Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart 1756-1791

Mozart was born in Salzburg Austria, the youngest of seven children of Leopold and Maria Pertl Mozart. Five of their children had died in infancy, leaving Wolfgang and his sister Maria Anna, called Nannerl. At four, Wolfgang began participating in his seven-year-old sister’s music lessons with their father. Within two years, the children were playing in public, touring Europe as child prodigies. Wolfgang wrote his first symphony at the age of eight. After a time in Italy with his father, Wolfgang grew restless with his position in Salzburg and travelled around the continent looking for employment. Defeated, he returned to Salzburg and worked as court organist. In 1781 he decamped to Vienna where he took on freelance work and married Constanze Weber. In 1787, Emperor Joseph appointed Mozart “chamber composer” after the death of Gluck. The job was part-time and low pay. Often in debt, Mozart travelled often to earn money. During this time, although he was dogged by he did some of his best work including The Magic Flute and the unfinished Requiem. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed over 600 works, including symphonies, operas, concertos, string ensembles, and church music. At the time of his death at the age of thirty-five, he was considered one of the greatest composers.

The plot of Amadeus springs from the rumor that Antonio Salieri was responsible for the death of the musical genius who was his rival. At the time, some said Mozart believed that he was being poisoned, and after his death it was whispered that Salieri was the culprit. These lingering accusations may have contributed to Salieri’s nervous breakdowns late in life. There was also a story that freemasons, angered by the betrayal of their rites in The Magic Flute, may have had a venomous hand in his death. Despite these lurid theories, there is little evidence that Mozart died by poison.

Contemporary accounts of the months leading to Mozart’s death are contradictory. He had been ill for some time, but some say he seemed to be recovering. There are conflicting reports about his state of mind as he toiled away at the Requiem that was left unfinished when he passed. Was he desperately ill and despairing as family and friends reported, or as cheerful and hopeful as his letters written shortly before his death indicated? Did he really say that he was writing the Requiem for his own funeral Mass?

The actual cause of Mozart’s death remains a mystery. While ill, he travelled to Prague to conduct the performance of La Clemenza di Tito. When he returned, he conducted the premiere of The Magic Flute. The composer suffered from reoccurrences of rheumatic fever, which could have led to his demise. The parish registry notes that at the time of his death he was covered with bumps. At that time, Europe was reporting cases of the plague. He was a hypochondriac and could have misused patient medicines. His sister-in-law suggested he was the victim of medical malpractice. The composer had fallen several times the year before his death. In 1994, an examination of what appears to be Mozart’s skull shows evidence of a lingering subdural hematoma, perhaps a result of those falls. Even more recent investigations have pointed to a possible runaway streptococcus infection.

Much has been made of the humble quality of his funeral, implying that somehow Mozart left this world out of favor with royalty. Actually, this was the norm for contemporary interments.