Mozart's Secret (cont'd)

It is probable that he also yearned for the compassion and companionship that freemasonry offered: in the brotherhood, Mozart found the support and acceptance that he never received from his father. In the 1780s freemasonry was quite popular with the Viennese professional elite and nobility, who probably enjoyed the networking they could do at meetings, and the support they could expect from their Masonic brothers. The Masonic lodges, special buildings in which freemasons met regularly, also provided a safe environment for political dissidence. The policy of absolute secrecy ensured that no one would tell the emperor if you thought he should be chucked out of power and replaced by an elected leader responsible to the people, for example. In 1784 Mozart joined the Beneficence Lodge in Vienna, passing the initiation test, then progressing to the degree of Master Mason, or full member, in 1785. ..

In the six short years before his death, Mozart wrote many pieces for Masonic lodges, including Gesellenreise, for the initiation of new journeymen; Die Maurerfreude (The Mason’s Joy), written in honour of the Grand Secretary of the Austrian Lodges Ignaz von Born; and Maurerische Trauermusik (Masonic Funeral Music). His final opera, The Magic Flute, was full of overt references to secret Masonic rituals and attitudes, particularly in its portrayal of the just ruler Sarastro and the tyrannical Queen of the Night, who are said to represent Joseph II and the Empress Maria Theresia, respectively. Mozart’s portrayal of class differences in The Marriage of Figaro, which was based on a politically radical French play, also evidences Mozart’s Masonic beliefs in equality and compassion.

Mozart’s participation in Freemasonry sheds light on another, hidden side of the composer that is often ignored. Mozart is too often regarded as a one-dimensional musical genius, not a normal human being with a political ideology and moral beliefs. To understand Mozart more completely, one should look at him through the eyes of his Masonic brothers, who knew that he was worth more than the sum of his compositions. “Half Europe revered him, the great called him their darling,” read the eulogy given for Mozart at his Masonic lodge soon after his death, “and we—we called him our Brother, a diligent member of our order: brotherly love, a peaceable disposition, advocacy of a good cause, beneficence, a true, sincere sense of pleasure whenever he could help one of his Brethren with his talents: these were the chief characteristics of his nature.”