3. Mozart's masonic music.

Like many of his contemporaries in the Austria of the Enlightenment, Mozart found the ideals of freemasonry enormously attractive. Though a Catholic, he was initiated into the first degree of the Craft, that of Apprentice (Lehrling), on 11 December 1784 in the lodge ‘Zur Wohltätigkeit’ in Vienna. His contact with freemasonry antedated his initiation, however: as early as 1773 he had written incidental music (k345/336a) for T.P. Gebler's masonic play Thamos, König in Ägypten, and in 1778 he at least considered writing a melodrama on Otto von Gemmingen's ‘masonic’ libretto Semiramis (von Gemmingen was later to be the Venerable of Mozart's first lodge). Mozart's progress through the early stages of freemasonry was fairly rapid: he reached the third degree, that of Master, by April 1785, and it seems that part of his contribution to his lodge included musical performance. For example, Mozart and his friend and lodge brother Anton Stadler, the clarinettist, organized a concert at their lodge for 20 October 1787 (see Nettl, 1932) with a programme including specifically masonic works (hymns, Mozart's cantata Die Maurerfreude k471, and two symphonies by the freemason Paul Wranitzky) as well as apparently non-masonic ones, notably a concerto for basset-horn and another for clarinet – both instruments, however, being held in high regard in masonic circles. Besides such performing activities Mozart composed a number of works for special occasions at Viennese lodges, especially during his first two years of membership. The cantata Dir, Seele des Weltalls k429/468a is thought to have been composed for a masonic celebration to which non-members were invited, and the song Gesellenreisek468, on a text by Joseph von Ratschky, was composed as a welcome to new Journeymen (Gesellen) entering the second degree of the Craft. Die Maurerfreude was composed in 1785 to honour Ignaz von Born, secretary of the Austrian Grand Lodge and a leading moral and intellectual figure in Vienna. The brief Maurerische Trauermusik k477/479a is now thought to have been written for the installation of a Master, as that ritual includes funerary imagery, not, as has been suggested, for the memorial service of two of Mozart's lodge brothers (it was performed on the latter occasion, but was composed in July 1785, several months before the brothers' death). These works, along with the much later cantatas Die ihr des unermesslichen Weltalls Schöpfer ehrt k619 and Laut verkünde unsre Freude k623, are properly considered masonic music, because they were explicitly intended for use in various aspects of the ritual, and they incorporate typically masonic musical symbols. Such is not the case, curiously, with a number of Mozart's works that have been adopted by the Craft for ceremonial use, including the Lobegesang auf die feierliche Johannisloge k148/125h, the Marian gradual Sancta Maria k273, the Adagio and Fugue in C minor k546, the Adagio and Rondo in C k617 and the motet Ave verum corpus k618.

Musical reflections of masonic imagery in Mozart's works are seen most clearly in his best-known masonic work, Die Zauberflöte (1791). The symbolism of the libretto (written by a freemason, Emanuel Schikaneder) merits close attention. The trials to which the two couples are subjected are thought to replicate those of the different stages of masonic initiation, and the relative success of worldly and spiritual attitudes in entering the mysteries of the Craft is reflected in the denial of initiation to Papageno and Papagena. Tamino and Pamina, by virtue of their strength of character and willingness to seek higher wisdom, are welcomed into the brotherhood, which is represented by a chorus of priests led by Sarastro, a character said to have been modelled on Ignaz von Born. The Queen of Night and her Ladies represent the unenlightened state, as does, ultimately, the dark Monostatos (for a detailed literary and musical analysis of the opera as a masonic parable see Chailley, 1968).

Musical symbolism directly related to masonic rites and images has been found in Mozart's score. Chailley argued that the tonal scheme of the opera reflected the changing attitudes of the characters and emphasized their worldly or spiritual ambitions. Thus the key of E serves as the perfect masonic tonality, the three flats of its signature reflecting both the threefold initiation rite and the three pillars of the ‘temple of humanity’; the relative minor (C) symbolizes an incomplete grasp of masonic ideals, while sharp keys are thought to represent worldly interests, and the neutral key of C major, according to Chailley, serves as the context for oracular statements. This thesis remains speculative, but may be supported by the fact that most of Mozart's explicitly masonic music, such as the cantatas k429/468a and 471, is in the ‘masonic’ tonality of E. Another aspect of masonic symbolism, reflected in rhythmic motifs, may be found in Die Zauberflöte. The number three has various ritual meanings in the Craft, the most common ones being an association with the third degree or Masters of the lodge and the representation of the three pillars of the temple. This is represented by various rhythmic ideas, of which the threefold repetition of chords is the most obvious (Chailley has further pointed out that the number five, associated with women's lodges, is also used).