December 1791 to January 1792

Notices of Mozart’s death in various English periodicals

The World, 21 Dec 1791 (Nr. 1552)

Wolfgang Mozart, the celebrated German
Composer, died at Vienna on the night of the
5th inst. – By his death the Musical World will
sustain an irreparable loss.

The World, 1791-12-21

⁣⁣⁣Morning Post and Daily Advertiser, 24 Dec 1791 (Nr. 5815)

⁣
           VIENNA.
         December 7.

Morning Post, 1791-12-24a

[...]
     We have just lost the celebrated Mozart, who
died suddenly at the age of 36. This famous Mu-
sician, who was considered as the greatest genius, as
a Composer, that we ever possessed, had finished a
few weeks before his death, four pieces, in which
he even surpassed himself in modulation and force
of expression. He is as much regretted by the
Court as by the Public.

Morning Post, 1791-12-24b

Commentary

News of Mozart's death reached London by 20 Dec 1791, when Haydn wrote his famous evaluation of the late composer's talent (Dokumente, 375). The earliest printed reference in an English source is apparently the above notice in The World of 21 Dec (first cited in Jones 2009, 155). Very similar or identical reports appeared over the next few days in the following papers:

22 Dec

London Chronicle (Nr. 5512); Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser (Nr. 19668); Whitehall Evening Post (Nr. 6763)

23 Dec

Lloyd's Evening Post (Nr. 5380), Public Advertiser (Nr. 17930)

24 Dec

Times (Neue Folge, 76); Morning Chronicle (Nr. 7034, with Mozart's death "on the 15th")

The report was also picked up in:

Gentleman's Magazine 61 (1791): 1165; Annual Register or a View of the History, Politics, and Literature for the Year 1791, 48; Literary Magazine and British Review 8 (Jan 1792): 77; and European Magazine and London Review 21 (Jan 1792): 78.

Thus the news of Mozart's death received a very wide distribution in the British press. The idea of an "irreplaceable loss" may derive ultimately from a similar phrase in the announcement of Mozart's death in the Wiener Zeitung (Dokumente, 369).

The notice in the Morning Post (first cited in Jenkins 1998, 142) appears as part of general news from Vienna. It seems to be related to similar reports in the German press (see Neue Folge, 76). The "four pieces" ("four quartets" in the German sources) is probably a garbled reference to the three "Prussian" quartets, K. 575, K. 589, and K. 590. The report also appeared on 26 Dec in The Star (Nr. 1144) but with a later byline of 10 Dec.

Bibliography

Jenkins, John. 1998. Mozart and the English Connection. London: Cygnus Arts.

Jones, David Wyn. 2009. The Life of Haydn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Credit: David Wyn Jones

Authors: David Black, Dexter Edge

Link(s):

Burney Collection Database (subscription only)

Search Term: mozart

Source Library:

most in London, British Library, Burney Collection

Categories: Biography, Reception

First Published: Wed, 5 Nov 2014

Print Citation:

Black, David, and Dexter Edge. 2014. “Notices of Mozart’s death in various English periodicals (December 1791).” In: Mozart: New Documents, edited by Dexter Edge and David Black. First published 5 November 2014. https://www.mozartdocuments.org/documents/december-1791-to-january-1792/

Web Citation:

Black, David, and Dexter Edge. 2014. “Notices of Mozart’s death in various English periodicals (December 1791).” In: Mozart: New Documents, edited by Dexter Edge and David Black. First published 5 November 2014. [direct link]