Biography of Mozart

Biography of a genius who wrote his name in the history of music. Mozart was a musical maestro who had his own unique style of composing music and presenting to the world

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is widely acknowledged as a musical genius.

He was born in Salzburg Austria on 27 January 1756.

His father, Leopold, was a composer and violinist who recognised – and exploited – his son’s extraordinary talent from an early age.

By the time he was five years old, Mozart had complete mastery of keyboards and violin, and had written his first five compositions. At six, he toured Europe as a child prodigy; by 16, he’d already written three operas and 25 symphonies.

Mozart’s adult life was a financial and emotional rollercoaster. His happy marriage produced six children, of whom only two survived. Despite his problems, Mozart composed at astonishing speed, achieving a remarkably prolific output. Even through the ill health that dogged his last years, he wrote as if driven by his muse.

No other great composer kept so detailed a chronological list of their works as the catalogue compiled by Mozart during the last eight years of his life. It was begun in 1784 to bring order to his increasingly busy schedule of composing and performing. Mozart’s meticulous notebook provides unique insight into the creation of some of history’s most celebrated music. Empty staves on its final pages stand as silent witnesses to the composer’s sudden and tragic death, aged just 35.

Towards the end of 1791, Mozart was commissioned to compose a requiem mass by a patron who insisted on remaining anonymous. Just after midnight on 5 December, suffering from a feverish illness, Mozart died, leaving the requiem unfinished. With very little money to his name, his body was buried in a communal grave with not a word of ceremony, still less the sombre majesty of his ‘Requiem’.