Mozart

Hi everybody! this is Eizaz here and I will be writing a series of articles about famous composers and their works, both for referance and for the reading interest of the students at Mama Treble Clef Studio. Today's article takes a look at the famed Mozart and the story of his life...

Who was Mozart? Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791), was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers and his influence on subsequent Western music is profound. Beethoven wrote his own early compositions in the shadow of Mozart, of whom Joseph Haydn wrote that "posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years." Mozart was born to his parents Leopold and Anna Maria Pertl Mozart in Salsburg, which is now the capital of Austria. His father Leopold was a minor composer, musician and an experienced teacher. An excerpt from his sister Nannerl's diary says: He often spent much time at the clavier, picking out thirds, which he was always striking, and his pleasure showed that it sounded good. [...] In the fourth year of his age his father, for a game as it were, began to teach him a few minuets and pieces at the clavier. [...] He could play it faultlessly and with the greatest delicacy, and keeping exactly in time. [...] At the age of five he was already composing little pieces, which he played to his father who wrote them down. Mozart's music, like Haydn's, stands as an archetypal example of the Classical style. At the time he began composing, European music was dominated by the style galant: a reaction against the highly evolved intricacy of the Baroque. But progressively, and in large part at the hands of Mozart himself, the contrapuntal complexities of the late Baroque emerged once more, moderated and disciplined by new forms, and adapted to a new aesthetic and social milieu. Mozart was a versatile composer, and wrote in every major genre, including symphony, opera, the solo concerto, chamber music including string quartet and string quintet, and the piano sonata. These forms were not new; but Mozart advanced the technical sophistication and emotional reach of them all. He almost single-handedly developed and popularized the Classical piano concerto. He wrote a great deal of religious music, including large-scale masses: but also many dances, divertimenti, serenades, and other forms of light entertainment.

Undoubtedly one of the most celebrated composers of all time, Mozart was laid to rest on the 5th of December 1791, at the St Marx cemetery outside the city of Salsburg. His birthday is celebrated every year in the form of performances and carnivals, with the 250th celebration in the year 2006.