Mozart: Music, Medicine, Masonry, and Mortality

Abstract

The early death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart at age 35, midway through completing his final mysterious commission, a Requiem Mass, remains the greatest tragedy in music history. For more than 200 years, laypersons, scholars, writers, and filmmakers have speculated on the cause of Mozart’s death, suggesting over one hundred possibilities. Some of these are rooted in illnesses documented earlier in Mozart’s life; others focus on ailments from his final year. In this chapter, I review leading candidate explanations, examining Mozart’s reported symptoms in his final two-week illness (high fever, copious sweating, swollen feet and hands, recurrent vomiting and diarrhea, and partial paralysis) as well as broader mortality trends at the time, including the possibility of an epidemic. While not conclusive, the evidence overall appears to favor a cause of death rooted in compromised kidney function associated with edema and uremia, potentially linked to an epidemic streptococcal infection. I conclude with some reflections on Mozart’s own attitude to death, which was greatly informed by his involvement with Freemasonry. A constant awareness of death, omnipresent in his world but colored by a non-despairing Masonic worldview, helped Mozart make the most of his life and genius.