News
The latest news about everything happening in the Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation around Mozart Week, Season concerts, the Mozart Museums and the research about Mozart.
Armin Brinzing, Johannes Honsig-Erlenburg, Ulrich Leisinger, Rolando Villazón
The Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation presents a lost letter by Wolfgang Amadé Mozart
The Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation is delighted to be able to report on one of its most valuable acquisitions in the last ten years. Thanks to the generosity of Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler-Thumann, a letter that Wolfgang Amadé Mozart wrote to his friend Anton Stoll in 1791 is now a part of the Mozarteum Foundation’s Biblioteca Mozartiana, a library that houses its collection of original Mozart autographs. The last time that the Foundation was able to acquire one of Mozart’s original letters was in 2001.
The Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation is delighted to be able to report on one of its most valuable acquisitions in the last ten years. Thanks to the generosity of Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler-Thumann, a letter that Wolfgang Amadé Mozart wrote to his friend Anton Stoll in 1791 is now a part of the Mozarteum Foundation’s Biblioteca Mozartiana, a library that houses its collection of original Mozart autographs. The last time that the Foundation was able to acquire one of Mozart’s original letters was in 2001.
As the Foundation’s president, Johannes Honsig-Erlenburg, explains, “This is a very special moment for the Foundation and a stroke of the greatest good fortune that the family that owns this particular Mozart letter approached the Mozarteum Foundation directly. We are grateful to the family for saving us from having to compete in the sort of bidding war that a charitable institution like the Mozarteum Foundation has long been unable to afford. And what a gift Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler-Thumann has made us by financing the acquisition of this letter! As a result we are able to make Mozart’s frivolous joke accessible to a worldwide audience.”
Rolando Villazón, who is the Mozarteum Foundation’s official ambassador and the intendant of the Mozart Week Festival, has the following to say about the significance of this priceless acquisition: “Every letter that Mozart wrote opens up a new door that grants us access to the soul of the greatest musical genius of all time. To discover a new letter from Mozart is like finding a new flower in a wonderfully beautiful garden.”