An
Interview With W. A. Mozart of Salzburg, Vienna, and Other Places With Germanic
Names
by Tom Dempster
Last time I fomented anger among the ranks of people in the music community.
I received a number of terrific (and by terrific I do not mean the general common
everyday sense – I mean it as horrifying. Terrifying. The grammar of some
of these missives borders on the shocking, the content egregious in its own
right, and I am loathe to reprint most of them) emails about my prequel to the
interview with Mozart. There were those who dug deep into my soul, questioning
my integrity as a new music supporter. One of the most rampant and flawed arguments
was that I should support all new music – not just avant-garde art music
or electroacoustic music or what, but new pop, new reggae, new folk, all that
jazz. Let me set something straight here: I said nothing about those genres
being any lesser or greater than anything else out there on the aural buffet
line, but there are, as I alluded to, so many hors d’oeuvers on the feed
table that are filled with empty calories, some unwholesome, and some that are
plainly terrible. Am I a snob? Yes. An elitist? Maybe. Show me one professionally
trained artist in any field that isn’t to some degree picky or discriminating,
and I will wax your bum and make it shinier than Wednesday morning. What I am
saying is that the dead are being honored without being among the undead, that
classical music in this country – and many others – is a field inhabited
only by corpses, people who have not touched pen and paper in decades –
and in some case centuries – but yet get treated as though they are the
outright messiahs of all things musical. I could also elaborate on another point,
one that caused such a torrent among the reading masses: instead of pumping
the plate of music full of fattening nothing, bland and tasteless top 40, we
could put some fulfilling, delicious, exquisite things on the table just by
making music smarter in general and training the populace to recognize what
it means to have smart music. Think on it for a second: music is one of the
few art forms that has regressed since the intellectual and artistic heydays
of thirty-plus years ago. There are a number of exceptions, of course, but on
the whole, mental dust has covered up whatever progress was being made. And
Mozart shares this concern from beyond the grave.
TD: Thank you very much for taking the time –
W A Mozart: Ach, it war nussink. Ich hab’ all day für
speaking mit you. Ich bin dead, you know.
TD: Yes, I’m quite aware. But thank you anyway for
taking the time out of your busy schedule –
WAM: Bizzee? Bizzee? Ach, come on, Herr Tom. I war only playink
fooßball mit Cselaw Milosz. I owe some money to Borges – I bet against
Brazil and I owe him some Geld. But, you are ferry velcome. Ist mein pleasure
to be hier.
TD: The pleasure is all mine. So, the first time I contacted
you –
WAM: Mit your – um, um – wie ist gesagt –
Neck-ro-komm-oo-nee-cay-tur?
TD: Yes. Necrocommunicator. The first time I contacted
you, you had just finished reading my column from the September issue. In your
esteemed opinion, am I anywhere close to being correct?
WAM: [lights up a Meerschaum filled to the brim with opium]
Ja, ja… I ssink daß, daß you are ferry close to being correct
– oder you are at least in za right neighborhood. That Fred Rogers can
drink bier, ja?
TD: I wouldn’t know, and thanks for ruining my childhood
memories for me. Pass that fucker over. [Mozart willingly passes the pipe] Well,
any general comments on the column? I made the statement that there were others
of your generation and of other generations that deserve, if not demand, equal
airtime, so to speak, alongside you and the other so-called masters of the art
forms.
WAM: Ach, ja… Ich agree kumpletely. I mean, I was not
zee only komponist alive betveen the year of our Lord Ein Tausent Sieben Hundert
Sechs un Fünfzig und –
TD: -- and 1791. I don’t have all day, Wolf.
WAM: You lazy Americans. I ran into Washington in 1801 in the
third circle and he was already scheissing himself over your fate.
TD: Yes, we’re all lazy and ignorant and dumb. Anyhow.
Continue.
WAM: -- un Ein Tausend Sieben Hundert Eins und Neunzig. There
war many gut komponists liffing betveen zat time az vell. My good friend Salieri,
and mentor, for instance. He geschreibt gut musik, und he iz neffer ahn ze radio.
Novhere! Zees makes me feel ferry uncomfortablischer. His musik was at least
as gut as mein musik, und he has been – wie ist gesacht – blackholed?
TD: Blackballed?
WAM: Dass not funny. My good violinist freund died of blackballs.
TD: Blackballed means to be blacklisted, overlooked. Not
the brain-rot and warts.
WAM: How much zings change im zwei hundert Jahre… Anyhoo,
ja – [drags off the pipe] [coughs] [drinks a glass of Port] – I
war not zee only music writer alife in dose täge, und zo many people seem
to think I was! Can you velieve it? Iss ridiculous!
TD: So, are you ungrateful that you are so posthumously
famous?
WAM: Vell, I’d be lying eef I said nein. I am ferry happy,
ferry happy indeed, dat people are höring my music und dat zey haff been
for lo the time of your Victrola and what not. Of course, people like you are
overshadowed by me and Beethoven and Hugo Wolf –
TD: Uhh, Wolfgang, Hugo Wolf is not exactly a household
word. In fact, many trained musicians – non-singers, mostly – have
no idea who he is.
WAM: Zat bastard! He told me he was the leader of ze Wien Philharmonischer!
Anyhow, ze recordinks have vitevasched any possible future of komponists. Wir
haben all ziss musik by Wagner und Strauß und mich – und it zeems
like people get zo trapped in their radios und TiVos und CDs that live musik
und neue musik geht am the wayside. Ist sad für mich, für if I hab
known daß mein life voot haff wrecked die futures, Ich voot haff broken
free.
TD: What do you mean, broken free?
WAM: You haff zeen dat awful, awful movie – Amadeus?
Ja?
TD: I have. It shows you as someone who wrote prolifically
and effortlessly and showed you as being a patron of the wench-for-rent. And
very decadent.
WAM: Vell, [coughing from the pipe] as you can zee, Ich bin
ferry decadent. I happen to enjoy the pleasures of the taste, der smell, der
sight. If meinen Augen und Näse un Hände are not freutlich, Ich bin
freutlich nicht.
TD: You’re slipping back into German. Exactly one
reader of this can speak German.
WAM: Ach, es tut mir Leid. Sorry. Ja, ich bin decadent, ja…
But zat movie is fillt mit nonsense! I didn’t just pull pieces ausser
mein ass! And I never, never wrote at a billiards table! You see? Ziss is vat
happens ven people overlook your shitty life und elevate your musik to etwas
– something – it is not meant to be.
TD: What do you mean, shitty life? Could you reflect on
your childhood a little bit for us?
WAM: Vell… From my earliest memories im childhood, I
can say dat ich never hat ein childhood like you may haff hat. I war maybe three
oder vier Jahre alt, und all ich can remember is practicing der piano from after
breakfast to midday, eating a sensible lunch with some wine midday, taking a
short nap, and writing all afternoon and night. Wenn mein vater war takink me
all around Evropa, I did ze same tink on ze road. Wir voot shtop im Kathedrale
in morninks, and mein Vater woult ask if ihr sonne coult practices on ein organ
or on ein klavier. Klavier is your piano, yes.
TD: Jawohl.
WAM: Ja. So, sometimes I didn’t eat until late at night,
especially if I had a performance – und I hat many of them and saw most
of vat ist now Germany und France und Österreich und Italia before I war
zehn jahre alt. Wenn Ich war alt enough, wir stopped tourink zo much, but the
schedule war maintained. I practiced all morning und composed into der small
hours of ze nacht. Mein vater never let me take breaks, never let me have tobacco
until I hat finished something each night… Vitch meant ich hat ferry little
room für ein zocial life. I war im mein mid-tventies before I even managed
to have a girl take off one of her corsets im bett mit mir! Vater war ferry
strict mit mir, und mein work ethic stayed mit me all my life. I punished myself,
toiled, all to die early and leave a rotten corpse.
TD: So, composing was something that was not second nature?
Or did it become so over time?
WAM: Vell, just like anyzink else, I think, I became faster
about it. Und I eventually stopped practicing Klavier so much and devoted almost
all my time to composing. It took me a great deal of time to produce thinks
dat both Vater und I ver in agreement about. Sometimes zee ideas just flowed
aus of mich, you know? I’m sure you haff ze same zings happen for you
sometimes. But, there ver times, und diese ver more often than ze othes, zat
I struggled – labored so painfully – over mein parchment for ten,
zwölf hours ov ze tag, und nussink! Just ein few paltry, sorry notes, mocking
my very forced profession. Und belief me ven I say dat it was forced. Dass one
zing de movie did get right – my relationship mit Vater? Nicht so gut.
If I did not please him, I war nussink. Und I often did not please him. [takes
a draw of the Meerschaum] But I now hab nicht regrets. Wir alle dead, you know.
TD: So this is what you meant by getting out – rather,
“breaking free?”
WAM: Ja, ja, geht ausser frei… I just vanted to studiere
law, make money für mein Weib und Kind – ach, sorry, make money for
my vife und child. But I couldn’t!
TD: Because of your father?
WAM: Vell, to be honest, he war only about three-qvarters of
ze problem. Im mein mid-tventies, I started drinking several litres of wein
a day. I know now that doctors say you should drink a glass a day, but our doctors
used leeches and mercury, für Christos sake! They didn’t know any
better. And I was wasting so much money on payink performers, drinking, tobacco,
opium, vatever, zat über time ich hat nussink left.
TD: Wait – you had to pay your performers?
WAM: [laughing] Ach, du dumbkopf, YES! Vat, you zink dat ze
opera companies und orchesters paid zemselves? I paid each performer I ever
had, and even if I had not been so vasteful mit mein money, there vood not have
been enough for meine familie. But I started drinking heavily, ran up large
debts mit der Fräuleine des Nachts – I particularly liked the public-haus
venches – and my vater actually made me pay him back for all the time
he spent trainink me. And good ink und fine paper wer nicht so cheap im doze
days, you see.
TD: Indeed. So, is this why you died penniless and were
buried in a pauper’s grave?
WAM: Partially. My vater actually hat a familie plot für
graves but refused to pay burial für mich. He hat der money – he
just war so disgusted mit mein life und mein drinking… [takes a sip of
Beaujolais]
TD: But back to your music. Do you think it should have
had such an impact on later composers?
WAM: Vell, dat ist ein ferry complex issue you bring forvärts.
Let me begin by sayink dass I am only viel freutig dass der menschen im all
der verld liebe meine musick soviel. Ach. But – ich muss say dass: Ich
bin kein Gott.
TD: You’re drifting into German again.
WAM: Vell, vat do you expecht? I’m fucking Austrian!
Anyvay, wass war ich gesagt – ach, so. Ich bin nicht a god to people.
Ich never set out to be ein Gott am der menschen. Der var menny menny people,
composers, alive durink mein time who kuld write besser dann ich kann. Und dey
ver all poor, nicht connected in der verld, und über all, had an iota of
shame. They did not believe in demselves and hid behind their pianofortes und
deiner hookers und der food.
TD: Wait, wait. You’re telling me that all I have
to do is believe in myself and in effect I will become a Mozart?
WAM: Vell, I give you none of dass stupid liburul idiocy. But
du musst liebe your musick. And fuck everything in sight in order to get ahead.
Or pay zem all off. But if zee komponist ist dedicatabungenden enough, er will
übercome all of his woes und trageödies. Er will, wie ist gesacht,
rise to super-schtardom im no time. He only needs to network, be a schlimy bastard,
and have on kompunction über anyzink. Und people haff done dass time und
zeit again. Und yet dey see mich as ein Gott! Err, God! Ja.
TD: And you’re not, of course.
WAM: I don’t mind beink kalled ein Gott. But honestly,
people should expand der horizons und see dass der ist mehr muisck out zehr
in dem verld. I charge you all mit dass: go listen to sumvink else.
TD: Thank you so much for that, and thank you for your
time.
WAM: Vat say ve head downtown und pick us up some of dem Ecuadorian
hookers, ach?
TD: Jawohl.
Nächstes Zeit -- Err, next time: We continue our discussion after our downtown
jaunt lands us in the Austin City Jail, discussing Top 40 and the endless revolutionary
tide of the 1960s and 1970s that came to a screeching halt around the time the
Gipper bombed Granada...