Sophie Weber
Sophie Weber appears in the history of classical music almost entirely in relation to one night in December 1791, when Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lay dying in Vienna. She was there. She helped her sister Constanze care for the composer during what the sources describe as a brief but harrowing final illness. And decades later, she sat down and wrote it all out in a letter that the Grove Dictionary author would call "moving." That letter, and an interview she gave in 1829, are why her name survived. But Sophie's life was far more tangled with Mozart's story than a single deathbed vigil. She was the youngest of the Weber sisters, all four of them trained singers, and Mozart had lived in her family's home. He had flirted with her. He inscribed her name into a piece of music. The questions her life raises are pointed: who was Sophie Weber apart from her famous brother-in-law, what did she witness, and what did she choose to remember?
Maria Sophie Weber was born in 1763 into a family where music was simply the air everyone breathed. Her mother was Cäcilia Weber, née Stamm. All four of the Weber daughters became trained singers, and two of them reached genuine professional fame. The eldest, Josepha Weber, and the second eldest, Aloysia Weber, built the kind of careers that put their names in opera programmes. Sophie, the youngest, followed a different path. The family moved first to Munich, then to Vienna, tracking the rising career of Aloysia. Sophie herself sang at the Burgtheater during the 1780-81 season. Whatever promise that appearance suggested, it did not translate into a lasting career on the stage.
When Mozart moved to Vienna in 1781, he lodged for a time with the Weber family. The situation was clearly charged. He appears to have flirted with both Sophie and Constanze. The flirtation with Sophie left a mark in the music itself. An incomplete Allegro in B flat, catalogue number KV 400, contains what the scholar W. Dean Sutcliffe described as "a self-contained melodic episode in G minor, with the names of Sophie and Costanze Weber inscribed above a pair of prolonged sigh figures." Mozart also wrote about Sophie in a letter dated the 15th of December 1781, calling her "good-natured but feather-brained." When Mozart and Constanze married in 1782, Sophie was the only Weber sister present at the ceremony.
In December 1791, Sophie was 28 years old and still unmarried, the last of the Weber daughters without a husband. She was living with her mother Cäcilia but spent a great deal of time in the Mozart household during the final weeks of the composer's life. She helped Constanze tend to Mozart through his illness and was present at his death. What she saw and heard during those days she eventually committed to a letter, written not for publication but to help Georg Nikolaus von Nissen, Constanze's second husband, with the biography of Mozart he and Constanze were compiling. The Grove Dictionary describes her remembrances as moving. In 1829, the musicians Vincent and Mary Novello visited her during a journey undertaken specifically to gather firsthand information about Mozart, and she spoke with them as well.
Sophie married on the 7th of January 1807 in Djakovar, Slavonia, the town now known as Đakovo in Croatia. Her husband was Jakob Haibel, born in 1762, a tenor singer, actor, and composer. Haibel had written a Singspiel that was performed many times by the theatrical troupe of Emanuel Schikaneder, making it a notable success in the popular theatre of the day. Some accounts suggest Haibel left a first wife in order to marry Sophie. He held the position of cathedral choirmaster in Djakovar, and the couple lived there until his death in 1826.
After Jakob Haibel died in 1826, Sophie moved to Salzburg, where Constanze was then living as a widow for the second time. After 1831 they were joined by their sister Aloysia, also widowed by then, and the three sisters shared that final chapter of their lives in the same city. Aloysia died in 1839. Constanze died in 1842. Sophie outlived them both, and outlived Mozart's son Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart by two years. She died in Salzburg in 1846, at the age of 83, the last surviving member of that musical household where a young composer had once scribbled two sisters' names into a melody in G minor.
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Common questions
Who was Sophie Weber and how is she related to Mozart?
Sophie Weber (1763-1846) was an Austrian singer and the younger sister of Constanze Weber, who married Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1782. Sophie was present at the Mozart wedding and was with Mozart during his final illness and death in December 1791.
What did Sophie Weber write about Mozart's death?
Sophie Weber wrote a letter to Georg Nikolaus von Nissen, Constanze's second husband, to help with the biography of Mozart that Nissen and Constanze were preparing. The Grove Dictionary describes her remembrances as "moving." She was also interviewed in 1829 by Vincent and Mary Novello, who were gathering firsthand accounts of Mozart's life.
Did Mozart write music with Sophie Weber's name in it?
Yes. An incomplete Allegro in B flat, catalogued as KV 400, contains what scholar W. Dean Sutcliffe described as "a self-contained melodic episode in G minor, with the names of Sophie and Costanze Weber inscribed above a pair of prolonged sigh figures." Mozart composed it while lodging with the Weber family in Vienna around 1781.
Who did Sophie Weber marry and when?
Sophie Weber married Jakob Haibel (1762-1826) on the 7th of January 1807 in Djakovar, Slavonia, the town now known as Đakovo in Croatia. Haibel was a tenor singer, actor, composer, and cathedral choirmaster who had written a successful Singspiel performed by Emanuel Schikaneder's theatrical troupe.
Where and when did Sophie Weber die?
Sophie Weber died in Salzburg in 1846 at the age of 83. She had moved there after her husband Jakob Haibel's death in 1826 to live near her sister Constanze, and she outlived all her sisters as well as Mozart's son Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart.
What did Mozart say about Sophie Weber in his letters?
In a letter dated the 15th of December 1781, Mozart described Sophie Weber as "good-natured but feather-brained." At the time, Mozart was lodging with the Weber family in Vienna and reportedly flirted with both Sophie and her sister Constanze.