Susan McClary's Perspectives on Mozart's Music

In ‘A Musical Dialectic from the Enlightenment: Mozart’s Piano Concerto in G Major’, Susan McClary attempts to identify the social factors of the eighteenth century and today contained in Mozart’s music that go beyond its sheer beauty. She claims that scholars treat the music of eighteenth century as too perfect and void of humanistic emotions. Further, she claims a line can be drawn between Mozart and the rest of eighteenth-century music, which was devoid of human drama and feelings. She claims there is personality and politics prevalent in Mozart’s music, and utilizes his ‘Piano Concerto in G Major, K. 453’, Movement 2 as an example of such.

McClary claims most people view Mozart as perfect and pure music that represents the Enlightenment. She emphasizes this idea with an anecdote about a colleague that felt a Mozart concerto he had heard wasn’t distinctly Mozart due to its ability to be about something. She refutes this idea by explaining that even musical form suggests social meaning. She states that harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic shapes affect emotional states in and of themselves. At the most basic level, major keys equate to positive emotions while minor keys equate to negative emotions. She also claims that musical rules and procedures can be seen as social rules. People decided those musical rules at one point, and therefore, continuing to follow them is also a social rule. They represent order, social unity, and emotional understanding amongst listeners, performers, and composers alike. These rules morph along with the generations, as evident in the fact that thirds were once considered dissonant and are now considered somewhat vanilla. The following of rules and conventions, even the convention of a concerto, can be considered a form of communication and social order in and of itself.

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Mozart’s concerto, as discussed in McClary’s article, follow the norms of eighteenth-century music very closely. It is a tonal piece which strays from the tonic in the middle before ultimately returning to the tonic. His harmonic structure supports this ultimate goal. Even though Mozart’s use of tonality probably wasn’t intended to be a social statement, his adherence to the ideals of the musical community prove a humanist identity within a group who valued rationality and goal seeking in compositions. Additionally, Mozart adheres to a form that consists of exposition, development, and recapitulation. This format treats the new theme presented in the development as a danger to the resolution of the piece and its original motive, but this danger is dissipated when the new theme returns in the home key. In this way, the original theme relies on the second for its true value. Not only does Mozart adhere to this form, but he also utilizes sonata form, which consists of a constant struggle between soloist and ensemble, which can be representative of struggles between an individual and society. This struggle reflects struggle of the middle class that was beginning to rise in the eighteenth century. Again, even if these ideals weren’t consciously thought about by Mozart at the time of his composition, his adherence to them gives his pieces such values. The concerto’s struggle between individuality and social group order has the potential to either submit to or contend the ideals which are associated with the musical forms.

McClary then delves into greater detail into the second movement of K.453. She claims that upon first glance, one could think the movement maintains complete social conformity to the aforementioned structures. Upon closer investigation, it can be seen that the piano’s intensity in contrast with the orchestra- in both tonality and emotion-should make the listener question Mozart’s conformity to unhindered musical perfection. The extraordinary difference in feel between the primary, five-measure theme and the following bars of the exposition creates a desire for closure within the primary theme. The development that follows is far more traditional and feels purposely avoidant of the conflicting primary section. The piano’s deviation toward a minor key, which greatly conflicts with what the rest or the orchestral part wanted to do, feels greatly defiant, and may purposely or accidentally be a self-representation of Mozart himself in the piece: as attention-seeking and big-headed. It is at this point where the listener’s personal views will affect the perception of the piece. This grandiose piano part can either be seen as a hero or a villain. Either way, this separates the piano from the remainder of the group and makes the listener question their views on individuality. If the pianist is seen as a hero, the listener may find self-identity as more critical than social order and vice versa. This nebulous section without a clear belief in mind serves as a clever question asked by Mozart of the listener. Then, the finale, which returns with grand parts in the tonic key, sounds clearly joyful, and the piano fits in with this.

Therefore, in summary, Mozart’s form in this piece can be viewed as an individual’s deviation from the norm before its eventual return to conformity. This can be perceived by the listener in several ways: as a moment of unnecessary rebellion, a cop-out, or a dramatic narcissistic statement. Similarly, in the development, the piano continuously resists the rest of the orchestra, in intensity and tonality. The piano’s long journey from C major to C# major symbolizes a sort of unreasonable and seemingly irrevocable split from the group. However, the pianist resorts back to C major fairly quickly, which symbolizes goal achievement and ultimate inability to stray from conventionality. This entire movement serves to prove that although yes, eventual return to the norm did occur, it was achieved by such unconventional means that it is difficult to argue that Mozart is a pure and perfect composer. One may argue the orchestra’s pulling of the soloist back into the tonic to be for the greater good. However, that notion in and of itself has great political significance behind it. The disregard of individualism through the piano’s sublimation is ultimately very politically and socially charged. Even if political and social ideas here are ignored, the unconventional composition of the piece is at the very least a statement of Mozart’s originality and deviation from perfection, even though he ultimately assimilates to convention in the end. By the time the recapitulation occurs, the piano has fully assimilated; leading the rest of the orchestra through the traditional style of the opening motto. Although the piano slips into a moment of dissent, it returns back to union with the orchestra for the end. The piano is allowed to show its individuality through grandiose gestures while maintaining cohesion with the orchestra, and any rebellious dissent is ultimately gone by the end of the movement. Therefore, McClary claims that this movement places value on both individuality and expression and social conformity to create the perfect system.

McClary further claims that the narrative of this movement can be viewed in either a positive or negative light depending on the listener’s attitude. The piano’s assimilation can either be viewed as suppressive order, or as a group rescuing a rogue entity. It can also be viewed as a bit of both; a required agreement between the value of the individual and the necessary assimilation into societal norms. The listener can even identify Mozart as an equivalent to the piano part itself: as a rebellious, self-righteous, composer who pushed the limits of conventional composition. In this way, it is nearly impossible to view Mozart as a perfect composer of the eighteenth century whose music is devoid of political commentary, social ideals, or humanistic emotions.

McClary goes so far as to claim Mozart even incorporates religious commentary into the piece; that the motto itself shows a struggle of both society and the individual to embrace a spiritual provocation. She claims the motto goes beyond both individuality and social order, and can be viewed as a divine dare. Surprisingly, it is the individual soloist that accepts this challenge and accepts the faith, surrendering to whatever ‘higher being’ Mozart associated with this motto. The submission to a religious entity is somewhat unheard of in the Enlightenment, unless the higher power mentioned is actually representative of any higher reaching idea of society, including the secular beliefs of the Enlightenment. Regardless of if any of these posed thoughts were purposeful in Mozart’s composition, their presence in his pieces makes it nearly impossible for anyone to argue Mozart is a perfectly pure composer whose music isn’t about anything, McClary claims.

To be candid, the entire premise of this article seemed entirely dramatic. When Mozart was writing, did he really care if people in 200 years believed he was socially charged or not? Was he trying to charge an entire school of debate where scholars wrote pages and pages of articles on his political and social commentary? Most likely, the answer is no. He loved writing and performing music, and he was a brilliant composer. It seems implausible his ego would be so large that he tried to think about how to tease scholars for hundreds of years on whether he was a perfectly emotionless, pure composer or not. It could be argued that Mozart wrote music because he was good at it and he loved it. That’s it. Why does anyone pursue a career? In most cases, certainly not to charge an entire base of people for the next several hundred years.

Regardless, if I had to pick a side, I would most certainly agree with McClary. There are simply too many parallels between the social, political, and religious issues at hand during the Enlightenment and Mozart’s compositions. The constant, evident fight between individuality and societal conformity is prevalent throughout this composition in particular, and even if its presence is entirely subconscious, it is too prevalent to be considered accidental or overreaching.

In addition, I think that not only is this constant struggle between individual and society key in the Enlightenment, its significance transcends time to modern day, and throughout all of history for that matter. Everyone is constantly battling between wanting to stand out from the norm, to be themselves, and establish themselves as different from the ‘average Joe’. This desire, of course, is always conflicting with the human desire to find a group you relate to and not be labelled as a strange outsider. Additionally, particularly in today’s politically charged climate, most people are always trying to separate themselves from one group or another; democrats vs. republicans, millennials vs. boomers, so as to not have a negative connotation attached to themselves. Mozart’s battle in this piece is still applicable in this way today.

Further still, it can be argued that no musician, artist, or any profession can truly ever transcend politics, culture, or society. Music and art today, still, follow a set of rules. Even the most obscure pieces of atonality try to identify with the idea of not identifying with the norm. Every song has a form and every art piece has a particular style. This reflection of society in music is not even limited by genre, as pop, rock, and classical music all have some sort of assigned set of rules to them. Lyrics reflect common emotions amongst people and serve to unite an entire group behind a meaning, whole tone pieces all follow a set of rules, pop songs typically have a set verse/chorus form, and so on. In summary, McClary’s claim that it is impossible for music to be pure of any social, political, or religious parallels is arguably valid, as even one of the closest to perfect composers, intentionally or not, fell victim to the power of humanism.