Mozart's Requiem

Mozart's Requiem was first introduced to the public by a performance of it in Vienna, soon after the composer's death, which happened on December 5, 1791. The hall it was performed in was crowded, showing it attracted great attention. Mozart had taken on some work received by the hands of an mysterious messenger, who had made so strong an impression on the composer's mind, with a super-natural warning of his own approaching death and to lead him to the firm assumptions, that the work he was about to write would be of his own funeral. Under this assumption, he worked at the composition with almost extraordinary abilities. His feelings proved to be too farsighted and death seized him almost with the pen still in his hand. The re-appearance of

I owe too much to the instruction of this great mall that I should silently allow a composition, the greater part of which is my work, to be given out for his, as I am firmly convinced that my work is unworthy of this great man. Mozart's composition is so unique, and, I venture to assert, so unattainable by the greater part of living composers, that every imitator attempting to pass off his work for that of Mozart, would come worse off than the crow in the fable, who decked himself in peacock's feathers. I will now state how it happened that the completion of the Requiem, which is the subject of our correspondence came to be entrusted to me. Mozart's widow could foresee that the posthumous works of her husband would be sought after. Death surprised him while he was yet working at this Requiem. The completion of the work was, for this reason, offered to several masters- some of them could not undertake the work on account of pressing engagements, and others would not compromise themselves by the comparison of their talents with those of Mozart. At last it came to me, as it was known that while Mozart was yet alive, I had often played and sung, through with him the parts he had already set to music-that he had very often conversed with me upon the development of the work, and had communicated to me the principal features (den Gang und die Grunde) of his instrumentation. I can only wish that I may have succeeded or at least may have so worked that competent critics may here and there find, in what I have done, some traces of his never to be forgotten teaching. To the Requiem with the Kyrie, the Dies Irae, and the Domine Jesu, Mozart has fully completed the four vocal parts