiselle,” Mozart interjected in an attempt to break the ice, which had frozen what was an otherwise warm introduction. “I can’t tell you how I look forward to hearing you sing. Pray, tell us what you will offer us this afternoon,” he went on enthusiastically, already charmed by her appearance and obvious intelligence.

“I’ve chosen some arias by Paisiello and a favorite of mine by Handel, Let the bright Seraphim from Sampson, as well as one of the Countess’ arias from the Salieri piece which opens in two weeks,” she replied nervously. She suddenly realized this would be her first time to sing for Mozart, who could be rather critical. “If I may, I need to excuse myself because I believe it is almost time for me to take my place for the concert.”

Let the bright Seraphim from Handel's oratorio, Sampson, was considered one of the best arias in Nancy Storace's repertoire. It is sung here by soprano, Kathleen Battle.

Sex & Marriage in the 18th Century Western World

2010-04-06T00:00:00.002-05:00

It has only been over the last 180 years that sex has taken on some of its more prudish trappings, especially in America. With the advent of the reign of Queen Victoria of England in 1837, the western world adopted a much stricter and often oppressive view of sex that had far-reaching effects even into the 21st century. And although sexual standards today have loosened considerably since the Victorian era, there is still an element of prudishness that exists along with a curious double standard. In America, we allow our movie stars and entertainment celebrities all kinds of sexual licenses and liberties while holding our government officials, clergy, and common folk to stricter standards, often rooted in religious restrictions and taboos. Nudity, fornication, homosexuality, prostitution, pornography, and graphic depictions of sex in film and literature abound, but if we live these things out in our everyday lives, we are judged and condemned by our society as being of "loose moral character".

In 18th century Europe, there also existed a double standard, but not in the way that it exists today in the United States. The standards and regulations for men were much looser than those for women, and although some men were condemned by society as "libertines" (such as Casanova, who indulged in sexual relationships with the wives and daughters of noblemen), most men, especially those of the noble and higher educated working classes enjoyed their mistresses, and even relations with prostitutes, with little or no condemnation as long as they kept these relationships discrete. In the 18th century, medical science taught that a man needed regular sexual release and that without it, he would become ill. So in the event that his wife was pregnant and/or lactating, he would seek his sexual release in the bed of a mistress or prostitute. A mistress was much safer, and since she generally reserved herself for one man at a time, she was considered relatively free from venereal disease, whereas there was no telling who the prostitute had slept with and how many times. The sin of adultery for a man was not in his finding himself in the beds of other women, but in finding himself in love with a woman other than his wife, for the transfer of his affections to the other woman threatened the well-being of his wife and, most importantly, his legitimate offspring.

Women were limited to two sexual roles in 18th century western society--that of wife and mother, or mistress and/or prostitute. All women, no matter their station, were the property of men and were to be used in whatever way men saw fit. The virgin daughters of royalty and nobility were expected to keep themselves pure for their future husbands, and often in an effort to keep them chaste until marriage, they were sent off to convents at very young ages and schooled by nuns until they began to menstruate. Once their periods began, usually around thirteen to fourteen years of age, they were betrothed and married off, generally to much older men of noble blood. The wife of a nobleman was expected to be sexually faithful to her husband, for she was the vessel from which sprang his heirs. The only way to guarantee that his legitimate heirs would carry on his name and entitlements was in seeing to it that his wife engaged only in sexual relations with him. Her celibacy was paramount, while his celibacy was a personal choice and not required.

The mistress held a less respected, but generally well-loved and vital role in society, for it was the mistress who gave the man pleasure and release from the tensions at home. Mistresses were "kept" by their men, and therefore only noblemen or wealthy businessmen or members of the upper educated working classes could afford to keep them. It was in the bed of the mistress that the man could indulge his sexual fantasies, for sex with a mistress had nothing to do with procreation and everything to do with pleasure. The only sin that a man ever committed with his mistress happened when he fell in love with her. Because the church was loathe to grant divorces, abandonment was often the lot of the wife whose husband transferred his affections to his mistress, and the man who did so was usually blackballed by members of his class and society, making it nearly impossible for him to maintain himself financially. History is rife with stories of noblemen who fell in love with their mistresses--Lord Admiral Nelson with Emma Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson with Sally Hemings, and George IV with Maria Fitzherbert--but few, if any, ultimately abandoned their wives and children and/or titles and positions in order to marry their mistresses. Ultimately the mistress was abandoned whether it be by pressure from society or by the man's death, and in these cases, the mistress was generally left shattered, both emotionally and financially.

It is very clear, then, that the institution of marriage was created to benefit men in western society. Over the course of the last two-hundred years, however, especially with the advent of Women's Suffrage, and later the Women's Liberation Movement, women have made significant gains both sexually and within the institution of marriage. With these new freedoms have come changes in our views of sex and marriage and their roles and purposes within our society that have brought a great deal of conflict and confusion. Now sex is viewed more openly and is less about procreation as for pleasure and expression, and marriage as an institution is about two people who love each other and have decided to join their lives, industry, and property together in order to better care-for and support one another. There are still those pockets of our society that wish to hold on to the old norms and traditions, but overall the changes have taken hold and the result is a much different structure and view of not only sex, but human relationships in general, than what was prominent with our 18th century forefathers.

Foreword by S.K. Waller

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The following is the foreword from So Faithful a Heart, written by my partner, S.K. Waller.

To read an historical fiction it is necessary to put aside our modern world. But that’s the easy part. The real difficulty lies in being willing to take off our modern goggles and see life as it was lived centuries in the past without judgments that come from several hundred years of social evolution. This isn’t easy, and there is so much we don’t know. Even writers who have spent years in research can only imagine life before mass media, women’s rights, the abolition of slavery, the overthrow of the monarchy, and the waning of theocratic governments.

This is a book that takes us to the eighteenth century to look at the life of a woman of the theater. At that time actresses were considered little better than prostitutes and few young women were encouraged to follow that path. Still, many did, not all of them women of loose moral character. Like women in our own time, many sought to be recognized and respected for their talents and hard work, stubbornly battling the stereotypes. However, also like modern women seeking acting or singing careers, some find themselves forced to acquiesce to the demands of the “casting couch” in order to find some small control over their lives. In the eighteenth century all women submitted to men, be they directors, fathers, brothers, or husbands. In this the wife was no different than the actress: she had a role to play, which was to see to the comfort and pleasure of a man. All women were held captive by this role, although the actress certainly appeared to have a more exciting life than the wife. While the wife may have looked at the actress with some envy for her supposed freedom, the actress probably looked at the wife, envying her security. Often, the pivot point between them was the husband, who required different things from the women in his life.

Which brings us to another problem when reading an historical fiction: that is the concept of marriage in an earlier time. In the eighteenth century a marriage was seldom made for love, especially between people of the noble, aristocratic, or educated working classes. The latter certainly had a little more access to romantic bonds, but the parents had the final say. After the ceremony it was back to life as usual; there was no honeymoon, and a steady parade of children usually followed, especially in those countries where the Catholic Church still held power.

With science teaching that a man needed regular sex to maintain his health, where was he to go when his wife was constantly pregnant, in post-partum confinement, or lactating? Men were expected to seek sexual release outside the marriage, something that few wives were threatened by. It was not his sexuality that made him loyal, but his sentiments. Falling into bed was not the sin, falling in love was, because that threatened the livelihood of the wife and her children. Therefore, men who could afford to do so kept mistresses and many wives were glad of it.

Likewise, the carrying, bearing, and raising of children were not the man’s concern. A man was not part of the birth of his children, nor was he part of the washing, feeding, or diaper-changing. He was expected to support his family and to be a good provider. He was to see to their religious instruction and their social grooming, and that was all. The children of a mistress, especially, were not his concern; only the generous, financially solvent man supported his bastards. Most men did not even acknowledge their illegitimate offspring, leaving it to the mistress to seek abortions or send the children into servitude as soon as they were able to work. Ideally, the mistress took care of what birth control was available at the time.

These things seem harsh to us today, but to see the eighteenth century clearly, without our modern sensibilities intruding, we must force ourselves to remember that where these social issues are concerned, people were not like we are. The roles of men and women were clearly defined in an attempt to keep society civilized. In our century such roles are looked down upon as we evolve socially, each of us toward our own personal fulfillment, regardless of gender. Death was always around the corner, most people were grossly uneducated, and Europeans, although largely dominated by the Church, were not religious in the way that people are today. There was no fear of global self-annihilation, no Freudian analysis, and no modern American fundamentalism, which didn’t take root until a hundred years later as a backlash to the liberal theology in both England and

America

. The world was a much larger place, and most people never traveled beyond their own city walls.

This is a book about two musicians who had seen most of Europe and had encountered other cultures, philosophies, and religious beliefs. They had been child prodigies, were worldly and educated, relatively tolerant, and unusually broad-minded. They were acquainted with many of the same people and had visited many of the same cities. When they met, they had to have recognized these similarities and they must have spent long hours in conversation about their mutual experiences. It is not difficult to imagine that they would have found these similarities comforting and even attractive.

As difficult as it is for us to slip beneath the skin of a person of the eighteenth century, it would be even harder for someone from that time to slip beneath ours. It is my hope that by reading this book you will truly get to know the characters and accept them for what they were, without modern bias.

S. K. Waller
Autumn 2009

April Author Sales Contest at Lulu.com

2010-04-04T09:17:00.000-05:00

I have entered the April sales contest at Lulu.com! Cash prizes are awarded to 1st through 3rd place authors along with highlighted recognition and publicity blasts to other Lulu authors and members. This also means discounts for anyone who purchases a copy of So Faithful a Heart during the month of April. Here you will find a link to my Lulu Storefront as well as a 10% discount coupon.

NOW AVAILABLE IN E-BOOK FORMAT!

HELP ME WIN!

APRIL COUPON SPECIAL! GET 10% OFF YOUR PURCHASE AT CHECK-OUT! Enter coupon code "SHOWERS" during checkout and save 10% off the purchase price. Discount cannot be used to pay for, nor shall be applied to, applicable taxes or shipping and handling charges. Maximum amount that may be applied to discount is $10.00 per account. Promotional codes cannot be applied to any previous orders. No exchanges or substitutions allowed. Only one valid promotional code may be used per order. Offer expires April 30, 2010 at 11:59 PM EDT. Lulu.com reserves the right to change or revoke this offer at any time. Void where prohibited. Copyright (C) 2002-2010 Lulu, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

An interview with the author

2010-04-03T20:10:00.000-05:00

K. Lynette Erwin is the author of So Faithful A Heart: The Love Story of Nancy Storace and Wolfgang Mozart, published in December 2009.

When and why did you begin writing?
I began writing when I was in my early teens. I think the first short story I ever wrote was for my 8th grade English class. We were studying Greek Mythology and were asked to write our own tale based on the characters found within that tradition, incorporating their personalities, attributes and relationships. My teacher was so impressed with my story that she recommended me for the Honors English track when I entered high school.

When I was sixteen I began writing a love story about a couple in 18th century England. I don’t remember all of the details, except that the characters and situations were amazingly similar to those found in So Faithful a Heart. It’s astounding considering that I didn’t begin my research on Nancy Storace for another twenty-four years.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?
I would say that I personally considered myself a writer when I was in college. I wrote several short works and articles for various college publications and newspapers. I enjoyed writing on historical, political, and musical subjects.

What inspired you to write So Faithful A Heart?
In the fall of 1999 I began work on my master of music in vocal performance and pedagogy. I had already put in several years worth of research on Mozart, my favorite composer, when I stumbled upon some information about one of his favorite sopranos and his original Susanna in his comic opera Le Nozze di Figaro, Nancy Storace. I was fascinated by her story and astounded by the fact that despite the wealth of information about her, so little had been written, recently, of her. When I learned that many notable and respected Mozart historians believed that Mozart had been in love with her, and that there was evidence that he had written a series of letters to her that many believed to have been love letters, my interest was piqued. The chair of my graduate committee encouraged me to write my master’s thesis on Storace and her relationship with Mozart and I took him up on that advice. Years later, after traveling to Vienna with my partner, S. K. Waller to be featured in a documentary for Mozart’s 250th birthday, and putting in more background research into both Mozart and Storace, I felt compelled to write their story. It was as if Mozart and Nancy came to me and told me that I they had chosen me to write it. It was an epiphany, for lack of a better term.

How did you come up with the title?
The title is taken from a line in the concert aria that Mozart composed for Nancy as a gift in 1787, C’hio mi scordi di te…Non temer amato bene, K. 505. He composed it using obbligato piano—actually a duet for voice and piano—and played the piano part himself in her farewell concert in late February of 1787. The text is a lover’s lament over his forced separation from his love, and how, despite their cruel separation, his heart will always remain faithful to her.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?
There are several messages in this novel that I believe are important, but I suppose that if I had to pin it down to the most important message, it’s that love transcends all manmade limitations. Human beings try to place all sorts of religious, moral, and ethical boundaries upon love, but two people can, and will, love one another, whether it’s within the scope of all the rules and regulations or not.

How much of the book is actual fact?
Well, personally, I believe it to be completely factual. It’s extremely difficult to pin it down to a percentage of what is fact and what is “fiction”. Of course, all of the love scenes and dialogue that take place between the characters are fictional. However, I based the structure of the story—timelines, dates, events, places, etc.—on documented facts taken from both Mozart’s and Storace’s biographies. There is nothing in this novel that couldn’t have happened, and any of what I have written as “fiction” could easily have taken place.

What was the easiest part of writing your book?
People will laugh, but the easiest parts of this book were the love scenes. Why? Because the emotions that poured forth from these two people for one another were so powerful and profound, those scenes literally wrote themselves.

What was the most difficult?
The most difficult technically was Nancy’s nervous breakdown on stage and staying within the 18th century’s limited understanding of human psychology and mental illness. The most difficult, emotionally, was the scene where John Fisher nearly beat Nancy to death with his fists. Domestic violence is horrible no matter the century in which it’s depicted.

What do you think your readers learn from your book?
I hope they learn that we cannot judge people from two-hundred years past by our 21st century standards, and that people are people no matter what time in history or culture they come from. Human beings have been plagued with the same difficulties and life lessons from the dawn of time. We return to this planet over and over again to learn those life lessons and to learn better how to love.

What books have most influenced your life most?
The first historical fiction novel I ever read was Gone With the Wind. I read it when I was thirteen years old, and in the course of about two years, I read it six times. I think that the strength and tenacity of the characters in the face of overwhelming tragedy were what stood out to me, and I often drew from their courage and strength, years later, when faced with the seemingly insurmountable difficulties in my own life. We should never underestimate the influential power of fictional literature upon our lives.

If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?
I consider my partner, Steph, my mentor. From the first time I read her historical fiction novel, Night Music: The Memoirs of Wolfgang Amadè Mozart, I was struck by her ability to make her characters so real, so human, and so accessible emotionally that I could literally see them and even sense them around me. I got lost in their lives, in their story. Writing is about communication, and some writers allow themselves to get in the way of communicating by following too many rules of writing (things that publishers and editors demand these days), and they don’t allow the characters to come to life. Steph is one of the few whose stories are easy to believe because her characters are so real.

Are you working on a new book?
I am. Don’t ask me what it’s about yet, because I haven’t completely decided. I’m not sure that I’ll write another historical fiction anytime soon. I spent ten years researching this one and I’m not entirely sure that I want to spend that much time researching another one!

Did you learn anything from writing your book, and what was it?
I learned that writer’s block is only a lazy excuse. If you have a story to tell and you have the ability to write, then there is no excuse not to write it.

Do you have any advice for other writers?
Just write. Don’t get bogged down by the rules. Don’t worry about whether or not it’s “publishable”. You have a story to tell—tell it. Your editor will help you fix it later on.

Do you have anything specific that you want to say to your readers?
No, I was not uncomfortable writing the sex scenes in this book. So Faithful a Heart is a love story—a sometimes very torrid, passionate, and heated love story about two very passionate people. Although this book is an historical fiction and not a romance novel, the sex scenes are vivid because of the nature of the story. Without them it would be rather bloodless and flat.