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Wolfgang Mozart Biography

in full Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, baptized as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart

(1756–1791)

Related Works

Operas
1770 Lucio Silla, K135
1781 Idomeneo, K366

1782 Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio), K384
1786 Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro), K492
1786 Der Schauspieldirektor, K486
1787 Don Giovanni, K527
1788 Bastien und Bastienne, K50
1791 Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), K620
1791 La clemenza di Tito, K621
Symphonies, 41
1778 No.31 ‘Paris’ in D, K297
1782 No.35 ‘Haffner’ in D, K385
1783 No.36 ‘Linz’ in C, K425
1786 No.38 ‘Prague’ in D, K504
1788 No.39 in E♭, K543
1788 No.40 in G minor, K550
1788 No.41 ‘Jupiter’ in C, K551
Concertos
Piano concertos, 21
1784 No.15 in B♭
1784 No.17 in G
1784 No.18 in B♭
1784 No.19 in F
1785 No.20 in d
1785 No.21 in C
1785 No.22 in E♭
1786 No.23 in A
1786 No.24 in c
1786 No.25 in C
1788 No.26 ‘Coronation’ in D
1791 No.27 in B♭
1 For 2 pianos
1 For 3 pianos
5 Violin concertos
1779 Sinfonia concertante for violin and viola, K364
Bassoon
Clarinet
Flute (later transcribed for oboe)
Flute and harp
4 For Horn
1778 Sinfonia concertante for oboe, clarinet, horn, and bassoon
14 Sonatas for organ and strings
3 Sonatas for organ and orchestra
Other orchestral music serenades
1776 Serenata notturna, K239
1776 ‘Haffner’, K250
1787 Eine kleine Nachtmusik, K525
Divertimentos
Cassations
Dances
Choral music
18 Masses
1779 No.16, ‘Coronation’
c1783 No.18, unfinished
1791 Requiem, unfinished
1773 Exsultate jubilate
Oratorios
Short sacred works
Chamber music
23 String quartets
1783–5 ‘Haydn Quartets’ in G, K387, in D minor, K421
1785 ‘Dissonance’, in C, K465
1788 Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K546
1789–90 ‘Prussian quartets’
6 String quintets
1787 In C, K515
1787 In G minor
Clarinet quintet
Flute quartets
Oboe quartet
Piano quartets
Piano trios
string trios
37 Violin sonatas
Piano and wind quintet
Piano music
17 Sonatas
Rondos
15 Sets of variations
2 Fantasias
6 Sonatas for piano duet
Sonatas for 2 Pianos
Adagio and Allegro in F minor
Fantasia in F minor
Vocal music
Concert arias for voice and orchestra
Songs for voice and piano

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(born Jan. 27, 1756, Salzburg, Archbishopric of Salzburg [Austria]—died Dec. 5, 1791, Vienna) Austrian composer, widely recognized as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music. With Haydn and Beethoven he brought to its height the achievement of the Viennese Classical school. Unlike any other composer in musical history, he wrote in all the musical genres of his day and excelled in every one. His taste, his command of form, and his range of expression have made him seem the most universal of all composers; yet, it may also be said that his music was written to accommodate the specific tastes of particular audiences.

Early life and works

Mozart most commonly called himself Wolfgang Amadé or Wolfgang Gottlieb. His father, Leopold, came from a family of good standing (from which he was estranged), which included architects and bookbinders. Leopold was the author of a famous violin-playing manual, which was published in the very year of Mozart's birth. His mother, Anna Maria Pertl, was born of a middle-class family active in local administration. Mozart and his sister Maria Anna (“Nannerl”) were the only two of their seven children to survive.

The boy's early talent for music was remarkable. At three he was picking out chords on the harpsichord, at four playing short pieces, at five composing. There are anecdotes about his precise memory of pitch, about his scribbling a concerto at the age of five, and about his gentleness and sensitivity (he was afraid of the trumpet). Just before he was six, his father took him and Nannerl, also highly talented, to Munich to play at the Bavarian court, and a few months later they went to Vienna and were heard at the imperial court and in noble houses.

“The miracle which God let be born in Salzburg” was Leopold's description of his son, and he was keenly conscious of his duty to God, as he saw it, to draw the miracle to the notice of the world (and incidentally to profit from doing so). In mid-1763 he obtained a leave of absence from his position as deputy Kapellmeister at the prince-archbishop's court at Salzburg, and the family set out on a prolonged tour. They went to what were all the main musical centres of western Europe—Munich, Augsburg, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Mainz, Frankfurt, Brussels, and Paris (where they remained for the winter), then London (where they spent 15 months), returning through The Hague, Amsterdam, Paris, Lyon, and Switzerland, and arriving back in Salzburg in November 1766. In most of these cities Mozart, and often his sister, played and improvised, sometimes at court, sometimes in public or in a church. Leopold's surviving letters to friends in Salzburg tell of the universal admiration that his son's achievements aroused. In Paris they met several German composers, and Mozart's first music was published (sonatas for keyboard and violin, dedicated to a royal princess); in London they met, among others, Johann Christian Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach's youngest son and a leading figure in the city's musical life, and under his influence Mozart composed his first symphonies—three survive (K 16, K 19, and K 19a—K signifying the work's place in the catalog of Ludwig von Köchel). Two more followed during a stay in The Hague on the return journey (K 22 and K 45a).