This essay was written for the Augst 23, 2014 Connecticut Lyric Opera performance of Die Zauberflöte
(The Magic Flute) by Wolfgang Amade' Mozart.
"The Magic Flute is like a mirror: anyone who looks into it sees himself, and he will find in it whatever he is looking for."
"The Magic Flute is like a mirror: anyone who looks into it sees himself, and he will find in it whatever he is looking for."
Jânos Leibner, Mozart on the Stage
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"...It has pleased the Eternal Architect of
the World to tear
one of our most beloved, meritorious members
from our brotherly chain. Who did not know him?
Who did not esteem him? Our worthy brother Mozart...."
from our brotherly chain. Who did not know him?
Who did not esteem him? Our worthy brother Mozart...."
So spoke the Worshipful Master of the Masonic Lodge Zur Neugrekronten Hoffnung ("New Crowned Hope") eulogizing fellow mason, Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus ("Amadeus") Mozart, after his untimely death on December 5, 1791, a month before his thirty-sixth birthday. Mozart was western civilization's most illustrious prodigy, its iconic genius, master composer of symphony, concerto form, chamber music and opera. Mozart was the Shakespeare and Michelangelo of his Art, mythologized for over two centuries as the apotheosis of Music, writing harmonies at once sublime and ineffable, who regrettably died before completing all of his myriad conceptions.
The precise cause of Mozart's death remains unknown, although the evidence suggests chronic conditions (extradural hematoma, renal disease and anemia, exacerbated by bloodletting), and an acute medical crisis, possibly a stroke and shock. 3
The precise cause of Mozart's death remains unknown, although the evidence suggests chronic conditions (extradural hematoma, renal disease and anemia, exacerbated by bloodletting), and an acute medical crisis, possibly a stroke and shock. 3
At the end of November, 1791, ill and confined to bed, Mozart continued to work on finishing a commissioned work, a Requiem Mass, which he was convinced he was composing for himself. His assistant, Franz Xaver Sussmayr, had been summoned to take dictation from Mozart on how the Requiem should be completed.
On that last day, Mozart asked his sister-in-law Sophie Weber Haibl to remove his pet bird to another room, because he could not bear to hear what the bird kept whistling: Papageno's tune from Die Zauberflöte. Mozart was said to have uttered to his assembled friends and family, "How I wish I could hear my beloved Zauberflöte one more time."
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| Wolfgang Mozart The unfinished 1782 portrait by brother-in law Joseph Lange |
His "beloved Zauberflöte" indeed! The opera, Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), remains one of the most beloved operas in the repertory.
It is a paean to fidelity and love, a Masonic allegory and a mystical drama. Even within the canon of Mozart's twenty-three other completed operatic works, where it is usually listed as a Singspiel (along with its forebears Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio) and Zaide - light operas sung in German and with spoken dialogue and no sung recitative), and although it was entitled a Grosse Oper (Grand Opera) in the program book at its premiere on September 30, 1791, the last of Mozart's operas to reach the stage, Die Zauberflöte remains a singular sensation. Why should that be?
It is a paean to fidelity and love, a Masonic allegory and a mystical drama. Even within the canon of Mozart's twenty-three other completed operatic works, where it is usually listed as a Singspiel (along with its forebears Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio) and Zaide - light operas sung in German and with spoken dialogue and no sung recitative), and although it was entitled a Grosse Oper (Grand Opera) in the program book at its premiere on September 30, 1791, the last of Mozart's operas to reach the stage, Die Zauberflöte remains a singular sensation. Why should that be?
Before demystifying this wondrous opera, Dear Reader, a "Spoiler Alert": Do not continue reading this essay if you wish to keep thinking of Die Zauberflöte as the story of a prince and a princess and their undying love and devotion to each other, in the face of the forces of darkness and danger, who come through these travails unscathed. However, if you, like Tamino, want to understand the deeper and enduring truths embedded within Die Zauberflöte, the multi-layered aspects that make this work of art interpretable on several levels, then Dear Reader, you are compelled to embark on the journey and read on.
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| The bird-catcher Papageno from an 1816 Berlin production of Die Zauberflote |
At the most literal plane of analysis, the exoteric level, Die Zauberflöte is a delightful opera by a great composer, approachable by children and adults, a charming musical fairy tale with hummable tunes, a hero and heroine, comical characters, and a story line that is easy to follow. It has exciting moments and a happy ending, in which truth, morality, personal integrity, love and fidelity win out. Mozart's inventiveness is displayed in the many different operatic styles embedded in Zauberflöte - soaring arias, Singspiel, the solemnity of opera seria, dramatic oratory, and the slapstick of opera buffa.
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| The Magic Flute Marc Chagall 1967 for the Metropolitan Opera |
Sarastro is given two great solos, O Isis und Osiris, and In diesen heil'gen Hallen, befitting his stature as the great sorcerer-priest. Vocal pyrotechnics are to be expected from the Konigin der Nacht (Queen of Night), who demonstrates her personality with the Act I aria, O Zittre Nicht, as a concerned mother would sing to her beloved daughter, and then morphs into the Janus-faced harpy that she really is, with the demonic Act II showstopper, Der Holle Rach, with those stratospheric F6's !
Who can forget the birdcatcher, Papageno? His charming Act I ditty, Der Vogelfänger bin ich ja, could be a Sesame Street theme song, and his Act II song of despair and then joy in searching for and finding his Papagena, are tunes that grade-schoolers encounter and internalize in their first experiences with the operatic art form.
The opera lover can take these ethereal arias, and the celestial music that accompanies them, and have a delightful three hours in the opera house, or at home (enjoying, for example, the 2003 DVD from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, under the direction of Sir Colin Davis).
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| Set design for Konigen der nacht (Queen of Night) Aquatint by Simon Quaglio, Munich 1818 |
There are other levels of meaning in Die Zauberflöte, allusions that exist on a deeper and more introspective plane, in a mesoteric level of interpretation. These are the Masonic symbols that serve as leitmotifs and recurrent threads throughout the opera.
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| Masonic symbols in the frontispiece of the opening night libretto of Die Zauberflöte September 30, 1791 Engraving by Freemason Ignaz Alberti |
The decade between 1780 and 1790 opened a brief but crucial window in the history of Freemasonry. Freemasonry had its roots in the Medieval era. but was not codified until the early 1700s. It was, in the words of historian A.F. Robbins, "an organized system of morality, veiled in allegory, and illustrated by symbol."
Both Freemasonry and the Enlightenment philosophy shared the concepts of rational thought and scientific inquiry. Because things are often not exactly as they first appear, the seeker of answers had to search deeply for the ultimate truth.
Both Freemasonry and the Enlightenment philosophy shared the concepts of rational thought and scientific inquiry. Because things are often not exactly as they first appear, the seeker of answers had to search deeply for the ultimate truth.
The Catholic Church was historically opposed to Freemasonry, having long banned the Brotherhood, deeming it too dangerous a secular force to its religious tenets. In contradistinction, Freemasonry accepted members of all races and creeds without exception, and still does. Despite the Church's extreme position, which was made clear to the populace through a series of papal bulls, it was difficult for each city-state to police the edicts. In Vienna, then part of the Hapsburg empire, the Empress Maria Theresa supported the ban, despite the fact that her husband, Francis I, was both Holy Roman Emperor AND a Masonic Lodge Master!
However, it was their elder son and successor, Joseph II, who came to the throne in 1780, who was the more " enlightened" ruler; he relaxed the proscription, and became a Freemason himself. The window would soon close again in the late 1789, with the Church reasserting its ban on the Lodges. Leopold II, Joseph II's feckless younger brother and successor, threatened by the Enlightenment ideas of Freemasonry, enforced the shutdown.
However, it was their elder son and successor, Joseph II, who came to the throne in 1780, who was the more " enlightened" ruler; he relaxed the proscription, and became a Freemason himself. The window would soon close again in the late 1789, with the Church reasserting its ban on the Lodges. Leopold II, Joseph II's feckless younger brother and successor, threatened by the Enlightenment ideas of Freemasonry, enforced the shutdown.
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| A Masonic Initiation Scene at "New Crowned Hope" by Ignaz Unterberger (1789) At one time, it was thought that Mozart was depicted on extreme right, next to a presumed Schikaneder, and that Nikolas Esterhazy, Prince of Hungary and Haydn's patron was the Master of Lodge and Ceremonies, at the center,speaking to the Initiate. This has since been disproven |
It was in that momentarily tolerant atmosphere that Mozart, a devout Catholic, decided to become a Freemason, joining several of his closest friends in the Vienna lodge Zur Wohltätigkeit ("To Benevolence") in December, 1784. Mozart's choice of Lodge was not random: the "Beneficence" Lodge served as a trial balloon for Viennese Catholics who wanted to embrace Freemasonry.
Mozart's father, Leopold, while visiting his son in Vienna in 1785, also joined the "T0 Beneficence" lodge. Soon thereafter, the Lodge was consolidated into a new and larger facility, Zur Neugekronten Hoffnung ("To the New Crowned Hope"), which Franz Joseph Haydn joined as well.
Mozart's colleagues, the financier Michael Puchberg and the clarinetist Anton Stadler, were also fellow Lodge brothers (from both of whom Mozart would episodically borrow money). The theatrical producer, writer, actor and machinist Johann Joseph Schickeneder (Emanuel Schikaneder) was also a Mason, a member of a different lodge just outside of Vienna.
Mozart had previously met Schikaneder in 1780, and after the 1782 premiere of Die Entführung, his troupe toured the opera around German-speaking Europe for a decade. Schikaneder was to be very much a part of Mozart's life at the end: he was the catalyst for Die Zauberflöte, its librettist, its first Papageno, and after Mozart's death, tried (unsuccessfully) with the poet Goethe, to write its sequel.
Schikaneder was a hyper-energetic, competitive and financially astute impresario, who demanded hit after hit for his new music art-house the Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden. In May of 1791, he proposed to Mozart that his libretto, Die Zauberflöte, be set to music.
Captivated by the theme, its esoteric allusions, the Masonic tangents, the prospect of using advanced machinery in the opera (a hot-air balloon!), and unhindered by other projects, Mozart set to work. By June 11, in just six weeks, he had already completed most of the opera, apart from the March of the Priests at the beginning of Act II. In typical fashion, Mozart did not finish the overture until right before the September 28th deadline, two days befor the premiere on September
Zauberflöte abounds in Masonic symbolism and numerology. A "prime" example is the number three, a foundational Masonic theme, which dominates the composition of Zauberflöte. The key of the overture and many arias are in Eb major, the third chord in the diatonic scale, the key with three flats:
The opening measures of the overture, heralded by woodwinds, are three harmonized chords, beginning with the tonic Eb triad, and mirroring the Masonic initiate knocking three times on the Masonic lodge door to request entry:
Three Ladies pop up from time to time, giving advice, succor and magical instruments to the protagonists, as do Three Boys (the Three "Genii," called the "Child-Spirits" in later productions).
There are three pairs of principals: Tamino/Pamina, Papageno/Papagena, Konigen der nacht/Sarastro; three temples in Sarastro's fortress (Reason, Wisdom and Nature); and three trials which Tamino and Pamina must undergo as initiation into self-awareness and knowledge (earth, water and fire).
An intriguing alternative analysis suggests that the use of the number three in Zauberflöte alludes not to Masonic imagery, but to the Trinity of Christianity. Given Mozart's fervent Catholic faith, evident in his letters and devotional Masses, it is plausible. Christian metaphors underpin this outwardly pagan opera. Mozart's ecumenical ideas would readily have allowed him to intertwine in music and drama positive attributes of both creeds. However, the majority opinion continues to favor the Masonic interpretation.
There are three pairs of principals: Tamino/Pamina, Papageno/Papagena, Konigen der nacht/Sarastro; three temples in Sarastro's fortress (Reason, Wisdom and Nature); and three trials which Tamino and Pamina must undergo as initiation into self-awareness and knowledge (earth, water and fire).
An intriguing alternative analysis suggests that the use of the number three in Zauberflöte alludes not to Masonic imagery, but to the Trinity of Christianity. Given Mozart's fervent Catholic faith, evident in his letters and devotional Masses, it is plausible. Christian metaphors underpin this outwardly pagan opera. Mozart's ecumenical ideas would readily have allowed him to intertwine in music and drama positive attributes of both creeds. However, the majority opinion continues to favor the Masonic interpretation.
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| Sarastro's Garden, with the Sphinx and Egyptian motif from Schinkel's design for an 1816 production of Die Zauberflöte |
Masonic ritual contains antecedents in Egyptian mythology, with its emphasis on the commingled journeys of the life-spark (ka) and the soul-spirit (ba). Another middle eastern philosophy, Zoroastrianism, which embraces the concept of the duality of good and evil (and therefore, the necessary existence of both ideas), manifests in the opera by the juxtaposition of the forces of light and darkness.
The high priest Sarastro (whose name is a variant of Zoroaster) intones the Egyptian creation gods Isis and Osiris in the first of his two magnificent arias. Zoroastrian light-dark duality is evinced by sun disk which accompanies Sarastro. in contrast with the night-time stars emblazoned behind the Queen of the Night, also called Astrofiammante.
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| Could there be a Master Architect of the Heavens? Note the "mechanistic" groupings of stars (in threes) that shine behind the Starflammende Konigen (Star-flaming Queen) |
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| The sun disk behind Sarastro, the priests and the protagonists. |
Mozart and Schikaneder were fascinated by Eastern philosophy and Orientalism, which were all the rage in late eighteenth century Europe. Mozart had already begun an unfinished dramatic work based in Egypt, Thamos, König in Ägypten, 1779), and an opera buffa, L'oca del Cairo (The Goose of Cairo, 1782). He also composed two Singspiele with middle Eastern touches, Zaide in 1779 with its own Egyptian setting and underpinnings, and Die Entführung aus dem Serail in 1782 with those wondrous Turkish accents - cymbals! Janissary music! a Pasha!
Wenzel Mueller's opera, Die Zauberzither (The Magic Zither, also known for some reason as Kaspar, the Bassoonist) served as an additional source for some of the oriental touches in Zauberflöte. At the same time, the play Sethos, based on Jean Terrason's eponymous 1731 novel, also set in Egypt and filled with both Masonic and Egyptian mythological references, was being performed in Vienna. The plot of Sethos portrays an evil sorcerer and a good queen.
Ideas from Sethos show up frequently in Zauberflöte. Mozart and Schikaneder had attended several performance of the play. After they had seen it, they completely revamped the second act of Zauberflöte, so as not to be accused of plagiarism, added Masonic symbols and reversed the aspects of good and evil portrayed by Queen of the Night and Sarastro.
Mozart and Schikaneder were also informed by the works of Shakespeare; Schikaneder was one of the leading Hamlets, Macbeths and Lears of his day. In the last months of his life, Mozart was planning to compose an opera to Shakespeare's The Tempest.
There are parallels between Zauberflöte and The Tempest: Sarastro and Prospero align, Tamino and Pamina can be re-imagined as Ferdinand and Miranda, the Three Ladies' musical antics conjure Ariel, and Monostatos and Caliban each serve as their master's evil assistants.
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| Monostatos Julie Taymor's design realized here by Opera Australia |
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| Caliban from a 1984 Royal Shakespeare production directed by Anthony Quayle |
Zauberflöte was also inspired by another popular opera of the day, Lulu, oder Zauberflöte, taken from C.M. Weiland's anthology Dschinnistan, which in turn derived from Sufi's Tales of Djinnistan ("The country of the Djinn, or "paradise spirits", whence "genie"). These tales parallel the classic literary form of Bildungsroman, the coming-of-age story, the journey of an individual's moral growth and initiation , from wayward darkness (ignorance) to light (knowledge and wisdom), the very journey undertaken by Tamino.
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| Queen of Night L'Opera de Montreal |
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| Empress Maria Theresa of Austria-Hungary |
Could Die Zauberflöte also have contained a hidden political agenda? Mozart and his earlier librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, through an original play by Beaumarchais, had already poked fun at the aristocracy in Le Nozze di Figaro, where servants trump their overlords.
Die Zauberflöte also displays political undertones, The Queen of the Night represents the reactionary Maria Theresa (and by extension, the whole of the ancien regime).
Sarasto can be seen as a surrogate for Ignaz von Born, the Master of Vienna's most prominent Masonic Lodge, a brilliant scientist and a philosopher of the Enlightenment philosophy of rational thought. Tamino stands either for Joseph II, Pamina represents the Austrian populace, and Monostatos, the Catholic Church. 2
Die Zauberflöte was a great success. Cautiously optimistic on opening night, Mozart and Schikaneder knew after a few shows that they had fashioned the eighteenth century-equivalent of a Tony-award winner. On October 7th after sixth straight performances, Mozart wrote to his wife Constanze (who was in Baden bei Wien taking the baths), "I have this moment returned from the opera, which was as full as ever...., but what always gives me the greatest pleasure is the silent approval ! You can see how this opera is becoming more and more esteemed." 3 Mozart had a lot of fun with the opera along the way. At one performance, he played the Glockenspiel from the wings, purposely mistiming his entrances to confuse Schikaneder's Papageno !
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| The opening night playbill for Die Zauberflöte Sept 30, 1791 |
Mozart returned many times to the Theater auf der Wieden to see his Zauberflöte, once bringing his mother-in-law Caecilia Weber (about whom he quipped to Schikaneder that "she will see it, but she will not hear it.") On another night, Mozart invited his colleague (and not, in historical fact, his nemesis) the court composer Antonio Salieri, who arrived squiring the soprano Caterina Cavalieri (they were an item at that point). Mozart's very last surviving letter (to Constanze, dated October 14, 1791), contains this comment: "Salieri listened and watched most attentively, and from the sinfonia (overture) to the final chorus there was not a single item that failed to draw from him a "bravo" or a "bello"!" Salieri and Cavalieri had both enthused that "Zauberflöte was a true Operone (a "Grand Opera"), worthy to performed before the greatest monarchs and before the grandest festivity, and that they certainly would see it very often, for they had never seen such a more beautiful and agreeable piece." 4
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| Act I Scene XV, entitled "Tamino warding off wild beasts" portrays the racist subtext of the opera Engraving by Joseph and Peter Schaffer, 1793 |
The role of women in the opera, and in Freemasonry in general, trends towards the submissive, the oppressed and the left out. The journey taken by Tamino and Pamina begins within a matriachal point of view (The Queen of Night as "benevolent" in Act I), and ends in Act II in a patriarchal matrix (Queen of Night as "evil," and Sarastro, now seen as Tamino's father-figure, as "benevolent").
There is an underlying sexual tension in the opera, as in almost all of Mozart's operas, when the Three Ladies lust after the sleeping Tamino after they had just slain the serpent which had been threatening him. By having Pamina lead Tamino, and then having her initiated with him into the rites of Sarastro and his priests (representing Masonic ritual), Mozart and Schikaneder demonstrated that they had a modern, balanced and liberated view of things for their time.
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| Sarastro and the Temple of Priests |
A perceptive, albeit androcentric, analysis of the matriarchal/patriarchal issues in Die Zauberflöte was offered by M. O. Lee (Father Owen Lee) for the Metropolitan Opera in 2006, who wrote that:
"The Magic Flute is not just an allegory of the eighteenth century struggle between Catholicism and Freemasonry; it is an imaginative description of something much older and more important, of humankind's primeval progression from nature to culture, from unreason to reason, and from matriarchy to patriarchy. Man's first deities were not father gods but mother goddesses. In our oldest mythologies, Mother Earth antedates Father Sky, Gaia is older than Uranus.... Taboo, spells and magic were important.... magic was replaced with ritual, and taboo with morality.... and the mother goddess yielded to a father god. The hero-myth is again fashionable thanks to Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell. In their writings, the mythic-hero goes on a quest for his father, which is ultimately a quest for his own self. If he is fortunate, he is joined by a companion.... who represents everything that the hero himself is not. Jung calls this figure the shadow, potentially dangerous to the psyche of the hero unless he is won over. But if he is won over, the shadow is helpful to the hero, as Tonto is to the Lone Ranger, or Jim to Huck Finn, or Sancho Panza to Don Quixote, Pylades to Orestes, Patroclus to Achilles, or Papageno to Tamino." 5
Is it possible that Die Zauberflöte, beyond its exoteric manifestation as an enjoyable Grimm fairy-tale opera of morality, and beyond its mesoteric exegesis as a Masonic source book, is also an esoteric text, a guide with hidden meanings, a mystical treatise of the most secret of the ancient philosophies and alchemical transmutations, knowable only to the initiated, to a group like the Illuminati? Does Die Zauberflöte contain within it some "Secret Knowledge," a system of living, allowing the initiated to attain an enhanced cosmic awareness of eternal life?
In the latter decades of the eighteenth century, at the end of the Age of the Englightenment, there was a dramatic shift in knowledge. Alchemy and other Hermetic philosophies (pseudepigraphically articulated by Hermes Trismegistus - a conflation of the magic/medicine gods of the Greeks (Hermes) and Egyptians (Thoth)), were supplanted by scientific inquiry and the rise of formal fields of study: anatomy, biology, chemistry, geology and mineralogy.
Is it possible that Die Zauberflöte, beyond its exoteric manifestation as an enjoyable Grimm fairy-tale opera of morality, and beyond its mesoteric exegesis as a Masonic source book, is also an esoteric text, a guide with hidden meanings, a mystical treatise of the most secret of the ancient philosophies and alchemical transmutations, knowable only to the initiated, to a group like the Illuminati? Does Die Zauberflöte contain within it some "Secret Knowledge," a system of living, allowing the initiated to attain an enhanced cosmic awareness of eternal life?
In the latter decades of the eighteenth century, at the end of the Age of the Englightenment, there was a dramatic shift in knowledge. Alchemy and other Hermetic philosophies (pseudepigraphically articulated by Hermes Trismegistus - a conflation of the magic/medicine gods of the Greeks (Hermes) and Egyptians (Thoth)), were supplanted by scientific inquiry and the rise of formal fields of study: anatomy, biology, chemistry, geology and mineralogy.
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| The ancient Eleusinian Mysteries as depicted on a red-figure krater kylex |
As the alchemical arts declined, there remained a desire by some proto-scientists to memorialize the writings about what they had still imputed to be a mystical energy source, some of which concepts were contained in the Eleusinian mysteries and others of which followed the alchemical grail of the material (in contradistinction to the spiritual) transmutation of lead into gold, the so -called "Philosopher's Stone."
Alchemy was based on three fundamental forms of matter: sulfur, mercury and salt. Norfleet, in an article on the relationship of alchemy to Die Zauberflöte, explains that this tripartite principle derives from Neoplatonism. In Neoplatonic thought (which began from revisions to Plato's philosophy by Plotinus in the third century C.E.), there are three levels of spiritual reality (the hypostases), which deal with aspects of the nous, or soul, which combine with the four levels of physical reality - air, earth, water and fire.6
Die Zauberflöte is rich in the triadic numerology previously discussed, along with a quaternary numerology: there are threes and fours (and thus, sevens) in Zauberflöte. Both the Egyptian pyramid and the Masonic symbol have four-sided bases with triangular sides Papageno plays the Pan Pipes - which contain seven reeds Adding up the three pairs of operatic principals (Tamino/Pamina. Papageno/Papagena. Sarastro/Queen of the Night) makes six, and Monostatos (whose name means "to stand alone") makes seven.
Alchemy was based on three fundamental forms of matter: sulfur, mercury and salt. Norfleet, in an article on the relationship of alchemy to Die Zauberflöte, explains that this tripartite principle derives from Neoplatonism. In Neoplatonic thought (which began from revisions to Plato's philosophy by Plotinus in the third century C.E.), there are three levels of spiritual reality (the hypostases), which deal with aspects of the nous, or soul, which combine with the four levels of physical reality - air, earth, water and fire.6
Die Zauberflöte is rich in the triadic numerology previously discussed, along with a quaternary numerology: there are threes and fours (and thus, sevens) in Zauberflöte. Both the Egyptian pyramid and the Masonic symbol have four-sided bases with triangular sides Papageno plays the Pan Pipes - which contain seven reeds Adding up the three pairs of operatic principals (Tamino/Pamina. Papageno/Papagena. Sarastro/Queen of the Night) makes six, and Monostatos (whose name means "to stand alone") makes seven.
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| The three Principles of Alchemy |
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| The pyramid of Cheops (Khufu) at Giza Is this four-sided base pyramid a Masonic symbol as well as an Illuminati marker? |
The serpent, in alchemical doctrine, is a physical manifestation of the tripartite principle of matter; and it is a serpent which Tamino confronts at the beginning of Zauberflöte, and which is slain by the Three Ladies (there's that numerology of three again, hmmmm).
There are further esoteric allusions in the opera. Does Tamino's journey parallel that of the Cathars, neo-Manichean dualistic heretics, or perhaps the Knights Templar themselves, both of which groups had esoteric codes and were persecuted by the Church over centuries ?
The number 22 is one of the most important numbers in their philosophy. Do the 22 cards that represent the Major Arcana of the Tarot also serve as markers for the exactly 21 arias plus the Overture (= 22) that comprise Die Zauberflöte?
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| Ignaz von Born (1742-1791) Mineralogist, Metallurgist, Masonic Master and member of the Bavarian Illuminati Was von Born Mozart's archetype for Sarastro? |
As a leader of the Bavarian Illuminati, von Born was also the keeper of the secret flame of their esoteric knowledge, which he began to codify in 1784 in a book-length article entitled The Egyptian Mysteries which was then published in the Journal fur Freimaurer (The Journal of Freemasonry), as well as in a 1786 book on the alchemical amalgamation of precious metals. Could von Born, who mentored Mozart as a Masonic initiate in 1784 and became his close friend, have given the composer some profound insights into the esoteric arts?
There is a tantalizing clue.
In 1790, Schikaneder asked four of Vienna's most accomplished composers to collaborate on a fantasy-opera for his Freihaus Theater. There were to be four operas in this planned series, an opera titled Oberon was the first, while Zauberflöte, still unhatched at that point, would be the last. The title of Schickaneder's proposed operatic pastiche was Der Stern der Wiesen, (The Philosopher's Stone). The Philosopher's Stone ! the grail of alchemy!
Mozart contributed several arias to this fascinating and incomplete work, one serious and the other comical. The comical aria Nun liebes weibchen, (KV 625/592a), is nicknamed the "Cat Duet." It is not only quite funny (replete with frequent "miaows" by tenor and soprano), but also presages the famous Pa-pa-gena!/Pa-pa-geno! duet in Die Zauberflöte. In fact, Der Stern der Wiesen called for a similar cast and was based on a similar concept to Zauberflöte: a hero on a journey who must pass trials by fire and water, who is led by a comic guide named Lubano (shades of Papageno). It starred Mozart's friend, the tenor and flutist (how serendipitous!) Benjamin Schack, who would create the role of Tamino.
Mozart and Schikaneder created a multi-layered operatic tour de force with Die Zauberflöte: approachable and popular with the masses (while satirizing the monarchy), it played to sell-out audiences in theaters all over Europe for a decade after Mozart's death, it was interpretable by the Masons, and all the while served as a secret lodestone for the Illuminati !
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| The Magic Flute by Marc Chagall 1966 |
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| Wolfgang Mozart The posthumous oil by Barbara Kraft (1819) Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde, Vienna |
Ref .1. Karhausen, The Bleeding of Mozart, XLibris, New York, 2011.
Ref. 2 Seifert, S."The Origins, Meanings, Rituals and Values of The Magic Flute," Opera Colorado
Ref. 3 Solomon, M. Mozart: A Life, New York, Harper Perennial, 1995.
Ref. 4 Branscombe, P. Die Zauberflöte, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pg. 153
Ref. 5 Lee, M.O. Metropolitan Opera Intermission Notes, Die Zauberflöte, January 21, 2006
Ref. 6 Norfleet, P. http://mozart2051.tripod.com/levels_meaning.htm
Ref. 3 Solomon, M. Mozart: A Life, New York, Harper Perennial, 1995.
Ref. 4 Branscombe, P. Die Zauberflöte, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pg. 153
Ref. 5 Lee, M.O. Metropolitan Opera Intermission Notes, Die Zauberflöte, January 21, 2006
Ref. 6 Norfleet, P. http://mozart2051.tripod.com/levels_meaning.htm
Copyright 2012, 2013, 3014 Vincent P. de Luise MD A Musical Vision
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