Pavel Josef Vejvanovský (1633-1693)
- Missa Salvatoris 4 Voces in Conc (1677)
Performers: DRS Singers; Cappella Musica Antica; Christoph Cajöri (conductor)
Further info: Pavel Josef Vejvanovsky: Missa Salvatoris
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Moravian composer, trumpeter and music copyist. He studied at the Jesuit
college at Opava, where he is mentioned in a register of students from
1656 to 1660. At this time he became acquainted with H.I.F. von Biber
and P.J. Rittler and started to compose. A letter of 15 June 1661
records his appointment as a trumpeter to the administrator E.F.
Castelle, who directed activities at the court of the Prince-Bishop of
Olomouc, Leopold Wilhelm (a son of Emperor Ferdinand II), who spent much
of his time away from Olomouc. Throughout his life Vejvanovský used the
title of Feldtrompeter, although he was not qualified to do so. He
remained at Kroměříž and in 1664 entered the service of the new
prince-bishop, Karl Liechtenstein-Castelcorno, as principal trumpeter
and as Kapellmeister; his duties also included the copying of music, and
many sets of parts in his hand survive. He possessed his own valuable
music collection, and was mainly responsible for the formation of the
famous one belonging to the bishop. He seems to have been on very close
personal terms with his patron and was one of the highest paid court
servants: with a salary in 1690 of 180 florins, he ranked third in the
list of the prince-bishop's establishment and is described in various
documents as ‘Hof-und Feldtrompeter’. He appears also to have been
director of the choir at the collegiate church of St Mořice, where many
of his works were performed during his 32 years at Kroměříž. The record
of his burial states that he was ‘about 60 years old’ at his death. All
of Vejvanovský's surviving works are found at Kroměříž.
Of the 137 works noted in the music inventory from 1695, 127 are
complete or in sketches; many doubtful works also exist. Since he played
the trumpet it is no surprise to find that he made considerable use of
it. In both vocal and instrumental music he wrote for trumpets and
trombones in a manner technically superior to that of most of his
contemporaries. An exception among them was J.H. Schmelzer, whom
Vejvanovský knew and with whom he may well have studied for a time,
since his music shows many traits of the school of Schmelzer and others
associated with the court of Emperor Leopold I in Vienna. In his trumpet
writing he sometimes called for a tromba brevis, which was tuned a tone
higher than the normal trumpet. The Missa clamantium (1683) includes
the direction ‘two clarinos may be added ad libitum, but they ought to
be one tone higher’. In conjunction with information from contemporary
German and Italian sources, these specifications can doubtless be
interpreted as references to the smaller variety of trumpet known as the
tromba piccola or tromba gallica, which was in D rather than C (the
usual tuning for military trumpets). One of Vejvanovský's most
exceptional pieces of trumpet writing is the church sonata (IV/43), for
solo trumpet, strings and continuo, that bears the reference ‘Be
mollis’, alluding to what for a trumpet was an unusual tonality. As in a
number of other instances, Vejvanovský cleverly employed here the
lowered 7th harmonic of a natural trumpet and used several non-harmonic
notes to score for the instrument in G minor rather than in the more
usual key of C major. In many of his works it is possible to detect the
influence of old modal music compositions, including the melody of the
Austrian Christmas song Joseph lieber, Joseph mein, once thought to be a
Czech folksong.
