In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Musik am Dom zu Salzburg. Repertoire und liturgisch gebundene Praxis zwischen Hochbarocker Repräsentation und Mozart-Kult by Von Eva Neumayr, Lars E. Laubhold und Ernst Hintermaier
  • Karina Zybina
Musik am Dom zu Salzburg. Repertoire und liturgisch gebundene Praxis zwischen Hochbarocker Repräsentation und Mozart-Kult. Von Eva Neumayr, Lars E. Laubhold und Ernst Hintermaier. Wien: Hollitzer Verlag, 2018. (Schriftenreihe des Archivs der Erzdiözese Salzburg, 18.) [iv, 416 p. ISBN 978-3-99012-539-7 (hardcover) € 55; ISBN 978-3-99012-540-3 (e-book) €49.99]

The present book can be used in several ways. First and foremost, it is a self-standing study. The authors, Eva Neumayr, Lars E. Laubhold, and Ernst Hintermaier, take as their starting point Patrick Bircher's interdisciplinary study on architecture, art, liturgy, and music relationships in the seventeenth century Salzburg Cathedral, Ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam (Regensburg: Schnell & Steiner, 2015), but extend their chronological framework to 1841 (the formal establishment of the Salzburg Dom-Musikverein and the Mozarteum), and concentrate entirely on music, viewing it in its historical, liturgical, and ceremonial contexts. In a kaleidoscopic way, a sequence of essays continually shifts the reader's attention from one topic to another, systematically exploring a variety of non-musical factors behind the musical activities of the Salzburg Cathedral, meticulously recording all the details of the musical events that took place in the church, and eventually discovering their traces.

The seven essays can be grouped in three parts. The first part views all musical events as the integral components of a more comprehensive, centralised, and hierarchical system, and not just as the results of composers' creative processes. Its focus is on the dual function of the Salzburg Cathedral as a metropolitan church on the one hand (the first two essays: 'Der Dom als Metropolitankirche', and 'Geschichte der Musik an der Metropolitankirche'), and as a city parish church on the other hand (the third essay, 'Der Dom als Stadtpfarrkirche'). The second part is [End Page 374] centred around the music written specifically for the Cathedral. It explores several fundamental aspects of performance practice, musicians' placement, and the basic 'rules' of scoring, discusses the role of individual orchestral instruments, and outlines the repertoire constraints that impacted the reception history of the late Renaissance and Baroque traditions throughout the eighteenth century ('Aspekte der Aufführungspraxis'). It also pays tribute to the Salzburg 'cult figure', Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, revising his Salzburg activities and stressing their significance for his entire career ('Sonderfall Mozart'). The focus of the third part is on the archival collection itself. It gives an overview of the significant milestones of its development from the beginning of the nineteenth century until the present day ('Die Sammlung Dommusikarchiv'), and detects its traces in Austrian, Swiss, and Italian libraries ('Der Salzburger Dom als Ausgangspunkt der Verbreitung musikalischer Quellen').

Secondly, the book can serve as a supplement to the catalogue that animates its records and turns them from preliminary sketches to colourful paintings. To show one random example, the litany De Venerabili Sacramento in D major by Joachim Joseph Fuetsch (catalogue no. 860, p. 350 of the catalogue volume) is tightly integrated in this book into the Forty Hours Devotion, traditionally performed 'in the evening around 7 o'clock on the great choir [of the Salzburg Cathedral] with a collaboration of numerous musicians' (p. 10). Its author is presented not only as a prominent composer, the student of Leopold Mozart and Michael Haydn (pp. 348–349), but also as one of the most important Salzburg scribes who was involved in the production of the 1822 inventory and the catalogue of the musical collection (p. 262)—a sample of documents preserving his handwriting is available for examination as well (p. 285).

Thirdly, one can benefit from all the additional information inserted within the essays: a number of tables listing key events (for example, the so-called Festa Pallii celebrated in the Salzburg Cathedral from 1693 to 1828), other lists of primary sources (bills, sheet music, and performance materials), and leading personalities (singers, musicians, and scribes). In several essays, one can also make use of such 'extras' as transcriptions of rare archival holdings from the so-called 'Old Fond' (Altbestand...

pdf

Share