Mozart’s Passion and Love for Music

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was one of the most influential and inspiring composers of the classical era. He is known as one of the greatest composers of western history. Unlike all other composers, Mozart was versatile and wrote in all forms of music. His taste and how he expressed his music was what made him the most universal of all composers.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in 1756 in Salzburg, Austria. His father was Leopold Mozart, who was a court musician. He was also the author to a well-known violin playing manual that was published the year Mozart was born.

His mother was from a middle class family who was in local administration. He also had a sister named Maria Anna, they were the only two children to survive until adulthood.

Mozart was a child prodigy and excelled in many different instruments. He also started composing at a very young age. At age six he could play the harpsichord and the violin, he could improvise fugues, write minuets, and read music extremely well at first sight. At age eight, he had already written a symphony and by age twelve he had written an oratorio as well as an opera. This showed how versatile he was with all forms of music. Because of all this Leopold was very eager to show his son off and have him perform for many esteemed citizens of society. Mozart was continually on tour for nine years, between the age of six and fifteen. In those years he played for Empress Maria Theresa in Vienna, he played for Louis XV in Versailles, George III in London and many more of society’s most well known citizens.

When Mozart returned back to Salzburg at the age of fifteen, it was under a new ruling. The prince-archbishop refused him a seat as a court musician and his career started to go downhill from there. All the fame he had claimed of being a child prodigy disappeared as he became an adult musician. He started to disappear when the prince-archbishop also forbade him from playing concerts for the aristocratic houses. Finally at the age of twenty-five Mozart had had enough and moved to Vienna.

Mozart’s first years in Vienna were very successful. Many of his concerts were attended by the emperor as well as many nobility. Students paid high fees to take lessons with him. His life in Viene composed of compositions getting published, and his playing being heard in palaces. All this success led to the commission of Don Giovanni by an opera company in Prague. Though Don Giovanni was a success in Prague, because of its dark qualities and dissonance it did not appeal to the Viennese audience. This led to a decrease in popularity for Mozart, his pupils started to disappear, and the elite started to decline at his concerts.

Mozart was most successful in his last year. He had received commission for a german opera. While Mozart was working on this opera he was visited by a stranger. This stranger commissioned a requiem for the dead. Thinking it was for himself Mozart rushed to write it even while he was on his deathbed. Sadly he died before he could finish it. It was later completed by his friend and pupil Franz S?‹ssmayer, and received great praise.

Mozart was one of the most versatile composers of all time. He didn’t limit himself to just one form of music. He wrote in many forms and wrote masterpieces in all of them. His music conveyed multiple feelings all at the same time. Mozart traveled in many tours over his years, he was known at a very young age for imitating other music. With all his traveling he picked up different pieces from different places, this led to a contrast yet perfectly harmonious collection. It was graceful, yet still at ease. His music was a perfect balance between spontaneity and restraint. There were harmonies that tied perfectly together in his music. There were mysterious harmonies that were tied into darker themes that were balanced by lyrics.

Mozart is known for his piano concertos, which were composed mainly for him to perform himself. Though he also wrote concertos for other instruments he was mainly known for his piano concertos. Along with concertos, Mozart was a master at the opera and was known for his ability to control the music as well as the stage.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is still to this day one of the greatest and most versatile composer of all time. He knew how to control the music and tie it all together. The music flowed from him and even through his hard times his music never failed to impress. As Mozart once wrote to his father “I am never happier than when I have something to compose, for that, after all, is my sole delight and passion.” Mozart’s passion and love for his music is communicated through his many masterpieces, which truly and deeply represent Mozart.

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