Mozart a fraud?

[DavidW]

Newman, I am curious if you enjoy listening to the compositions attributed to Mozart?

[Gurn Blanston]

Congratulations to Gurn Blanston for his remarkable achievement of never having confused Mozart with the music of any other composer.  Since no less than 63 composers have had works falsely attributed to Mozart in Mozart industry approved publications over the past 200 years you are setting a good record. And the Mozart situation is totally unique for massive misattributions. The confusion is total. And, in each and every edition of the Koechel catalogue these 'experts' have been forced to keep removing items. The 8th edition of this farce will remove at least another 8 works. LOL !!

Perhaps you should be approached by publishers of the Koechel catalogue for editorship of the 9th edition to stop the bleeding before a complete blood transfusion is necessary  !!!

You're amusing, Robert. I don't want to fall into your bad habit of upbraiding other posters, but please note that I didn't mention music in that post, not even once. What I don't confuse about them is their biographies...

Of course, there is always the problem of people who speak the same musical language sounding confusingly alike. IMO, if you have real problems telling 'Haydn' and 'Mozart' apart, you will never be able to tell Vanhal from Ditters. I speak from experience here...

A couple of posts later you will find the spot where I brought music into the equation. In a post of yours a few years back on the Mozart Forum,
you self-admittedly can't tell Mozart's music from Haydn's. Well, nearly all the time I can. But all those other guys, whose music I quite enjoy, the fact is you could shake them up in a sack and pull one out, and in most cases they can't be differentiated. Which is one more brick in the wall of reasons why none of them wrote Mozart's music for him.

And I would like to add here one more thing before absenting myself from this discussion: what musicologists do ex post facto 50, 100, and 200+ years after Mozart's death has little or nothing to do with Mozart himself. Your "raging against the machine" of establishment can never, and will never affect Mozart himself in any way. I should have imagined that a bright fellow like you would have realized that by now. Yet, somehow, not...




----------------
Listening to:
Academy of St. Cecilia Chorus & Orchestra / Myung-Whun Chung - Bia 538 Op 117 Incidental music to "King Stephan" pt 08 - Ihr edlen Ungarn! Hort mein Stimme!: Maestoso con moto - Andante maestoso - Maestoso con moto

[robnewman]

Hi there Gurn,

The truth remains that 'Mozart' has always been a hotchpotch of musical misattributions. More so, in fact, than virtually any other famous composer. And that is a clear, indisputable fact. I think you might realise what the track record is trying to tell you.

But you've not seen the arguments that I will present. I've hardly touched on the little known aspects of his biography or of his associations. When you've seen the fuller picture I predict you will say, 'That man Newman was right, after all'.

Now, I cannot repair car engines and I have no abilities as a bricklayer or as a sailor. But on this particular subject forgive me thinking that I may yet produce something worthy of your appreciation.

Regards

[robnewman]

Newman, I am curious if you enjoy listening to the compositions attributed to Mozart?

DavidW,

Yes, some of the music attributed to Mozart is amongst the finest of the 18th or any other century. I've always believed this. But if you listen to all of it you will agree that some of it is hardly worthy of any composer and is of poor quality. So, yes, let's consider the whole picture, and not just those parts which we always hear.

Have you heard the early quartets of Mozart. They are rubbish. And there is, stylistically, nothing 'Mozartean' about them. They could have been written by almost anyone. Such is the reality. The same is true of many, many other works.

[robnewman]

You are a liar.

Cato may be no fun sometimes, but he's one of the most intellectually rigorous people on this site, and we know it.  There's a saying, it doesn't matter whether the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone.  It's going to be bad for the pitcher.  You can criticize Cato this way, it only reflects worse on you.

Scarpia,

Since you have nothing to contribute to this thread and are being allowed to call me a 'liar' I have no more time to give to you on this thread. Cato can speak for himself.

Finally, you know perfectly well what I said of Mozart and his public reception in Vienna. I told you repeatedly and was online for a full day on the subject. Read it again.

Anyway, we hope you find another thread.

[robnewman]

Cato writes -

Bold A: No!  YOUR TURN to answer simply YES or NO: will you provide us a list of the paleographers, archivists, etc, from around Europe whom you met while researching the original documents?

Bold B: Because you claim to have answered questions which everyone reading this knows you did not answer!!!

Bold C: "Merely copied" still means you need to study the manuscripts of everyone involved paleographically for evidence of fraud.

Bold D: Yes, and I am still waiting for your facts.

In reply -

I am now going to ask you again to tell us which books you have ever read which call in to question Mozart's reputation as a composer and as a performer. And we are STILL waiting for your reply. You can't answer, can you Cato ? Because the truth is you have read none. Why not just admit it ?

Evidence of Mozart's career consists of many kinds. Not just the fact that manuscripts exist. Anyone can create a manuscript. Mozart created lots of manuscripts. But he was not the composer of this music. So, please try to think a little more deeply before you post on this subject.

As for the rest, I hope you mature to the point where you can examine issues from more than one side. Right ?  Which is what you must be able to do if you want to be informed. Otherwise you will end up like those 'Mozarteans' who posture as though they know their subject but who have never once examined the arguments against their own dogmas.

[robnewman]

No apology needed!  

And has everything to do with Newman's charade.

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

Professor Karl Henning,

At the fourth time of asking, will you please provide me with an email address so that I can send you free of charge the remarkable book of Bianchini/Trombetta/Newman (2008) which examines the documentary evidence for 'Le Nozze di Figaro' based on the actual theatre score used in Vienna in May of 1786 and others used in the years which followed ?  From which you will see lots of evidence this music is NOT by Mozart, but is instead an arrangement of already existing music which was hastily translated into the Italian language from the German by Lorenzo da Ponte and re-arranged (badly) by W.A. Mozart. And will you provide us the name of some books, even one, which calls in to question the musical talents and achievements of W.A. Mozart ? Since you have so far failed to give an answer to these questions. And it shows. You have not read any such books, have you ? Nor can you name even one.

And it shows ! That is dogmatism, plain and simple.

[karlhenning]

Yes, some of the music attributed to Mozart is amongst the finest of the 18th or any other century. I've always believed this. But if you listen to all of it you will agree that some of it is hardly worthy of any composer and is of poor quality. So, yes, let's consider the whole picture, and not just those parts which we always hear.

LOL

Have you heard the early quartets of Mozart. They are rubbish. And there is, stylistically, nothing 'Mozartean' about them. They could have been written by almost anyone. Such is the reality. The same is true of many, many other works.

As 'musicology', that is utter rubbish.  It is dogmatism, plain and simple.

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

[robnewman]

Speaking as somebody who knows Gurn Blanston, this is probably not a bad idea.

Yes Brian, he (Gurn Blanston) has always been open-minded over the several years I have seen his posts on Mozart. Seriously. I want to extend my offer to him to send a book on the opera 'Le Nozze di Figaro' free of charge by email. And the same to yourself.

Regards

[robnewman]

LOL

As 'musicology', that is utter rubbish.  It is dogmatism, plain and simple.

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

Good morning to Professor Karl,

May I send you a book recently published which indicates that 'Le Nozze di Figaro' is not music by Mozart ? Which I will happily send to you free if you provide an email address. We wouldn't want you to know things from only one perspective, would we ?  People might start to realise they've been deceived. But let others judge if you avoid answering the question, right ?

As for dogmatism, this exists when the person refuses to appreciate the views of others. Which is really the 'pot calling the kettle black', isn't it, Prof. Karl ?

[Cato]

Cato writes -

Bold A: No!  YOUR TURN to answer simply YES or NO: will you provide us a list of the paleographers, archivists, etc, from around Europe whom you met while researching the original documents?

Bold B: Because you claim to have answered questions which everyone reading this knows you did not answer!!!

Bold C: "Merely copied" still means you need to study the manuscripts of everyone involved paleographically for evidence of fraud.

Bold D: Yes, and I am still waiting for your facts.

In reply -

I am now going to ask you again to tell us which books you have ever read which call in to question Mozart's reputation as a composer and as a performer. And we are STILL waiting for your reply. You can't answer, can you Cato ? Because the truth is you have read none. Why not just admit it ?

Evidence of Mozart's career consists of many kinds. Not just the fact that manuscripts exist. Anyone can create a manuscript. Mozart created lots of manuscripts. But he was not the composer of this music. So, please try to think a little more deeply before you post on this subject.

As for the rest, I hope you mature to the point where you can examine issues from more than one side. Right ?  Which is what you must be able to do if you want to be informed. Otherwise you will end up like those 'Mozarteans' who posture as though they know their subject but who have never once examined the arguments against their own dogmas.

Bold A: I have already answered "No" to this question.  Why do you keep saying I have not answered it?  Is it because - as everyone here knows - you STILL have not answered one of my questions?   

Bold B: Which means that they leave behind EVIDENCE of their fraud to a paleographer:  we await your EVIDENCE!

Bold C: Please say that while looking in a mirror! 

[Cato]

Es gibt hier viele Märchen!

Herr Neumann: ich möchte Ihnen eine Frage stellen, nämlich ob Sie Deutsch können?

Dann habe ich eine zweite wichtigere Frage: haben Sie persönlich die originellen Manuskripte von Mozart, Vanhal, Myslivececk, Righini, Fiala, Luchesi, Paul Wranitsky, Anton Wranitsky etc. gelesen und verglichen?

Wenn ja, dann haben Sie zweifellos eine Liste der Namen der Bibliothekare, die Ihnen mit den MSS. geholfen haben, und auch eine  Liste der Tage und Jahre, an denen Sie die verschiedenen Bibliotheken und Archiven besucht haben?  Können Sie das uns zeigen?

So eine Unternehmung muss viel Geld kosten: wer hat Sie finanziell unterstützt, damit Sie Wien, Prag, u.s.w. besuchen können, um zu beweisen, Mozart sei ein grosser Betrüger?

Translation:

There are many fairy tales here!   0:)

Mr. Neumann: I would like to ask you a question, namely, can you read and speak German?

Then I have a second, more important question: have you personally read and compared the original manuscripts ofMozart, Vanhal, Myslivececk, Righini, Fiala, Luchesi, Paul Wranitsky, Anton Wranitsky etc.?

If so, then you indubitably have a list of all the librarians who helped you with the manuscripts, along with a list of the days and years when you visited the various libraries and archives?  Can you show us that?

Such an undertaking costs much money: who has supported you financially, so that you can visit Vienna, Prague, and so on, in order to prove that Mozart was a grand fake?

Zeigen Sie uns, bitte, solchen Beweis!  Dann können wir Ihnen eine Glaubensgelegenheit schenken!

Show us such evidence, please!  Then we can grant you a chance to be believed!

Waiting, waiting, waiting for Godotdämmerung as well as for this evidence!   0:)

[robnewman]

Cato,

For 200 years buffoons like yourself have writing nonsense on Mozart with virtually no criticism. That's not musicology. It's propaganda. It's official hogwash. And now it's being exposed. 'Mozart studies' (so-called) exist within a bubble. And always have. You can't even read books being offered to you on the specifics of the subject. You want others to be as ignorant as yourself. All the time claiming no evidence has been presented.

I am offering repeatedly to send you evidence, in respect of 'Le Nozze di Figaro'. Now, stop fooling around. If you want evidence tell us. Otherwise your scam is exposed.

The Mozart industry and its version of 'musicology' is designed for the musical underachiever. It's the FOX news of classical music. So where is your email address ?

Sounds to me like your bluff has been called Cato, right ?

[karlhenning]

Cato,

For 200 years buffoons like yourself have writing nonsense on Mozart with virtually no criticism.

Thank you for yet again no response of substance, and a reversion to ad hominem which is an implicit acknowledgement of the entire insufficiency of your "claim."

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

[karlhenning]

Sounds to me like your bluff has been called Cato, right ?

How interesting that you speak of bluffs which have been called!

Fact: Mozart learned music from his father, a professional musician.

Fact: Newman consistently glosses over this fact.

Fact: Newman consistently lies, by asserting the opposite.

Fact: Mozart's string quartets do not just sound like the string quartets of his lesser contemporaries.

Fact: Newman's only answer to this is boilerplate on the order of "the music of Josef Myslivececk is amazingly 'Mozartean', yes?"

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

[greg]

Fact: Mozart's string quartets do not just sound like the string quartets of his lesser contemporaries.

Even if they did, how would it be explained that he "got better" by the time of writing his last symphonies?
(then again, not sure i want to know, cause i see more blahblahblah coming up)

[karlhenning]

Bold A: I have already answered "No" to this question.  Why do you keep saying I have not answered it?  Is it because - as everyone here knows - you STILL have not answered one of my questions?   

Bold B: Which means that they leave behind EVIDENCE of their fraud to a paleographer:  we await your EVIDENCE!

Bold C: Please say that while looking in a mirror! 

I think we understand why there is as yet no news of a publisher taking up Mr Newman's "smoking gun" exposé!

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

[Cato]

Cato,

I am offering repeatedly to send you evidence, in respect of 'Le Nozze di Figaro'. Now, stop fooling around. If you want evidence tell us. Otherwise your scam is exposed.

The Mozart industry and its version of 'musicology' is designed for the musical underachiever. It's the FOX news of classical music.

So where is your email address ?

Sounds to me like your bluff has been called Cato, right ?

Bold A: AGAIN, where are the answers to my questions posed above?   

Bold B: Which scam is that?  "The Mozart Code"   Which is free?

Bold C: Irrelevant and ignorant.

Bold D: Hesse3000@totalmail.com  Is this the same available on line?

Bold E: Which bluff is that?

[karlhenning]

Even if they did, how would it be explained that he "got better" by the time of writing his last symphonies?
(then again, not sure i want to know, cause i see more blahblahblah coming up)

Aye, in absence of any meat on the bones of his "claim," the propagandist is generous with blahblahblah  

BTW, did you know that Stravinsky did not actually compose any of the music commonly ascribed to him?  Don't laugh! Consider this:

To criticise in some detail the 'official' career of  I.F. Stravinsky (1882-1971), to call in to question his musical abilities, both as a composer and as a legendary performer, to ask if he was truly the composer of virtually all the great musical works that are published and widely performed in his name, to question the truthfulness and reliability of documents which date from his own time, many of them describing him as being a musical 'genius', to question the contents of well known Stravinsky biographies - to argue, instead, that the life and musical career of this St Petersburg 'genius', this colossus of western culture, was really a gigantic cultural fraud of the late Romanov Dynasty virtually from beginning to end (a fraud continued and further exaggerated for decades after his death by sympathetic publishers and propagandists) - these are views so controversial, so unusual and so rarely considered within 'polite and educated society' that a number of experts who specialise in these areas of study, having heard that such a work may appear soon and being alarmed at the prospect of it becoming reality are queuing up to rescue the iconic status of their musical hero from such a strange, seemingly unprovoked and lengthy attack. Saying that I must have studied my subject for too long, that mine is the work of a man whose fertile imagination has 'got the better of him', that I've succumbed to a rare academic illness, that publication of a work against the Stravinsky we all know and love may even corrupt the young, that it might lead to ugliness within their beautiful world if read by the innocent etc., and that the views expressed here and the evidence presented in its support are the musicological equivalent of  'tilting at windmills' or of 'whistling in to the wind'.

Stravinsky is, of course, big business. And yet you may be surprised to know how rarely his huge musical status and his alleged achievements have ever been criticised in any detail.  'Stravinsky studies' (so-called) is an elitist and highly conservative offshoot of musicology whose workers assume 'everything we have heard and read of Stravinsky is true' or, at least, so worthy of belief that the paradigm that underpins this virtual secular religion is hardly appreciated. The first American musician to propagate Stravinsky's music and to disseminate information on him, Robert Craft, is today seen internationally as a reliable confidant of the composer and is able to obtain funding, regularly, for vast promotional work that is read and believed as reliable worldwide. Stravinsky has been for almost a century one of the pillars of the musical establishment - a subject so complex and so highly regarded by teachers and schools in widely available literature that it may seem unthinkable that any complaint, however well researched, can be made against its ethos, and against the industry which promotes and has come to dominate the education of students in matters of musical history.

And yet criticise Stravinsky we must, since there is no science, nor any body of academic study, great or small, which should escape or avoid detailed criticism of the assumptions on which it is based and on which it has always been based.

Have you listened to Stravinsky's Symphony № 1?  LOL  It could have been written by any of a dozen of his suppressed contemporaries.  

Stravinsky's iconic status within western musical culture is little more than a fantasy, a fairy story. But one that has a global fan base. Manufactured in the late 1920s and still, today, dominating the teaching of music history to a grotesque extent. But on issue after issue the facts surrounding Stravinsky's life, career and even his reputation as a performer and composer simply do not add up. Crucially important evidence was hidden, turned on its head, systematically, routinely, even traditionally, its sources often out of reach and massaged by an endless stream of biographers, each quoting the other, in a mockery of musicology. To subscribe to the Stravinsky myth you will be made ignorant, almost without realising it, of virtually all of Stravinsky's musical contemporaries in preWWI Petersburg, just for a start. You will be asked to believe things of him which dumb down your own critical faculties.  And this is not new. It's been happening for decades in countless publications, and even in film, in a storyline which is rarely, if ever, subjected to cross-examination and criticism but which we can and must give to any area of valid research.  Stravinsky studies' (so-called) exist and have always existed in a bubble. As to whether they are a valid branch of musicology is for readers to decide.

Do yourself a favour. Examine this issue from more than one side so you can form your own judgement. This great music today attributed to I.F. Stravinsky is not that of a provincial St Petersburg musician. Stravinsky, in fact, spent not a single day at music school in his entire life nor studied for any period of time under any recognised teacher of music. History deserves better. So does music. And so do you.

Someone, please: send Rob Newman to school!

[Gurn Blanston]

I don't believe that 'Stravinsky' as such even actually existed. I think our impressions of the 'Stravinsky' that we 'knew' is actually the result of years of forgery, fraud and fakery, where music from (non nomen) peers, cleverly juxtaposed with body doubles and the earliest experiments with sound synching (which came to full fruition only with the great Brittany Spears), have successfully duped the public, and more importantly, those few sincere members of the musicology profession who have then served to perpetuate the fraud ad infinitum.

Just sayin',