The virtuoso pianist with 30 years of performance experience lived only 35 years and had already become the most famous European composer by the age of 20, achieving recognition in all musical genres of his time. How much more “eternal music” could this unique talent have left to humanity if he had spent his allotted time on immortal creativity rather than searching for those who needed it.
“A Miracle from God”
Out of seven children in this family, only two survived. The birth of the son on January 27, 1756, nearly cost his mother her life, and the newborn was so weak that he was hastily baptized on the second day. The father named the son, who clung to life, “God’s miracle” or “Beloved of God” – this is how his name Theophilus or Amadeus translates from the Greek and Latin versions (one in honor of his grandfather, the other given at baptism).
The son of the violinist and composer of the Salzburg Archbishopric court chapel, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791), was indeed “kissed by God.” The left-handed prodigy learned to write and read music notes earlier than he could distinguish letters. From childhood, Mozart had such a delicate ear that trumpet sounds caused him physical pain. By the age of three, the gifted child had mastered the clavier and harpsichord, and at four flawlessly performed his violin part in the family string trio: he taught himself to play the violin by watching his older sister’s musical exercises. At five, Mozart played pieces on keyboard and string instruments with professional skill, and by six was already performing worldwide with his sister before nobility and royal courts.
Father teaching young Wolfgang to play the piano. Artist Ebenezer Crawford (19th century)
The remarkable talent deprived the young genius of a childhood, as his early years passed in an exhausting schedule of concert activity, long performances, and meetings with potential patrons and commissioners. During a long tour, the young Mozart contracted scarlet fever, then smallpox, which left unsightly scars on his pale face, and following his sister, suffered from typhoid fever. According to doctors, excessive strain on the delicate child’s body (he was small and slender by nature) may have worsened his health problems, turning acute infections chronic and hastening his premature death.
Music Without Borders
To accompany his son and daughter on trips to different countries, the father of the young travelers, Leopold Mozart, even obtained a three-year leave from the archbishop. But the travels through the royal and princely courts of Europe stretched on for decades. The honorable employer grew tired of such disorder and dismissed Leopold Mozart with the words: “Let him go, I no longer need him.”
In the geography of these many-month-long trips, only in the first great tour were Vienna (where decades later another great composer would end his earthly path — Ludwig van Beethoven, about whom our hero said in 1787: “Everyone will be talking about this young man!”), Munich, Linz, Pressburg (Bratislava), Paris, London, The Hague, Lyon, Geneva, and Brno. The mentor’s strategy was to introduce influential people to the virtuoso performer for subsequent promotion as a composer. The young prodigy amazed audiences with unprecedented performance tricks: playing music backward from memory, flawless playing on cloth-covered keys with eyes blindfolded, with his back to the instrument, and even lying on a bench.
Visiting the Sistine Chapel at age 13, Mozart reproduced Gregorio Allegri’s Miserere heard in Rome, copying from memory Vatican property that was carefully guarded. The owner of a phenomenal musical ear, memory, and improvisation skills was a “world star” from childhood, and from age 14 – the youngest member of the Bologna Philharmonic Academy and a knight of the Order of the Golden Spur.
Half of all his symphonies the composer wrote between ages 8 and 19. However, the author of musical masterpieces never attended school: his father taught him all the necessary sciences. Besides musical literacy, the self-taught son knew almost all European languages, including German, English, Italian, Spanish, French, Polish, Bohemian (Czech), Dutch, Russian, Turkish, as well as Ancient Greek, Latin, and Biblical Hebrew. This helped him work not only in his homeland: Mozart spent half his life (14 out of 35 years) outside Austria.
The Mozart Family. On the wall — a portrait of the mother. Artist Johann Nepomuk de la Croce, 1780.
The Horse, Bowling, Minuet
Unlike his pianist sister, who stopped performing upon marriage, Wolfgang Amadeus actively played and conducted. At the height of fame, the outstanding composer and instrumentalist had no shortage of students and fees: income from publishing works and concert subscriptions allowed him to rent expensive housing and maintain servants (the household included a maid, a cook, and a barber). Mozart bought himself a valuable piano, a billiard table, and even his own carriage. His favorite pets were a horse, a dog, a starling, and a canary. The composer enjoyed horseback rides in the park, bowling, danced the minuet well, and sang confidently. The tenor wanted to tie his life to an opera singer, in whose family he once lodged, but she married another, and Mozart married her younger sister.
In the marriage with the theater double bass player’s daughter, Constanze Weber, six children were born over eight years, but four infants died (as an ominous sign, those were named after Mozart’s father and mother: it is known that Leopold Mozart disapproved of his son’s choice and did not consent to this union). The two surviving sons, Karl Thomas and Franz Xaver, also became musicians but lived their lives without wives and did not continue the Mozart line. The elder son’s education in Perchtoldsdorf was paid for by Wolfgang Amadeus, while the widow had to raise the younger son alone (she remarried only 18 years later).
Wolfgang and Constanze. 19th-century postcard.
Trying to bring his works to the opera stage, Mozart worked on individual arias for colleagues’ operas and eventually secured an imperial commission for an original opera. Although Viennese opera lovers did not appreciate his “The Marriage of Figaro,” the composer found satisfaction in Prague, where the production was successful. After the triumphant return to Vienna, the emperor granted him support, and Mozart was appointed imperial musician (the position became vacant after the death of the predecessor). For an annual salary of 800 florins, the composer had to write masquerade and dance music. This was the last good news in his career.
The theater in Prague where the world premieres of the operas “Don Giovanni” and “La clemenza di Tito” took place.
From Major to Minor
From 1787, the number of the composer’s “academies” rapidly declined, and the next year, due to lack of subscribers, they disappeared altogether. His finances began to “sing romances” also because of the public failure of Mozart’s second opera on the Viennese stage — “Don Giovanni.” Two moves to cheaper housing (including to the suburbs) indicated Mozart’s growing money troubles. The tragedy was compounded by the death of a newborn daughter and the illness of his wife, who was prescribed recovery at a spa (she lived to 80 and, unlike her husband, was buried next to his father, who never reconciled with such a daughter-in-law in life).
Mozart addressed a series of bitter pleas for help to a wealthy friend and brother in the Masonic lodge, and in just one and a half summer months in 1788, he created his three best symphonies: Nos. 39, 40, and 41. However, they brought no money, as timely concert performances could not be organized. From the end of the year, the composer arranged others’ works for home performances at the request of his patron Baron van Swieten. He was buried in a common grave without a name and in a third-class cemetery, making it impossible to locate Mozart’s remains even seven years after burial.
After the death of Emperor Joseph II in 1790, Mozart offered himself to the new monarch Leopold II as second Kapellmeister (deputy to Antonio Salieri), emphasizing his great experience with sacred music. No answer followed. Later, Mozart requested appointment as an unpaid assistant to the seriously ill Kapellmeister of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, hoping to someday take over the post, but the sick man outlived Mozart.
“The Last Hours of Mozart’s Life,” painting by G. N. O’Neill, 1860s.
At the end of his life, Austria’s today “national pride” had only two students left. Mozart was not invited to perform before King Ferdinand nor to the coronation of Leopold II, which seemed insulting. In the autumn, Wolfgang Amadeus went on concerts to Frankfurt am Main and on the way back performed in Mainz, Mannheim, and Munich. Meanwhile, his wife moved the household belongings to their new address, where she soon remained alone with two sons and the debts of her deceased husband. Mozart died on December 5, 1791.