Creative Spotlight: Mozart

On January 27 1756, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in Salzburg, Austria. His father, Leopold Mozart, was a musician who worked as a composer and violinist for the archbishop of Salzburg. His mother, Anna Maria, supported the musical education of their two children. She gave birth to seven children in total, but only Wolfgang and his older sister survived to adulthood. Mozart’s musical talents were apparent from a remarkably early age: by the age of 3, he could play chords on the harpsicord by ear, by 4 he could play short pieces, and by 5, he was composing his own works. By the age of 6, he was a budding composer and skilled keyboardist. In 1762, Leopold brought his son to the imperial court in Vienna, and from the following year, Wolfgang and his sister, Maria Anna (known as Nannerl), embarked on exhaustive tours of Europe as musical prodigies. 

Under the guidance and management of Leopold Mozart, Wolfgang and Nannerl travelled across Europe, performing for royalty in Paris and London, as well as all the main musical centres of Europe: Munich, Frankfurt, Brussels, Stuttgart, and others. While in London, Mozart’s musical gifts attracted the attention of Johann Christian Bach (the youngest son of the composer, Johann Sebastian Bach), who was a major influence on Mozart’s earliest symphonies. The experience of travelling exposed Wolfgang to a variety of musical styles at an early age, and it also contributed to his fluency in a variety of European languages. However, the pressures were intense. Leopold Mozart described his son as ‘The miracle which God let be born in Salzburg’, and as he grew older, Wolfgang struggled to free himself from his father’s controlling influence.  

The young Wolfgang wrote his first secular music drama, Apollo et Hyacinthus, at the tender age of 11 in 1767. It was a commission for the Benedictine University in Salzburg where Mozart’s father was heavily involved in the musical scene. The Mozarts moved to Vienna in 1767, where Mozart wrote Bastien und Bastienne, a one-act singspiel (a dramatic play with songs), and La finta semplice (The Feigned Simpleton, 1768), an Italian-language opera buffa (comic opera), which was performed in the palace of the Archbishop in Salzburg the following year. In October 1769, Mozart was appointed Honorary Konzertmeister at the court in Salzburg. 

From 1775-77, he held the salaried position of Konzertmeister (court musician) in the court of Prince-Archbishop Hieronymus Colloredo, during which time Mozart composed the opera seria/dramatic cantata, Il re pastore (The Shepherd King), as well as sacred and instrumental works. These included some five violin concertos and three piano concertos, as well as (confusingly) a concerto for three pianos. By 1777, he had become increasingly interested in writing works for the opera stage, and he resigned his position. At 21 years of age, Wolfgang set out in search of new opportunities.  

In 1777 Mozart travelled with his father to Munich, Augsburg and Mannheim in search of a position at court, without success. In Mannheim, Mozart fell in love with the soprano, Aloysia Weber, the second of four sisters, but when his father learned of their plans to travel to Italy, Leopold intervened, instead dispatching his son to Paris, where in 1778, he was joined by his mother. Mozart’s D-major symphony, the Concert Spirituel, was a great success with Parisian audiences, but Mozart got into debt, and the trip took a tragic turn when his mother’s health declined, and in July 1778 she died. Grieving in Paris, Mozart stayed with his friend, Friedrich Melchior, Baron von Grimm, who confided in Leopold that Mozart’s prospects looked unfavourable. Although Mozart was later offered a position in Paris, he declined it, and returned home to Salzburg in mid-January 1780, where his father had negotiated him a position as court organist. 

Mozart’s return home saw a flurry of creative activity. His most popular works from this time include: the Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola, the Coronation Mass, and Zaide, another Singspiel. In Summer 1780, he received an opera commission from the opera theatre in Munich, which became Idomeneo, re di Creta. The opera had its premiere in 1781, soon after Mozart’s 25th birthday, and it was a success.  

Following the success of Idomeneo, Mozart was summoned to Vienna to serve the Archbishop Colloredo. Unfortunately, the relationship soon soured: the archbishop housed Mozart in humble lodgings and banned him from playing at lucrative concerts. Tensions between the two men came to a head and Mozart resigned from his position in a stormy meeting in 1781. Mozart remained in the city, lodging with the family of his former girlfriend, Aloysia Weber (who was herself now married to a court painter and actor). He earned a living teaching, writing music for publication (including the ‘Gran Partita’ Wind Serenade in 1781), and playing in concerts.  

Having begun work on his first full-length German-language opera, Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio) in 1771, the premiere took place at the Vienna Burgtheater in July 1782. According to legend, the Emperor reacted, saying, ‘Very many notes, my dear Mozart’. While the story may be a fiction, it is true that the opera is more densely scored than his earlier works, with rich textures, ornamentation of vocal lines, and longer, more complex arias. Although the opera was received favourably, it didn’t generate huge income for the composer, and so he turned to other compositional forms, including piano concerti and a set of six string quartets inspired by the works of Joseph Haydn. Other inspirations included Bach and Handel (see our Handel Creative Spotlight here). Mozart’s Mass in C minor was left incomplete, but the ‘Kyrie’ and ‘Gloria’ from this work show his indebtedness to the Baroque tradition, with its sparse textures and vocal lines. Other popular works from this era including the 1782 ‘Haffner’ symphony, and the ‘Linz’ Symphony no. 36 in C major.  

Throughout the 1780s Mozart continued to perform as a keyboard soloist, giving the premieres of his piano concerti (of which he wrote a total of 12 between 1782-91) to great acclaim. During this time his mastery of orchestration developed hugely, demonstrated by the symphonic unity of the later piano concerti, and their dramatic interactions between the soloist and the orchestra. There was also an outpouring of chamber music, including sonatas for piano and violin, a quintet for piano and wind instruments, and more string quartets. In 1785, the composer Joseph Haydn remarked to Leopold Mozart: ‘Your son is the greatest composer known to me in person or by name’. 

Mozart and his wife, Constanze, had lavish tastes and often lived beyond their means, despite Mozart’s success as a pianist and composer. In the Vienna Court, Kapellmeister Antonio Salieri wielded considerable influence, in accordance with the fashion for Italian music. While the two men were on friendly terms (unlike the bitter rivalry depicted in Peter Shaffer’s 1979 play, Amadeus, made famous in the 1984 film), Mozart realised it made more sense for him to turn his attentions to the Vienna Court Opera of Joseph II.  

In May 1787, Mozart’s father, Leopold died. Wolfgang continued to compose, creating string quartets and other chamber works of increasing sophistication, including the now-famous Eine kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music). The 17-year-old Ludwig van Beethoven was in Vienna at the time and, according to anecdote, he met Mozart, his idol at the time. The legend goes that Ludwig played one of his own works for Mozart, who remarked to his wife, ‘Watch out for that boy. One day he will give the world something to talk about’. Mozart agreed to teach him, but it wasn’t to be: Beethoven was summoned back to his hometown of Bonn, where his mother was seriously ill, putting an end to those plans. 

By 1788, Mozart’s financial situation had worsened. This was in part due to the Austro-Turkish War, which caused finances across the city to become more straitened, with a knock-on effect on the aristocracy’s patronage of the arts. During this time, Mozart composed his two most famous symphonies, nos. 40 and 41, the ‘Jupiter’ (1788), but he was forced to borrow from his friends. He embarked on journeys to Leipzig, Dresden and Berlin (1789), Frankfurt, Mannheim and elsewhere in Germany (1790) in the hope of improving his prospects. Letters from this time demonstrate Mozart’s low mood, and some commentators have suggested that he was suffering from depression.