Missa in C

In the 1770s, Mozart was the most prolific composer of church music in the service of the Salzburg Prince-Archbishops. The Mass in C major, K. 317 is dated March 23, 1779 in the autograph score and it appears that it was first performed in Salzburg Cathedral on Easter Sunday (April 4, 1779); Mozart would then have played the organ. It seems likely that the Church Sonata in C major, K. 329 with an obbligato organ part was written for the same occasion.

Mozart took two of his masses, possibly K. 317 and K. 337, with him when travelling to Munich in the fall of 1780 to prepare the premiere performance of Idomeneo, re di Creta, K. 366. He also had the mass performed several times in Vienna and in Baden near Vienna around 1790.

K. 317 is widely known as the Coronation Mass. This term cannot be traced to Mozart’s lifetime, though; the earliest occurrence is a set of parts associated with coronation ceremonies for Francis II, the last Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, as Emperor Francis I of Austria in 1806.

Did you know…

Did you know that only two masses by Mozart, K. 257 and K. 317, were published in score during the first fifty years after the composer’s death? Both masses were issued by Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig in 1803. Mozart’s church music was widely disseminated in Southern Germany and the Habsburg lands, but almost exclusively in manuscript copies.