MOZART, WOLFGANG AMADEUS Austrian composer, was born at Salzburg on Jan. 27, 1756. (In the baptismal register his name stands Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus [Lat. Amadeus, Ger. Gottlieb].) He was educated by his father, Leopold Mozart, a composer with a high reputation as a violinist in the service of the arch bishop of Salzburg. When only three years old he shared the harp sichord lessons of his sister Maria ("Nannerr), five years his senior. A year later he played minuets and composed little pieces, some of which are still preserved. In 1762 Leopold Mozart took "Wolferl" and Nannerl on a musical tour, during the course of which they played before most of the sovereigns of Germany. The little Wolferl remained unspoilt by all the petting he received from royalty. At Vienna the emperor, Francis I., sat by his side while he played and called him his "little magician." When he slipped one day on the polished floor the archduchess Marie Antoinette, afterwards queen of France, lifted him up, whereupon he said, "You are very kind ; when I grow up I will marry you." Childhood and Youth.—In 1763 the whole family started on another tour. Wolferl now sang, composed and played on the harpsichord, the organ and the violin, winning golden opinions everywhere ; but not enough money for more than bare necessities after the irreducible expenses of travel. In Paris they lodged at the Bavarian embassy, performing on a grand scale both there and at Versailles, where Wolferl's organ-playing was especially admired. Here also he published two sets of sonatas for the harpsi chord and violin, having already composed several smaller pieces. In April 1764, Leopold Mozart took his family to England, where Wolferl astonished the royal family with his playing at sight and accompanied the queen in a song. He composed a symphony, published a third set of sonatas, dedicated to the queen; and wrote a tiny anthem (Spruch ) for four voices, God is our Refuge, for presentation to the British Museum. (The autograph is num bered "Select Case C, 21 d.") Barrington contributed to the Philosophical Transactions for 178o a paper on Mozart's prodi gious talent as shown during his visit to London at eight years of age. In Sept. 1765 the family left England for the Hague, where, in March 1766, Wolferl made his first attempt at an oratorio, astonishing the Dutch as he had astonished the English, and play ing with great effect, at Haarlem, on the largest organ in the world. In Sept. 1767 he paid a second visit to Vienna, and at the
suggestion of the emperor, Joseph II., composed an opera buffa, La flute semplice, which, though acknowledged by the company for which it was written to be "an incomparable work," was sup pressed by an intrigue. The archbishop of Salzburg thereupon commanded a representation of it in his palace, and gave Wolferl an honorary appointment as maestro di capella. Since this did not involve residence, Leopold Mozart took his son to Italy, in Dec. 1769, as the proper measure to complete a musician's edu cation.
Wolfgang, now nearly 14 years old, received at Milan a com mission to write an opera for the following Christmas. Arriving in Rome on the Wednesday in Holy Week, he went at once to the Sistine chapel to hear Allegri's famous Miserere, which after wards he wrote down from memory, to the consternation of all who heard of the feat ; for the composition was guarded as a mystery, and the singers were forbidden to transcribe it on pain of excommunication. Towards the end of June the pope made him a "cavaliere" of the order of "The Golden Spur," an honour which had some years previously been conferred on Gluck. Mozart prized it the more on that account, but soon gave up signing him self with the title, whereas the chevalier Gluck insisted on it to the end of his life. In July the Accademia Filarmonica of Bologna gave Mozart the degree of compositore in spite of a statute re stricting this title to persons at least 20 years of age. His degree exercise in strict counterpoint on the antiphon, Quaerite primum, is extant (KOchel's Catalogue, No. 86). His friendship with the learned padre, G. B. Martini (q.v.), was delightful to the boy and the sage, and it foreshadowed for Wolfgang what was afterwards to come to him from another spiritual father, "Papa Haydn." On Dec. 26, Wolfgang's new opera, Mitridate Re di Ponto, was triumphantly produced under his direction at Milan after a nerve-racking struggle with hostile intrigues. Mozart had been baulked of his hope to be allowed to set an opera by Metastasio; but the poetaster from Turin did his best ; and the first rehearsal settled all doubt as to the capacity of a German child of 14 to write an Italian opera and to control the orchestra of La Scala, the largest in Europe. The piece had a continuous run of 20 nights, a record for those times; and it established the boy as a master needing no apologies.