Exsultate, jubilate, K.165

Few composers of seventeen have written anything that has achieved such lasting and widespread popularity as Mozart’s motet Exsultate, jubilate. Even Mozart might not have been so successful here without the inspiration of Venanzio Rauzzini, whose voice he had in mind as he wrote it. As he would have discovered when rehearsing his opera Lucio Silla in Milan in December 1773, the castrato soprano who took a leading part in it was not only a highly accomplished singer but also a gifted all-round musician and a composer in his own right. So here was an opportunity to write a church work with a soprano solo part of nothing less than operatic virtuosity and here too was a challenge to create something that would impress Rauzzini with the quality of its scoring, its melodic invention and its harmonic ingenuity. If the last movement of the motet, the famous Alleluia, is the most familiar of the three, the aria to be performed on this occasion is no less brilliant in the vocal part and at the same time more varied in expression and more sustained in construction.

Aria: Exsultate, jubilate (Allegro)

Recitativo: Fulget amica dies -

Aria: Tu virginum corona (Andante) -

Aria: Alleluja (Vivace)

Few composers of sixteen have written anything that has achieved anything like the lasting and widespread popularity of Mozart’s motet Exsultate, jubilate. Even Mozart might not have been as successful as he was without the inspiration of Venanzio Rauzzini, whose voice he had in mind as he wrote the piece. As he would have discovered when rehearsing his opera Lucio Silla in Milan in December 1772, the castrato soprano who took the leading role of Cecilio was not only a highly accomplished singer but also a gifted all-round musician and a composer in his own right. So here was an opportunity to write a church work with a soprano solo part of nothing less than operatic virtuosity and here too was a challenge to create something that would impress Rauzzini with the quality of its scoring, its melodic invention and its harmonic ingenuity.

Written for performance in the Theatine Church in Milan on 17 January 1773, the motet is addressed, as the Church calendar required on that day, to the Virgin Mary. It is clear from the start, however, that it is at least as much a celebration of Rauzzini’s virtuosity as the Virgin’s virtue. In the opening aria the soloist’s technique is most impressively displayed in the rapid runs and wide leaps applied to each of the three appearances of the closing line “psallant aethera cum me.” As the intervening recitative suggests, Tu virginum corona is an episode of contrasting serenity. Oboes and horns are omitted while strings provide a gently expressive accompaniment to a poised, decoratively melodious vocal line. It leads without a break into the closing Alleluja, an aria of such irresistible vitality that it is frequently performed as a separate item - even though it is heard to best effect only in its original context, offset by the preceding cavatina and corresponding in tempo and harmony with the opening Exsultate, jubilate.