Mass in C major, Op.86: Vocal score

Commissioned by Price Esterhazy, the patron of his teacher Joseph Haydn, Beethoven's first major choral mass with orchestral accompaniment was generally dismissed as an inferior work by both patron and audience at the first performance in Eisenstadt on 13 September 1807. Later audiences nevertheless came to appreciate Beethoven's masterful contrapuntal writing, which are a precursor to his towering Missa Solemnis composed 15 years later. This newly engraved vocal score features a superb pia...