Gottfried van Swieten and income following the earlier completion of their Grand Tour of Europe. According to Mozart's father Leopold, Van Swieten was involved in the early planning of Wolfgang's ill-fated opera "La Finta Semplice" (the opera was later blocked by intrigues, and could be performed only in Salzburg). In 1781, shortly after Mozart had moved to Vienna, van Swieten met him again: at the salon of Countess Thun, Mozart played extracts from his recent opera Idomeneo, with van Swieten and other important officials in the audience; this event helped instigate Mozart's commission for the opera "The Abduction from the Seraglio", his first
Willoughby Weiss di Lammermoor" (with Dorus Gras and Henry Whitworth), conducted by Hector Berlioz, in Louis Antoine Jullien's company: soon afterwards Reeves and Weiss sang together again in the premiere of Balfe's opera "Maid of Honour". In 1854 he set Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem ""The Village Blacksmith"" to music, from which he made a considerable fortune. In that year Weiss was in Jarrett's company at Drury Lane, with Reeves, Agnes Büry, Mme Rudersdorff, Louisa Pyne and others, in a season including "Lucia", "Fra Diavolo", "La sonnambula", "Il Seraglio" and "Masaniello". On New Year's Day 1856, with Reeves, Novello and Lewis Thomas, he