The story of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s precocity is so familiar as to be taken for granted. In scholarship and popular culture, Mozart the Wunderkind is often seen as belonging to a category of childhood all by himself. But treating the young composer as an anomaly risks minimizing his impact. In this book, Adeline Mueller examines how Mozart shaped the social and cultural reevaluation of childhood during the Austrian Enlightenment. Whether in a juvenile sonata printed with his age on the title page, a concerto for a father and daughter, a lullaby, a musical dice game, or a mass for the consecration of an orphanage church, Mozart’s music and persona transformed attitudes toward children’s agency, intellectual capacity, relationships with family and friends, political and economic value, work, school, and leisure time. Thousands of children across the Habsburg Monarchy were affected by the Salzburg prodigy and the idea he embodied: that childhood itself could be packaged, consumed, deployed, “performed”—in short, mediated—through music. This book builds upon a new understanding of the history of childhood as dynamic and reciprocal, rather than a mere projection or fantasy—as something mediated not just through texts, images, and objects but also through actions. Drawing on a range of evidence, from children’s periodicals to Habsburg court edicts and spurious Mozart prints, Mueller shows that while we need the history of childhood to help us understand Mozart, we also need Mozart to help us understand the history of childhood.

Introduce young readers to one of history’s greatest composers. They will enjoy tracing Mozart’s life from his childhood touring Europe as a musical prodigy through his years in Italy, Salzburg, and Vienna. They’ll learn about his struggles for independence and his musical innovation. The title touches on the composition of operas, liturgical music, symphonies, concertos, and more. Mozart’s enduring popularity and the significant influence he had on the composers who followed him are also discussed. A timeline helps readers understand the chronology of events discussed in the book.

“Don Giovanni” Captured considers the life of a single opera, engaging with the entire history of its recorded performance. Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni has long inspired myths about eros and masculinity. Over time, its performance history has revealed a growing trend toward critique—an increasing effort on the part of performers and directors to highlight the violence and predatoriness of the libertine central character, alongside the suffering and resilience of his female victims. In “Don Giovanni” Captured, Richard Will sets out to analyze more than a century’s worth of recorded performances of the opera, tracing the ways it has changed from one performance to another and from one generation to the next. Will consults audio recordings, starting with wax cylinders and 78s, as well as video recordings, including DVDs, films, and streaming videos. As Will argues, recordings and other media shape our experience of opera as much as live performance does. Seen as a historical record, opera recordings are also a potent reminder of the refusal of works such as Don Giovanni to sit still. By choosing a work with such a rich and complex tradition of interpretation, Will helps us see Don Giovanni as a standard-bearer for evolving ideas about desire and power, both on and off the stage.

Focuses on the childhood and early musical training of the versatile eighteenth-century Austrian composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

"Mozart today is known as one of the foremost composers in Western music; yet, during his lifetime, his compositional mastery seemed to pale in comparison with his achievements on the concert platform. Mozart knew that his fame was due to his piano playing and improvisations; and, as a result, much of the music he wrote was intended to serve a single aim: to set the stage, quite literally, for compelling and captivating performances. In his piano works, symphonies, and operas he sought to amuse, stir, and ravish an awe-struck public. Mozart the Performer brings to life this elusive side of Mozart's musicianship. Over the course of five "variations," Dorian Bandy traces the influence of showmanship on Mozart's style, imbuing his output with a theatricality and evanescence easily lost behind the scrim of familiarity. This insightful and imaginative book reveals the countless ways performance influenced Mozart's compositional habits, ultimately offering a genuinely novel understanding of why, centuries later, Mozart's music still captivates us and inspiring new ways of listening to it"--

Publisher description

As a little boy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart began writing musical compositions when most kids his age were still learning to read. By the time he was seven, Mozart was an accomplished musician who could play several instruments and also sing. Accompanied by his older sister, Nannerl, and his father, Leopold, young Wolfgang toured Europe. He performed before royalty and some of the richest members of society. By the time he was twelve, Wolfgang was famous. He first tasted failure as a teenager, as audiences ignored his operas, and he had trouble making money. He began to be known for his bad jokes and relentless pursuit of women. He eventually married the sister of the woman who broke his heart. In adulthood, Mozart's problems grew. He couldn't keep a job. He was usually broke. One of the greatest composers the world had ever known was forced to make a living giving piano lessons. Yet today, he is one of the most celebrated and respected composers of all time.