Having spent the summer completing the Fantasia in F minor for piano duet (D940) and the Mass in E flat (D950), on 1 September 1828 the ailing Schubert moved to his brother’s apartments (‘Auf der Wieden’) in the Viennese suburbs in order to breathe the ‘better air’ of the surrounding countryside. However, the house had only recently been erected and the resulting dampness did little to improve the composer’s constant syphilitic fits of giddiness. As he had left most of his belongings and manuscripts with his close friend Schober, it is generally assumed that the composer had originally intended only a short stay, but in the event it was to become his last residence.