Exploring the Life of Mozart

Back in 1985, the film Amadeus swept the Academy Awards. It won eight Oscars, including Best Picture, and it grossed more than 50 million dollars. Who would have thought an 18th century composer would become a 20th century movie star? The film introduced Mozart's life and music to millions, but scholars and musicians bristled at its depiction of the composer as a silly, overgrown child with a hyena cackle. Was Mozart really just a privileged child? young man who happened to have an uncanny knack for composing. Fortunately, Mozart and his family were prolific letter writers, and their letters show us another Mozart entirely, a brilliant, often troubled genius who reinvented music. It's amazing what this guy did in one lifetime. He didn't start prolifically composing until he was about 12 years old. You know, he dies at 35. Can you imagine the output of this man? It's hard to think of another composer who has contributed so much great music as Mozart did. He must have been as popular in the 1780s as some rock stars are today. What I love most about Mozart is that even though it comes from a time very far from my own, it still is closest to my heart. Salzburg. On January 27, 1756, in this small city at the foot of the Austrian Alps, Leopold Mozart, his wife Anna Maria, and their daughter Marianne were joined by a son, Wolfgang. His father would later proclaim him the miracle which God let be born in Salzburg. Leopold Mozart was a musician at the Royal Archbishop's Court, and he was also something of a composer. The elder Mozart is still remembered for his writings on the violin and for a symphony he composed for toy instruments, long ascribed to Joseph Haydn. Wolfgang's sister Marianne showed early promise as a musician, and so her father began teaching her. teaching her the piano. Little Wolfgang, then just three years old, was drawn to the sound of the music and to his father's surprise and delight, he began to play. He would soon spend hours at the keyboard. He had an immediate sensuous contact with the materials of music and would go to the piano and pick out these sounds that he just found very attractive. Leopold Leopold wasted no time in cultivating his son's amazing talent. Under his guidance, Wolfgang was playing minuets by the age of four. Mozart probably had the most unique preparation and natural gift of any human being who has ever lived as far as music is concerned. At a very early stage, Leopold Mozart contemplating the talent, the genius of his son, was a son and recognizing how extraordinary it was determined that it had the capacity of transforming his family's fortunes. He thereafter devoted himself entirely to the exploitation of his son's gifts. Wolfgang was just five when he wrote his first musical composition, which his father transcribed. This is Mozart's first composition that we know about, Cursal 1, a minuet. That's not bad. for a six-year-old kid. Leopold was astounded by his son's ability and hoped a royal audience would be astounded as well. So in 1762, he sought a musical debut for his two children in Vienna at the court of Emperor Francis and Empress Maria Theresa. They came under very difficult conditions to Vienna, but they were lucky enough to meet the right people, and within a fortnight or so, Mozart played before the Empress in the Castle of Schönbrunn. And the Empress was very enchanted by him. The court showed its appreciation with a splendid lavender costume for Wolfgang, which pleased him very much, and a payment of 100 ducats, which pleased Leopold even more. He was six or seven years old, which was, of course, for the time then, the absolute sensation. And he made a lot of money. Music was thriving in Europe, and Leopold thought the time was just right to take his phenomenal children on a tour. So in June of 1763, they set out for Germany, Paris, and London. Leopold... became his son's great promoter. And to drum up business, he had the boy perform tricks on the piano. The little seven-year-old dazzled audiences playing intricate pieces with just one finger or on a keyboard hidden under a cloth. Having an upbringing as a prodigy, like what are we going to do today? Oh, we'll go and visit the Queen of England and you can play that little sonata in C major that you wrote yesterday. I mean, I don't think he grew up doing the things that normal children do. I think it was rather precious. Leopold and his two children traveled far and wide in search of audiences. He wrote, My children have taken almost everyone by storm. And they were taking everyone's money as well. The trip was enormous. profitable but traveling in open carriages in freezing weather was very difficult for the children and the threat of disease followed them everywhere he traveled all over Europe as a child and winter in summer led a very unhealthy life as a boy. Wolfgang began to suffer from recurring bouts of rheumatic fever. But when the children became ill, Leopold fretted over the loss of profits. It will certainly be a week before Wolfgang is quite restored to health. In God's name, a hundred Florins will disappear. But by Journey's end, with his father's help, the now eight-year-old Mozart had begun to write more and more sophisticated compositions, from simple keyboard compositions to simple piano compositions. sonatas to the first of his symphonies. The thing that was so great about Mozart's first symphony is not only that he wrote it when he was eight years old, but so Mozartian. And I've asked musicians in symphony orchestras, what is this piece? Does anybody know what it is? And, And everybody says, well, is it the Magic Flute or maybe the abduction from the seraglio to Mozart operas? You know, everybody guesses Mozart. but it's Mozart's first symphony that he wrote when he was eight years old It was all very well to be a sensation in Austria, but to really prove his mettle, Mozart would have to make a name for himself in Italy, the true center of European music. So in December of 1769, Wolfgang and Leopold embarked on an extended tour of Italy, performing before the leading members of the nobility. CHOIR SINGS In Rome on Easter Sunday, April 15, 1770, Wolfgang and Leopold were summoned to St. Peter's for an audience with Pope Clement XIV. The Pope soon joined the chorus of those singing Wolfgang's praises and conferred upon him a rare honor, the Order of the Golden Spur. But Wolfgang took something else from St. Peter's. With his phenomenal memory, he brought back with him the famous secret choral piece, the Miserere, which was never allowed to be heard outside the Vatican. Wolfgang delighted in all the attention, and his father delighted in the status of those showering the attention. And when Wolfgang was just 14, he was given a commission for an opera. In December of 1770, Mitrodotus, King of Pontus, premiered in Milan. But not everyone was enchanted with this precocious composer. Still, as Leopold wrote of the event, My son's opera has been received most favorably, in spite of the great opposition of his enemies and detractors, who before hearing a single note had spread the rumor that it was a barbarous German composition. Whatever the resistance Wolfgang met in Italy, he was soon given his due. At the prestigious Academia Philharmonica in Mantua, after putting the boy through a battery of tests, the local masters agreed that young Mozart was a miracle in music. and one of those freaks nature causes to be born. And one German composer who heard Mozart perform in Milan proclaimed, this boy will consign us all to oblivion. In 1769, when Mozart was just 13, his hometown of Salzburg appointed him honorary concertmeister of the court. Now the teenager began to turn out one composition after another, and the works showed a stunning growth in their sophistication. One of the things about Mozart which is striking and Unexplainable. He wrote all five violin concertos in nine months of his 19th year. And from the first one in B-flat major to the last one in A major is about 30 years progress. Go explain it. There's no way. Mozart was not modest about his gifts. And he began to feel his provincial little Salzburg could never fully appreciate him. His father, too, felt the time had come for the now 21-year-old genius to find a position with one of Europe's royal courts. But Leopold still did not trust Wolfgang to travel alone. So in 1777, Leopold sent his wife as a chaperone on Wolfgang's mission to Paris in search of his fortune. On their way, Mozart and his mother stopped in Augsburg. There, while visiting an uncle, Mozart and his young cousin Maria began a playful relationship. He and his cousin, Maria Anna Tekler Mozart, fell in love and thus commenced one of the most joyous, riotously, bawdy correspondences in music history. Mozart wrote her letter after letter. The intimacy and raunchiness of the correspondence have never failed to shock historians. There is a very famous or infamous set of letters that Mozart wrote to his cousin. And these are really, I don't know if bawdy is exactly the word, because bawdy suggests that the letters are sexual in content, and they basically aren't. They're just dirty. They're just scatological. They're bathroom-type humor, and really very infantile. It's impossible to characterize Mozart simply, which may be a measure of his genius. There's so many different Mozarts. There's an earthy man, childlike at times, and with an innate wisdom that he himself couldn't explain. You can certainly see from his music that he enjoyed life, and was probably very witty. And you could also see that he had a wild side, because the music sometimes would break out into a more wild nature. In the fifth concerto, the last movement of the fifth concerto is this really cute... minuet which sounds like Mozart into the way kind of something you'd expect and then all of a sudden in the middle of the piece he breaks out into this Turkish dance which you wouldn't expect it Which is, it's totally unexpected and, but he liked to do that. He liked to have fun. On October 30th, 1777, Mozart and his mother arrived in Mannheim to wait out the winter. Frau Mozart wrote to Leopold, You cannot imagine in what high favor Wolfgang is here with both the orchestra and with other people. It was here that Mozart met and fell hopelessly in love with the young singer, Aloysio Weber, daughter of a fellow musician. He wrote home to Leopold that he planned to help launch her career. He thinks he's come up with the greatest possible idea, namely escaping, running away with Aloysio to Italy. And then his father writes back and says, are you insane? Have you gone off your rocker? Leopold warned Wolfgang that... Union with a woman only leads to one thing, the hardship of supporting a wife and children. Off with you to Paris. Find your place among great people. Leopold was a very controlling father. He wanted to be the most important person in Mozart's life, always. Mozart wrote his father asking him to leave him in peace and denying any impropriety in his behavior. I am a Mozart. And a young and clean-minded Mozart. He said, please don't barrage me with these relentless criticisms. I can't get my work done. Your letters put me into a... A bad mood. Wolfgang was not delighted by his return to France. Shortly after he and his mother arrived, Mozart lamented that the French all seemed to think he was still a child. People who had seen him at an early age expected to continue to see a child prodigy frozen in time. He said, give me any test, any audition, and I will show that as young as I am, as German as I am, I am as good as any composer. Mozart became increasingly unhappy in Paris. He deplored the French taste in music. I do not think much of Parisian applause. But Leopold, ever eager to see his son succeed, urged Mozart to compose in the local style. Be guided by the French taste. Leopold was, in a sense, too pragmatic to really understand Mozart's genius. He thought that Mozart could be a great composer. But by great composer, he really meant somebody who would have a commercial financial success. In 1777, a patron engaged Wolfgang to compose a series of concertos and quartets for the flute. But Wolfgang soon wrote home, his payment did not appear to be forthcoming, adding, Furthermore, I become quite powerless when composing for an instrument I cannot bear. When Mozart came out with this famous statement about not liking the flute, he was in a curious set of circumstances having not been paid for a composition. Now I know what it is like when you don't get paid for something. You tend not to like the person who doesn't pay you and you tend not to want to do anything for that person ever again. And in Mozart's case, this guy was a flute player. The concerto for flute and harp I think is truly One of Mozart's masterpieces, it's a great piece of writing for both instruments. And at the time I think Mozart was probably having a little flirt with this harp player. But still, no one was offering Mozart a position that acknowledged his brilliance at composing. I neither can nor ought to bury the talent for composition with which God in his goodness hath so richly endowed me. Mozart is writing for himself and I think he's one of the first musicians that I know of who did that. And he is hurt and shocked that not everybody else wants to hear that. He was suffering greatly lack of real recognition. Not being considered in his own time the kind of genius he really was. One man was able to hear Mozart's genius. When Joseph Haydn, perhaps the most eminent composer of the time, heard Mozart play, he was deeply impressed. He told Leopold, Your son is the greatest composer known to me either in person or by name. While Wolfgang busily pursued his prospects, his mother's health began to fail. But she was suspicious of French doctors and refused treatment until it was too late. Wolfgang wrote, Her life flickered out like a candle. There's a very passionate piano sonata that Mozart wrote shortly after the death of his mother. And it's been argued that that was, in a sense, his working out some of his feelings after the death of his mother. Now bitterly alone, he suffered the darkest days he'd ever faced. He wrote of his unhappiness to his father, adding, I often wonder whether life is worth living. When Leopold Mozart finally learned the news, he scolded Wolfgang for poor judgment. You had your engagements, you were away all day, and as she didn't make a fuss, you treated her condition lightly. Leopold now demanded that Wolfgang return to Salzburg. So, in 1778, the 22-year-old Mozart departed from Paris. On his return trip, he stopped again in Mannheim. Wolfgang was overjoyed to be back in a German city and hopeful about rekindling his romance with Aloysia. He wrote, Mannheim loves me as much as I love Mannheim. Unfortunately, Aloysia did not love Mozart anymore, and she all but ignored him. She knew he was in love with her, but she just didn't feel the same way about him. She said, I just couldn't love him. Despite his hundreds of miles traveled over a year and a half, Mozart had not found the appointment he was looking for. His great mission to Paris had failed. Now, the dejected young composer was home. But his patience for an overbearing father and provincial tastes wouldn't last for long. It was 1780, and the 24-year-old Mozart was again living back home in Salzburg, ever more frustrated by its limited opportunities. Mozart was miserable in Salzburg. Not only... Was the Salzburg musical culture not really of the first class? But beyond that, Mozart would have felt too constrained, probably by the mere presence of his father. Aside from his father, another authority figure loomed large in Mozart's life in Salzburg, the royal archbishop Colorado. He was not a man Mozart respected. He felt that the archbishop was a skinflint. Had no possible understanding of what really was important in the world of music and above all, treated Mozart like a servant. As a musician, Mozart was somewhere between servant and gentry. It was a fact of society he was very sensitive about. In 1781, the Archbishop summoned Mozart and his father to Vienna, where he was assembling his finest musicians. He wanted to show the Viennese because he was a very pompous bishop. He had the better musicians than the Viennese. And Mozart, during his stay here, suddenly discovered his fame. Mozart wanted to stay in Vienna. The Archbishop demanded he return to Salzburg. But Wolfgang found such high-handed treatment intolerable. My blood began to boil and I could no longer contain myself. And I said, so your grace is not satisfied with me. Such insubordination was unheard of. Mozart was shown the door, but the struggle didn't end there. There was this very unseemly confrontation between Mozart and the representative of the archbishop, a count named Count Arco, that resulted in the count literally giving Mozart a kick in the backside. Mozart was humiliated, but once again Leopold urged his son to avoid trouble and reconcile with the archbishop. But for Mozart, it was impossible. I beg you, most beloved father, not to crawl too much. Mozart would stay in Vienna, happily out from under the watchful eyes of his father and the archbishop. In May 1781, Mozart took a room with his old Mannheim friends, the Weber family. Their daughter, his once beloved Aloysia, was now married. But before long, Mozart became fond of Aloysia's sister, young Constanza. He sought his father's permission to marry, but convinced that Wolfgang was in danger of dashing his prospects, Leopold withheld it. Now, for once, Mozart rebelled. He and Constanze would marry anyway. The result was an almost irreparable break in the family and an estrangement between Mozart and his father. On August 4th, 1782, Wolfgang married. My dear Constanza, at last my true wife. She obviously had a lot to offer Mozart. She was probably a lot of fun. They apparently had a great love life. Also that year, Mozart began a series of six-string quartets dedicated to composer Joseph Haydn, perhaps to thank him for his years of enthusiastic support. While Mozart was writing one of the quartets, Constanza went into labor with their first baby. She later said, hearing her screams, he wrote those labor pains into the quartet. In 1783, Wolfgang and Constanze took a trip to Salzburg to introduce her to Leopold and mend family fences. But Leopold and Wolfgang's sister Marianne turned a cold shoulder toward Constanze. Then, Wolfgang and his wife received sad news from home. Their first son, whom they had left in the care of a nursemaid, had died. Mozart wrote, We are both so sad about our bonny, fat little boy. They left Salzburg, never to return. On their way back to Vienna, Mozart and Constanza stopped in the city of Linz. A concert was arranged, but Mozart had nothing prepared. For this occasion he wrote a fresh symphony. First of all it was written in four days. In other words, there was not even a time to correct anything. From beginning to end, there is of course not a wrong note for us. It's charming, it's like opening a bottle of champagne. Imagine that a man who spent most of his life performing, traveling, produced one jewel after another, whatever he wrote. No city and composer were ever as perfectly suited to each other as Vienna and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1781. What Mozart found in Vienna after 1781 was not just personal freedom, but it was creative freedom. The freedom to be original. There was a thriving musical culture there. Mozart himself was overwhelmed by the amount of talent that he found when he arrived in Vienna. and he became enormously popular in no time at all. He must have been as popular as a pianist in Vienna in the 1780s as some rock stars are today. For a time, Mozart sat at the pinnacle of Viennese music in a city notoriously fickle in its tastes. He did quite well. He was among the most well-off, most affluent, non-aristocratic people. In 1782, Mozart more than doubled his income. His piano concertos were by any measure everlasting testaments to his genius. Enormously popular, they were expressions of the most profound feeling. The C minor concerto is, I think, one of the the deepest and most personal and most troubled. He wrote the most profound things, from music which was just plain, ordinary, happy, to music that was tragic and would tear your heart out. Mozart can say... More in 1618 measures than other people can in a whole novel. In spite of his growing popularity, he was passed over once again by the Emperor Joseph for a position with the court. Mozart was stunned. One story has it that when the emperor heard one of his compositions, he told Mozart it was too complicated. Too many notes, Mozart, he said. It was never Mozart's aim to write exclusively for the musical elite. His music was also written to appeal to the common man. But he was never afraid to express his greatest inspirations. There are these genius who take the risk, whose spirit speaks to them, and who take the risk of writing it down. They are not conformists. Mozart was never a conformist. Otherwise, he would never take a text like the Marriage of Figaro. hardly contain his excitement when he read a book called The Marriage of Figaro in 1785, which in part, because of its revolutionary theme, was fast becoming a bestseller. What could be more appealing to Mozart than a story in which a commoner takes his revenge against the nobility, in this case a barber who plays a trick on the count? You have to understand the marriage of Figaro in context with the French Revolution. That a barber of a palace playing a joke and having sort of a vendetta on his master is... unthinkable in those days. Figaro is so full and so packed with incredible music and incredible ideas. In one scene, the maid Susanna hides the Count's page, Carabino, in a closet. The whole duet is about getting Carabino out of the closet and out of the room. And there's this panic that you hear in both of the voices because of the way the music's written. Da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And the way that Mozart has conveyed this musically is just miraculous. It's also great fun. the same Mozart's Figaro was fairly well received in Vienna but that was nothing compared to its reception in Prague when Mozart traveled to Prague in 1787 he was astonished and of course gratified by the Opera's smash success there he wrote home here they talk about nothing but Figaro nothing is played sung a whistle but Figaro For some of the fan-loving Viennese, Mozart was too much. moving. So not for the Praguers with the Slavic soul. In Prague they understood him completely. Mozart made the music that sometimes gripped your heart. He's the first great musical dramatist. There is a psychological subtlety that had never been there before. He's able to shade his characters, give them a humanizing quality, rather than a caricature or a stereotype. He is the Shakespeare of musical drama. In 1787, in the aftermath of Figaro's success, Emperor Joseph II appointed Mozart chamber composer. But the title was just an honorary one, and the court never gave him a single commission. That year, a promising 16-year-old came to meet Mozart. Ludwig von Beethoven was just embarking on his remarkable career. Mozart listened to the young man play and then said, That is very pretty, but studied. Then Beethoven improvised. Later, Mozart told his friends, Watch out for him. He will give the world something to talk about. In May 1787, Mozart's father died. The two had become estranged, so it came as no surprise to Wolfgang that his father left the bulk of his estate to his sister. Still, Mozart was bitter and told her... in a letter, it was hardly worth his while to travel to Salzburg for the settling of the estate. Yet that same month, he wrote one of his most deeply emotional works, the string quintet in G minor. It's one of the most beautiful pieces, and he actually makes the instruments, the violin in this case, almost cry, I would say. I mean, he had this very, it's very melancholy. Despite the grief Mozart may have felt, this was now a particularly productive period for him. His new opera, Don Giovanni, the story of master seducer Don Juan, was produced in the fall of 1787. Mozart may well have seen in Don Giovanni a fellow master artist. Don Giovanni was very pleased with himself in his escapades. He is so exuberant with his own prowess in his chosen field, which is seduction. But I could imagine Mozart really identifying with this intoxication, with his own superior. abilities. Mozart was now 31, long past his boy genius stage. Still, he was young enough to look forward to years of fruitful work. Sadly, that was not to be. In the course of his short life, Mozart wrote over 600 compositions, an extraordinary body of work. Some of these compositions are little minuets, others are full operas. But it's noteworthy how many of them appear to have been written with no corrections. He wrote everything out almost instantly without many revisions. Everything was actually perfectly clear in his head. In some cases, Mozart did make drafts of his compositions. Unfortunately, his widow destroyed many of these. The fact is, Mozart's works were hardly accidents of genius. He worked diligently from the early hours till late at night, often struggling to meet a deadline. Eventually, his fingers became so curled, he could not even cut his own food. In 1788, Mozart composed two symphonies, both masterpieces, within just months of each other. Symphony number 40 is one of the most sensual works of Mozart. Mozart was a very passionate human being. G minor symphony, there is no introduction. There's one bar of viola thirds, stormy, and the violins burst into this ebb and flow of the passionate melody. Every movement is a revolution. Around 1789, Mozart was becoming more and more strapped for money. He wrote pathetic, pleading letters to his friend Michael Puckberg, asking for loans. I am at the moment so destitute that I must beg you to assist me with whatever you need. you can spare. This has puzzled historians because by all accounts Mozart was fairly well paid for his work. Mozart never got a salary job. He was a freelance musician for most of the time and income fluctuated wildly. The question is whether Mozart squandered his money. He was very careless with the money. It was the greatest spendthrift you can imagine. He made a lot and spent it on girls, on cards, on betting. I'm somewhat taken with this speculation that he might have had a gambling problem. I think it's an intriguing idea and it would explain a lot. There has also been speculation Mozart had mistresses, with all that that would have meant for his finances. Mozart himself had an affair, or had several affairs, but I don't think any of them were serious. But Mozart remained devoted to his Constanze. When they were apart, he would write sweet, loving letters to her. The depth of his love for her is very clearly evidenced in the letters. You cannot imagine how I've been aching for you this long while. I can't describe what I've been feeling. A kind of emptiness which hurts me dreadfully. A kind of longing which is never satisfied. 1790 was a difficult year for Mozart. Emperor Joseph had died and Mozart applied to the new emperor for the post of Kapellmeister or choir master. But the emperor had already given the post to Italian composer Antonio Salieri. History has painted Salieri as Mozart's great detractor. It doesn't seem like Salieri ever actively worked against Mozart. I just don't think he tried to be very helpful. 1791 promised to be a much better year. The commissions were rolling in, including an opera, The Magic Flute. It's a fairy tale set in a forest in which Pamina, a princess, must navigate a confusing maze of danger and love, evil and goodness. She starts out in this opera as a very young girl, but she goes on to become a very strong woman. She grows up and learns a lot about pain. Pamina's mother, in an aria that is one of the most difficult to sing in all of opera, tells her she must kill her father. Pamina's prince cannot express his love for her because he has taken a vow of silence. In despair, she becomes suicidal. She sings this aria about feeling that death is the only thing that can bring her peace. It sounds to me, these descending notes, almost like dropping tears. considered one of his purest, most profound works. The Magic Flute was a great success. Even Salieri offered effusive praise. A strange and now famous episode befell Mozart in the summer of 1791. One day a messenger arrived at his home carrying a commission from a mysterious, anonymous patron for a funeral mass or requiem. Though he was already overworked, Mozart accepted the assignment and an advance fee. Some months later, the patron's messenger returned, demanding the still-uncompleted requiem. Mozart was terrified. He told his wife there was something otherworldly about the whole series of events. But what Mozart never learned is that the patron insisted... on hiding his identity just because he wanted to take credit for the work. He was a strange aristocrat, the Count of Arzzi. He was a very good pianist, but he was not a composer. He wanted to be able to say, I composed it myself. That same fall, Mozart suddenly became very ill. His body grew swollen and his limbs ached. He began to speak of death. I feel definitely that I will not last much longer. I am sure I have been poisoned. I cannot rid myself of this idea. Mozart became obsessed with the funeral mass he was still writing for the mysterious patron. He began to believe he was writing it for himself. One singer recalled visiting Mozart to perform the Requiem for him, but after a few bars, Mozart began to weep violently. Did I not say I was writing this Requiem for myself? And the great tragedy is, of course, he didn't finish it. The great tragedy. He did not live to finish the Requiem. Who knows what the end would have been like, because already the movement that he stops... It's Lacrimosa, one of the most melodically, most beautiful, touching movements. I mean, the man is weeping, he's crying out. And on the 5th of December 1791, two months before his 36th birthday, Wolfgang Mozart died. He was buried in a common grave. Only years later would his burial site be marked with a monument. Strangely, many years later, Antonio Salieri confessed to having murdered Mozart. Salieri, in his later life, became insane. He tried to commit suicide, and he ranted about having... having murdered Mozart. However, historians have long since dismissed that possibility. There's no reason to think that Mozart was poisoned. He died of natural causes. We don't know exactly what they were. He had probably kidney failure. suffered from rheumatic fever throughout his life. There was an epidemic in Vienna in the fall of 1791. A lot of people were dying. At his death, Mozart had lived just 36 years, which makes it all the more staggering that for the rest of us, it takes a lifetime to fully appreciate and understand his music. I feel that in listening to Mozart that you can really almost touch the creator through his music. The spirit spoke to him so readily that whatever came out of his pen is today a classic. Just imagine that. Of Mozart's six children, only two sons lived past childhood. Neither married, so the Mozart family name died with them. After Mozart's death, Constanza continued to sell his compositions and eventually pulled herself out of the debt that he had amassed. Ironically, by publishing her dead husband's works, she finally attained the financial comfort that he had never been able to provide. The flute and harp concerto. There are so many tunes that Mozart wrote, it's a big... It could go on all day.

The film introduced Mozart's life and music to millions, but scholars and musicians bristled at its depiction of the composer as a silly, overgrown child with a hyena cackle. Was Mozart really just a privileged child? young man who happened to have an uncanny knack for composing.

Fortunately, Mozart and his family were prolific letter writers, and their letters show us another Mozart entirely, a brilliant, often troubled genius who reinvented music. It's amazing what this guy did in one lifetime. He didn't start prolifically composing until he was about 12 years old. You know, he dies at 35. Can you imagine the output of this man?

It's hard to think of another composer who has contributed so much great music as Mozart did. He must have been as popular in the 1780s as some rock stars are today. What I love most about Mozart is that even though it comes from a time very far from my own, it still is closest to my heart. Salzburg. On January 27, 1756, in this small city at the foot of the Austrian Alps, Leopold Mozart, his wife Anna Maria, and their daughter Marianne were joined by a son, Wolfgang.

His father would later proclaim him the miracle which God let be born in Salzburg. Leopold Mozart was a musician at the Royal Archbishop's Court, and he was also something of a composer. The elder Mozart is still remembered for his writings on the violin and for a symphony he composed for toy instruments, long ascribed to Joseph Haydn. Wolfgang's sister Marianne showed early promise as a musician, and so her father began teaching her. teaching her the piano.

Little Wolfgang, then just three years old, was drawn to the sound of the music and to his father's surprise and delight, he began to play. He would soon spend hours at the keyboard. He had an immediate sensuous contact with the materials of music and would go to the piano and pick out these sounds that he just found very attractive.

Leopold Leopold wasted no time in cultivating his son's amazing talent. Under his guidance, Wolfgang was playing minuets by the age of four. Mozart probably had the most unique preparation and natural gift of any human being who has ever lived as far as music is concerned.

At a very early stage, Leopold Mozart contemplating the talent, the genius of his son, was a son and recognizing how extraordinary it was determined that it had the capacity of transforming his family's fortunes. He thereafter devoted himself entirely to the exploitation of his son's gifts. Wolfgang was just five when he wrote his first musical composition, which his father transcribed.

This is Mozart's first composition that we know about, Cursal 1, a minuet. That's not bad. for a six-year-old kid.

Leopold was astounded by his son's ability and hoped a royal audience would be astounded as well. So in 1762, he sought a musical debut for his two children in Vienna at the court of Emperor Francis and Empress Maria Theresa. They came under very difficult conditions to Vienna, but they were lucky enough to meet the right people, and within a fortnight or so, Mozart played before the Empress in the Castle of Schönbrunn. And the Empress was very enchanted by him. The court showed its appreciation with a splendid lavender costume for Wolfgang, which pleased him very much, and a payment of 100 ducats, which pleased Leopold even more.

He was six or seven years old, which was, of course, for the time then, the absolute sensation. And he made a lot of money. Music was thriving in Europe, and Leopold thought the time was just right to take his phenomenal children on a tour.

So in June of 1763, they set out for Germany, Paris, and London. Leopold... became his son's great promoter.

And to drum up business, he had the boy perform tricks on the piano. The little seven-year-old dazzled audiences playing intricate pieces with just one finger or on a keyboard hidden under a cloth. Having an upbringing as a prodigy, like what are we going to do today?

Oh, we'll go and visit the Queen of England and you can play that little sonata in C major that you wrote yesterday. I mean, I don't think he grew up doing the things that normal children do. I think it was rather precious. Leopold and his two children traveled far and wide in search of audiences. He wrote, My children have taken almost everyone by storm.

And they were taking everyone's money as well. The trip was enormous. profitable but traveling in open carriages in freezing weather was very difficult for the children and the threat of disease followed them everywhere he traveled all over Europe as a child and winter in summer led a very unhealthy life as a boy.

Wolfgang began to suffer from recurring bouts of rheumatic fever. But when the children became ill, Leopold fretted over the loss of profits. It will certainly be a week before Wolfgang is quite restored to health.

In God's name, a hundred Florins will disappear. But by Journey's end, with his father's help, the now eight-year-old Mozart had begun to write more and more sophisticated compositions, from simple keyboard compositions to simple piano compositions. sonatas to the first of his symphonies.

The thing that was so great about Mozart's first symphony is not only that he wrote it when he was eight years old, but so Mozartian. And I've asked musicians in symphony orchestras, what is this piece? Does anybody know what it is?

And, And everybody says, well, is it the Magic Flute or maybe the abduction from the seraglio to Mozart operas? You know, everybody guesses Mozart. but it's Mozart's first symphony that he wrote when he was eight years old It was all very well to be a sensation in Austria, but to really prove his mettle, Mozart would have to make a name for himself in Italy, the true center of European music. So in December of 1769, Wolfgang and Leopold embarked on an extended tour of Italy, performing before the leading members of the nobility.

CHOIR SINGS In Rome on Easter Sunday, April 15, 1770, Wolfgang and Leopold were summoned to St. Peter's for an audience with Pope Clement XIV. The Pope soon joined the chorus of those singing Wolfgang's praises and conferred upon him a rare honor, the Order of the Golden Spur. But Wolfgang took something else from St. Peter's. With his phenomenal memory, he brought back with him the famous secret choral piece, the Miserere, which was never allowed to be heard outside the Vatican. Wolfgang delighted in all the attention, and his father delighted in the status of those showering the attention.

And when Wolfgang was just 14, he was given a commission for an opera. In December of 1770, Mitrodotus, King of Pontus, premiered in Milan. But not everyone was enchanted with this precocious composer.

Still, as Leopold wrote of the event, My son's opera has been received most favorably, in spite of the great opposition of his enemies and detractors, who before hearing a single note had spread the rumor that it was a barbarous German composition. Whatever the resistance Wolfgang met in Italy, he was soon given his due. At the prestigious Academia Philharmonica in Mantua, after putting the boy through a battery of tests, the local masters agreed that young Mozart was a miracle in music. and one of those freaks nature causes to be born.

And one German composer who heard Mozart perform in Milan proclaimed, this boy will consign us all to oblivion. In 1769, when Mozart was just 13, his hometown of Salzburg appointed him honorary concertmeister of the court. Now the teenager began to turn out one composition after another, and the works showed a stunning growth in their sophistication.

One of the things about Mozart which is striking and Unexplainable. He wrote all five violin concertos in nine months of his 19th year. And from the first one in B-flat major to the last one in A major is about 30 years progress. Go explain it. There's no way.

Mozart was not modest about his gifts. And he began to feel his provincial little Salzburg could never fully appreciate him. His father, too, felt the time had come for the now 21-year-old genius to find a position with one of Europe's royal courts.

But Leopold still did not trust Wolfgang to travel alone. So in 1777, Leopold sent his wife as a chaperone on Wolfgang's mission to Paris in search of his fortune. On their way, Mozart and his mother stopped in Augsburg.

There, while visiting an uncle, Mozart and his young cousin Maria began a playful relationship. He and his cousin, Maria Anna Tekler Mozart, fell in love and thus commenced one of the most joyous, riotously, bawdy correspondences in music history. Mozart wrote her letter after letter. The intimacy and raunchiness of the correspondence have never failed to shock historians.

There is a very famous or infamous set of letters that Mozart wrote to his cousin. And these are really, I don't know if bawdy is exactly the word, because bawdy suggests that the letters are sexual in content, and they basically aren't. They're just dirty. They're just scatological. They're bathroom-type humor, and really very infantile.

It's impossible to characterize Mozart simply, which may be a measure of his genius. There's so many different Mozarts. There's an earthy man, childlike at times, and with an innate wisdom that he himself couldn't explain. You can certainly see from his music that he enjoyed life, and was probably very witty. And you could also see that he had a wild side, because the music sometimes would break out into a more wild nature.

In the fifth concerto, the last movement of the fifth concerto is this really cute... minuet which sounds like Mozart into the way kind of something you'd expect and then all of a sudden in the middle of the piece he breaks out into this Turkish dance which you wouldn't expect it Which is, it's totally unexpected and, but he liked to do that. He liked to have fun.

On October 30th, 1777, Mozart and his mother arrived in Mannheim to wait out the winter. Frau Mozart wrote to Leopold, You cannot imagine in what high favor Wolfgang is here with both the orchestra and with other people. It was here that Mozart met and fell hopelessly in love with the young singer, Aloysio Weber, daughter of a fellow musician. He wrote home to Leopold that he planned to help launch her career.

He thinks he's come up with the greatest possible idea, namely escaping, running away with Aloysio to Italy. And then his father writes back and says, are you insane? Have you gone off your rocker? Leopold warned Wolfgang that...

Union with a woman only leads to one thing, the hardship of supporting a wife and children. Off with you to Paris. Find your place among great people. Leopold was a very controlling father. He wanted to be the most important person in Mozart's life, always.

Mozart wrote his father asking him to leave him in peace and denying any impropriety in his behavior. I am a Mozart. And a young and clean-minded Mozart.

He said, please don't barrage me with these relentless criticisms. I can't get my work done. Your letters put me into a... A bad mood.

Wolfgang was not delighted by his return to France. Shortly after he and his mother arrived, Mozart lamented that the French all seemed to think he was still a child. People who had seen him at an early age expected to continue to see a child prodigy frozen in time.

He said, give me any test, any audition, and I will show that as young as I am, as German as I am, I am as good as any composer. Mozart became increasingly unhappy in Paris. He deplored the French taste in music. I do not think much of Parisian applause.

But Leopold, ever eager to see his son succeed, urged Mozart to compose in the local style. Be guided by the French taste. Leopold was, in a sense, too pragmatic to really understand Mozart's genius. He thought that Mozart could be a great composer.

But by great composer, he really meant somebody who would have a commercial financial success. In 1777, a patron engaged Wolfgang to compose a series of concertos and quartets for the flute. But Wolfgang soon wrote home, his payment did not appear to be forthcoming, adding, Furthermore, I become quite powerless when composing for an instrument I cannot bear. When Mozart came out with this famous statement about not liking the flute, he was in a curious set of circumstances having not been paid for a composition. Now I know what it is like when you don't get paid for something.

You tend not to like the person who doesn't pay you and you tend not to want to do anything for that person ever again. And in Mozart's case, this guy was a flute player. The concerto for flute and harp I think is truly One of Mozart's masterpieces, it's a great piece of writing for both instruments.

And at the time I think Mozart was probably having a little flirt with this harp player. But still, no one was offering Mozart a position that acknowledged his brilliance at composing. I neither can nor ought to bury the talent for composition with which God in his goodness hath so richly endowed me. Mozart is writing for himself and I think he's one of the first musicians that I know of who did that. And he is hurt and shocked that not everybody else wants to hear that.

He was suffering greatly lack of real recognition. Not being considered in his own time the kind of genius he really was. One man was able to hear Mozart's genius.

When Joseph Haydn, perhaps the most eminent composer of the time, heard Mozart play, he was deeply impressed. He told Leopold, Your son is the greatest composer known to me either in person or by name. While Wolfgang busily pursued his prospects, his mother's health began to fail. But she was suspicious of French doctors and refused treatment until it was too late. Wolfgang wrote, Her life flickered out like a candle.

There's a very passionate piano sonata that Mozart wrote shortly after the death of his mother. And it's been argued that that was, in a sense, his working out some of his feelings after the death of his mother. Now bitterly alone, he suffered the darkest days he'd ever faced. He wrote of his unhappiness to his father, adding, I often wonder whether life is worth living. When Leopold Mozart finally learned the news, he scolded Wolfgang for poor judgment.

You had your engagements, you were away all day, and as she didn't make a fuss, you treated her condition lightly. Leopold now demanded that Wolfgang return to Salzburg. So, in 1778, the 22-year-old Mozart departed from Paris. On his return trip, he stopped again in Mannheim. Wolfgang was overjoyed to be back in a German city and hopeful about rekindling his romance with Aloysia.

He wrote, Mannheim loves me as much as I love Mannheim. Unfortunately, Aloysia did not love Mozart anymore, and she all but ignored him. She knew he was in love with her, but she just didn't feel the same way about him.

She said, I just couldn't love him. Despite his hundreds of miles traveled over a year and a half, Mozart had not found the appointment he was looking for. His great mission to Paris had failed. Now, the dejected young composer was home. But his patience for an overbearing father and provincial tastes wouldn't last for long.

It was 1780, and the 24-year-old Mozart was again living back home in Salzburg, ever more frustrated by its limited opportunities. Mozart was miserable in Salzburg. Not only... Was the Salzburg musical culture not really of the first class?

But beyond that, Mozart would have felt too constrained, probably by the mere presence of his father. Aside from his father, another authority figure loomed large in Mozart's life in Salzburg, the royal archbishop Colorado. He was not a man Mozart respected. He felt that the archbishop was a skinflint.

Had no possible understanding of what really was important in the world of music and above all, treated Mozart like a servant. As a musician, Mozart was somewhere between servant and gentry. It was a fact of society he was very sensitive about.

In 1781, the Archbishop summoned Mozart and his father to Vienna, where he was assembling his finest musicians. He wanted to show the Viennese because he was a very pompous bishop. He had the better musicians than the Viennese.

And Mozart, during his stay here, suddenly discovered his fame. Mozart wanted to stay in Vienna. The Archbishop demanded he return to Salzburg.

But Wolfgang found such high-handed treatment intolerable. My blood began to boil and I could no longer contain myself. And I said, so your grace is not satisfied with me.

Such insubordination was unheard of. Mozart was shown the door, but the struggle didn't end there. There was this very unseemly confrontation between Mozart and the representative of the archbishop, a count named Count Arco, that resulted in the count literally giving Mozart a kick in the backside.

Mozart was humiliated, but once again Leopold urged his son to avoid trouble and reconcile with the archbishop. But for Mozart, it was impossible. I beg you, most beloved father, not to crawl too much.

Mozart would stay in Vienna, happily out from under the watchful eyes of his father and the archbishop. In May 1781, Mozart took a room with his old Mannheim friends, the Weber family. Their daughter, his once beloved Aloysia, was now married. But before long, Mozart became fond of Aloysia's sister, young Constanza.

He sought his father's permission to marry, but convinced that Wolfgang was in danger of dashing his prospects, Leopold withheld it. Now, for once, Mozart rebelled. He and Constanze would marry anyway. The result was an almost irreparable break in the family and an estrangement between Mozart and his father.

On August 4th, 1782, Wolfgang married. My dear Constanza, at last my true wife. She obviously had a lot to offer Mozart. She was probably a lot of fun. They apparently had a great love life.

Also that year, Mozart began a series of six-string quartets dedicated to composer Joseph Haydn, perhaps to thank him for his years of enthusiastic support. While Mozart was writing one of the quartets, Constanza went into labor with their first baby. She later said, hearing her screams, he wrote those labor pains into the quartet. In 1783, Wolfgang and Constanze took a trip to Salzburg to introduce her to Leopold and mend family fences.

But Leopold and Wolfgang's sister Marianne turned a cold shoulder toward Constanze. Then, Wolfgang and his wife received sad news from home. Their first son, whom they had left in the care of a nursemaid, had died. Mozart wrote, We are both so sad about our bonny, fat little boy. They left Salzburg, never to return.

On their way back to Vienna, Mozart and Constanza stopped in the city of Linz. A concert was arranged, but Mozart had nothing prepared. For this occasion he wrote a fresh symphony.

First of all it was written in four days. In other words, there was not even a time to correct anything. From beginning to end, there is of course not a wrong note for us. It's charming, it's like opening a bottle of champagne.

Imagine that a man who spent most of his life performing, traveling, produced one jewel after another, whatever he wrote. No city and composer were ever as perfectly suited to each other as Vienna and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1781. What Mozart found in Vienna after 1781 was not just personal freedom, but it was creative freedom. The freedom to be original.

There was a thriving musical culture there. Mozart himself was overwhelmed by the amount of talent that he found when he arrived in Vienna. and he became enormously popular in no time at all.

He must have been as popular as a pianist in Vienna in the 1780s as some rock stars are today. For a time, Mozart sat at the pinnacle of Viennese music in a city notoriously fickle in its tastes. He did quite well. He was among the most well-off, most affluent, non-aristocratic people. In 1782, Mozart more than doubled his income.

His piano concertos were by any measure everlasting testaments to his genius. Enormously popular, they were expressions of the most profound feeling. The C minor concerto is, I think, one of the the deepest and most personal and most troubled.

He wrote the most profound things, from music which was just plain, ordinary, happy, to music that was tragic and would tear your heart out. Mozart can say... More in 1618 measures than other people can in a whole novel.

In spite of his growing popularity, he was passed over once again by the Emperor Joseph for a position with the court. Mozart was stunned. One story has it that when the emperor heard one of his compositions, he told Mozart it was too complicated.

Too many notes, Mozart, he said. It was never Mozart's aim to write exclusively for the musical elite. His music was also written to appeal to the common man. But he was never afraid to express his greatest inspirations. There are these genius who take the risk, whose spirit speaks to them, and who take the risk of writing it down.

They are not conformists. Mozart was never a conformist. Otherwise, he would never take a text like the Marriage of Figaro.

hardly contain his excitement when he read a book called The Marriage of Figaro in 1785, which in part, because of its revolutionary theme, was fast becoming a bestseller. What could be more appealing to Mozart than a story in which a commoner takes his revenge against the nobility, in this case a barber who plays a trick on the count? You have to understand the marriage of Figaro in context with the French Revolution. That a barber of a palace playing a joke and having sort of a vendetta on his master is...

unthinkable in those days. Figaro is so full and so packed with incredible music and incredible ideas. In one scene, the maid Susanna hides the Count's page, Carabino, in a closet.

The whole duet is about getting Carabino out of the closet and out of the room. And there's this panic that you hear in both of the voices because of the way the music's written. Da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

And the way that Mozart has conveyed this musically is just miraculous. It's also great fun. the same Mozart's Figaro was fairly well received in Vienna but that was nothing compared to its reception in Prague when Mozart traveled to Prague in 1787 he was astonished and of course gratified by the Opera's smash success there he wrote home here they talk about nothing but Figaro nothing is played sung a whistle but Figaro For some of the fan-loving Viennese, Mozart was too much.

moving. So not for the Praguers with the Slavic soul. In Prague they understood him completely.

Mozart made the music that sometimes gripped your heart. He's the first great musical dramatist. There is a psychological subtlety that had never been there before.

He's able to shade his characters, give them a humanizing quality, rather than a caricature or a stereotype. He is the Shakespeare of musical drama. In 1787, in the aftermath of Figaro's success, Emperor Joseph II appointed Mozart chamber composer.

But the title was just an honorary one, and the court never gave him a single commission. That year, a promising 16-year-old came to meet Mozart. Ludwig von Beethoven was just embarking on his remarkable career. Mozart listened to the young man play and then said, That is very pretty, but studied.

Then Beethoven improvised. Later, Mozart told his friends, Watch out for him. He will give the world something to talk about.

In May 1787, Mozart's father died. The two had become estranged, so it came as no surprise to Wolfgang that his father left the bulk of his estate to his sister. Still, Mozart was bitter and told her... in a letter, it was hardly worth his while to travel to Salzburg for the settling of the estate.

Yet that same month, he wrote one of his most deeply emotional works, the string quintet in G minor. It's one of the most beautiful pieces, and he actually makes the instruments, the violin in this case, almost cry, I would say. I mean, he had this very, it's very melancholy.

Despite the grief Mozart may have felt, this was now a particularly productive period for him. His new opera, Don Giovanni, the story of master seducer Don Juan, was produced in the fall of 1787. Mozart may well have seen in Don Giovanni a fellow master artist. Don Giovanni was very pleased with himself in his escapades. He is so exuberant with his own prowess in his chosen field, which is seduction.

But I could imagine Mozart really identifying with this intoxication, with his own superior. abilities. Mozart was now 31, long past his boy genius stage.

Still, he was young enough to look forward to years of fruitful work. Sadly, that was not to be. In the course of his short life, Mozart wrote over 600 compositions, an extraordinary body of work. Some of these compositions are little minuets, others are full operas.

But it's noteworthy how many of them appear to have been written with no corrections. He wrote everything out almost instantly without many revisions. Everything was actually perfectly clear in his head.

In some cases, Mozart did make drafts of his compositions. Unfortunately, his widow destroyed many of these. The fact is, Mozart's works were hardly accidents of genius. He worked diligently from the early hours till late at night, often struggling to meet a deadline.

Eventually, his fingers became so curled, he could not even cut his own food. In 1788, Mozart composed two symphonies, both masterpieces, within just months of each other. Symphony number 40 is one of the most sensual works of Mozart.

Mozart was a very passionate human being. G minor symphony, there is no introduction. There's one bar of viola thirds, stormy, and the violins burst into this ebb and flow of the passionate melody.

Every movement is a revolution. Around 1789, Mozart was becoming more and more strapped for money. He wrote pathetic, pleading letters to his friend Michael Puckberg, asking for loans.

I am at the moment so destitute that I must beg you to assist me with whatever you need. you can spare. This has puzzled historians because by all accounts Mozart was fairly well paid for his work.

Mozart never got a salary job. He was a freelance musician for most of the time and income fluctuated wildly. The question is whether Mozart squandered his money.

He was very careless with the money. It was the greatest spendthrift you can imagine. He made a lot and spent it on girls, on cards, on betting.

I'm somewhat taken with this speculation that he might have had a gambling problem. I think it's an intriguing idea and it would explain a lot. There has also been speculation Mozart had mistresses, with all that that would have meant for his finances. Mozart himself had an affair, or had several affairs, but I don't think any of them were serious.

But Mozart remained devoted to his Constanze. When they were apart, he would write sweet, loving letters to her. The depth of his love for her is very clearly evidenced in the letters. You cannot imagine how I've been aching for you this long while. I can't describe what I've been feeling.

A kind of emptiness which hurts me dreadfully. A kind of longing which is never satisfied. 1790 was a difficult year for Mozart.

Emperor Joseph had died and Mozart applied to the new emperor for the post of Kapellmeister or choir master. But the emperor had already given the post to Italian composer Antonio Salieri. History has painted Salieri as Mozart's great detractor. It doesn't seem like Salieri ever actively worked against Mozart.

I just don't think he tried to be very helpful. 1791 promised to be a much better year. The commissions were rolling in, including an opera, The Magic Flute.

It's a fairy tale set in a forest in which Pamina, a princess, must navigate a confusing maze of danger and love, evil and goodness. She starts out in this opera as a very young girl, but she goes on to become a very strong woman. She grows up and learns a lot about pain. Pamina's mother, in an aria that is one of the most difficult to sing in all of opera, tells her she must kill her father.

Pamina's prince cannot express his love for her because he has taken a vow of silence. In despair, she becomes suicidal. She sings this aria about feeling that death is the only thing that can bring her peace.

It sounds to me, these descending notes, almost like dropping tears. considered one of his purest, most profound works. The Magic Flute was a great success.

Even Salieri offered effusive praise. A strange and now famous episode befell Mozart in the summer of 1791. One day a messenger arrived at his home carrying a commission from a mysterious, anonymous patron for a funeral mass or requiem. Though he was already overworked, Mozart accepted the assignment and an advance fee.

Some months later, the patron's messenger returned, demanding the still-uncompleted requiem. Mozart was terrified. He told his wife there was something otherworldly about the whole series of events.

But what Mozart never learned is that the patron insisted... on hiding his identity just because he wanted to take credit for the work. He was a strange aristocrat, the Count of Arzzi.

He was a very good pianist, but he was not a composer. He wanted to be able to say, I composed it myself. That same fall, Mozart suddenly became very ill. His body grew swollen and his limbs ached. He began to speak of death.

I feel definitely that I will not last much longer. I am sure I have been poisoned. I cannot rid myself of this idea. Mozart became obsessed with the funeral mass he was still writing for the mysterious patron. He began to believe he was writing it for himself.

One singer recalled visiting Mozart to perform the Requiem for him, but after a few bars, Mozart began to weep violently. Did I not say I was writing this Requiem for myself? And the great tragedy is, of course, he didn't finish it. The great tragedy. He did not live to finish the Requiem.

Who knows what the end would have been like, because already the movement that he stops... It's Lacrimosa, one of the most melodically, most beautiful, touching movements. I mean, the man is weeping, he's crying out.

And on the 5th of December 1791, two months before his 36th birthday, Wolfgang Mozart died. He was buried in a common grave. Only years later would his burial site be marked with a monument. Strangely, many years later, Antonio Salieri confessed to having murdered Mozart. Salieri, in his later life, became insane.

He tried to commit suicide, and he ranted about having... having murdered Mozart. However, historians have long since dismissed that possibility. There's no reason to think that Mozart was poisoned. He died of natural causes.

We don't know exactly what they were. He had probably kidney failure. suffered from rheumatic fever throughout his life. There was an epidemic in Vienna in the fall of 1791. A lot of people were dying.

At his death, Mozart had lived just 36 years, which makes it all the more staggering that for the rest of us, it takes a lifetime to fully appreciate and understand his music. I feel that in listening to Mozart that you can really almost touch the creator through his music. The spirit spoke to him so readily that whatever came out of his pen is today a classic. Just imagine that. Of Mozart's six children, only two sons lived past childhood.

Neither married, so the Mozart family name died with them. After Mozart's death, Constanza continued to sell his compositions and eventually pulled herself out of the debt that he had amassed. Ironically, by publishing her dead husband's works, she finally attained the financial comfort that he had never been able to provide. The flute and harp concerto. There are so many tunes that Mozart wrote, it's a big...

It could go on all day.

Transcript for:Exploring the Life of Mozart

Transcript for:
Exploring the Life of Mozart