Mozart was perhaps the most musically gifted individual Western Civilization has ever produced and he was extremely fortunate to be born into a highly musical age in which his wide ranging genius could find the stimuli it needed to develop and flourish.
His father Leopold Mozart was a talented violinist and composer in the employ of The Archbishop of Saltzburg. He and his wife Anna Maria had seven children but only two survived infancy. A girl, whom the family named Nannerl and a boy, Wolfgang Amadeus five years younger, born on twenty seventh of January 1756 in Saltzburg.
Nannerl proved to be a bright musical girl who profited from her father’s lessons. However, what astonished the family was to see baby Wolferl (their pet name for him), little more than a toddler, take an intense interest in his sister’s music making.
He could pick out simple little chords before he was three and before he was four his father started teaching him.
Soon he was composing simple little tunes. A friend recalled how he and Leapold returned from Church one evening to find the four year old child hard at work with pen and paper. He insisted he was writing a Clavier Concerto.
Leapold and friend chuckled at the ink blobs but on closer inspection Leapold was astonished at the neatness. “Look how extraordinarily difficult it is “ he said. “Nobody could play it”. His small son interrupted, ”That is because it is a Concerto, it has to be practised” and going to the keyboard he tried to show them what he had in mind.
There are many more wondrous stories, some probably exaggerated, but it was not long before Leapold concluded that he had fathered a genius. He resolved to nurture this God Given wonder and expose him to the world.
Leapold gave up his career and toured with his children. They were the talk of Europe. ”Exploitation of Children” said the critics, but apart from the much needed money, Mozart certainly benefited from being exposed to so much music during those early years.
Around 1767 interest in the child genius began to wane. He was no longer cute and was not experienced enough to stand up to the rivalry of older musicians. Nannerl’s career was over by the time she was eighteen and from then on father and son travelled.
We must remember that in the time of Mozart music was the main, if not the only, source of cultural entertainment making it relatively easy to arrange performances.
Leapold was clever and preferred concerts to private bookings because tickets were sold for concerts in advance thus providing money. Private bookings however were usually by invitation and payment could be anything from a silk scarf to a bottle of cheap cologne.
When Mozart was twenty one he ventured alone to Munich. He was happy to be free of his father and the discipline of the Archbishop of Saltzburg for whom he had worked tirelessly for four years.
However, instead of being welcomed he discovered that many people had almost forgotten the child genius and were not terribly interested in a twenty one year old musician.
Let me say right now that Mozart composed only to survive. He knew no other way of making a living. He never wrote a note unless commissioned to do so. He wrote anything from a Symphony (41 of them), to tunes for musical clocks.
Mozart married in 1782 and settled in Vienna. Constanze was probably not the best wife for Mozart however she was musical and bore him six children of whom only two survived to adulthood. It is interesting to note that Mozart sent both his boys to Hayden whom he admired very much. No greater compliment could he pay Hayden who was also his best friend.
Mozart was very happy in Vienna with his wife and children and he worked very hard. Teaching all day, concerts at night as well as commissioned compositions kept him very busy.
He was turning out compositions furiously in order to survive for in those days there were no royalties and composers were only as well off as their next concert or commission.
Everything he wrote was not sensational but who would argue with:
41 Symphonies
25 Piano Concertos
17 Piano Sonatas
5 Operas
15 Masses
just to mention a few of his Masterpieces.
Although Mozart’s favourite form was Opera the instrument he loved to play and write for was the piano.
The instrument itself was just coming into favour especially in Vienna and Mozart’s concerts and Sonatas did much to establish the basic styles of pianistic writing.
As early as 1774 Mozart had discovered the suitability of the piano for playing big chords for rapid passage work and for singing melodies.
Long before Chopin he played with the free and expressive treatment of rhythm known as rubato. He took pride in the fact that his left hand strictly kept the beat while his right hand was able to take subtle rhythmic freedoms.
The piano Mozart used was much smaller than the piano of today, but even with a smaller range of tone, inadequate sustaining power, and fewer keys, Mozart made the piano sing glitter and thunder.
In July 1791 he received a secret commission to write a Requiem and this is the origin of the legend that a ghostly visitant ordered Mozart to write his own Requiem shortly before his death. Actually it was a certain Count Walsegg who sent a servant to ask Mozart to do this for a substantial fee.
At this time Mozart was worried about his wife and he also became ill himself. This depressed state allowed the mystery of the Requiem to prey on his mind and he believed he was writing his own Requiem.
The last few months of Mozart’s life were filled by the struggle to finish the production of the Magic Flute as well as to complete the Requiem in the face of illness and depression.
The Magic Flute attracted large audiences and its success cheered his last weeks.
He was destined not to finish the Requiem despite his attempts to compose in bed. Two months before his 36th birthday on December 5th 1791 he died of what Doctors believed to be Nephritis.
He had the cheapest possible funeral and was buried in a pauper’s grave. A group of friends set out to follow the coffin to the grave yard but as a storm appeared they turned back and left it to go on its humble way. A more obscure end can hardly be imagined.
Mozart composed and performed for the purpose of entertaining. He was not, as was J.S.Bach, a musical scientist. However, Anton Rubinstein the famous Russian Composer/Pianist said “Eternal Sunshine In Music, Thy Name Is Mozart”.
