Mozart and aristocratic women performers in Salzburg : a study of the piano concertos K. 242 and K. 246

Among recent approaches to Classic music, one of the most revealing is the investigation of expression via topoi. Pioneered by Leonard Ratner, and developed by leading musicologists specializing in 18th-century music, this system identifies characteristic figures and styles that conveyed specific meanings to 18th-century audiences via processes of association. These implications resulted from intimate contacts with everyday musical activities in worship, entertainment, dance ceremonies, the military, hunt, and outdoor events. Familiarity with such characteristic topoi and styles enables listeners and performers today to reconstruct the original venues of communication between composers and their audiences. Serving as case studies, this paper explores the expressive content of two concertos intended for aristocratic women performers in Salzburg: the Concerto for three keyboards in F, K. 242 (1776), written for the Countess Antonia Lodron and her two daughters, Aloysia and Josepha, and the keyboard concerto in C, K. 246 (1776) intended for the Countess Antonia Lützow. Indeed, it seems that much as Mozart provided his singers with arias that were tailored to their voices,3 in these cases, he granted the Countesses music that was redolent of their social milieu. In support of this hypothesis, this article opens with a description of several social-musical activities that engaged the Lodron and Lützow families in Salzburg during the 1770s. It then proceeds to discuss references to these concertos found in the Mozart family correspondence. While much of this information is gleaned from well-known Mozart sources, its recall establishes the cultural and sociological context for these specific works, and provides an insight into the manner of performance that Mozart valued for this music. The paper concludes with a semiotic analysis of selected passages, suggesting that the choice of the topical content bears homage to the women dedicatees

Composing Pieces for Peace: Using Impromptu to Build Cross-Cultural Awareness

Music has long played a role as an ambassador for peace and understanding between cultures. Yet, there is little research that gauges how creating music aids in the development of cross-cultural awareness. Given today’s tense political climate post-9/11, further investigation of the role that music can play in fostering cross-cultural awareness is needed. Using a sociocultural constructionist framework, this study investigated how 22 youth (12 girls and 10 boys) from the United States, in communication with youth in Tel-Aviv, Israel, analyzed and composed music steeped in traditional Hebrew, Arabic, and Western traditions using the computer program, Impromptu. Participants took part in pre-tests and post-tests to measure their awareness and respect for Israelis at the start and end of the study using the Cross-Cultural Awareness Drawing Task (Bar-Tal & Teichman, 2005). Using qualitative techniques, the researchers analyzed the written reflections of participants on their music composition process over the course of the intervention. Findings suggest that the music composition and analysis exercises had a positive impact on the development of crosscultural awareness over time among American students, helping to counter the common misconceptions about the Middle East fostered in today’s media