school of pianists of which the young Beethoven was already showing himself a leader.
In spite of the pathetic brevity of his life and the still more pathetic failure of suitable opportunity in it, Mozart stands out as one of the most striking instances of the intuitive grasp and abounding inspiration of pure genius. Even from his boyhood, he needed but the call of an occasion to bring before him both the appropriate method of procedure and the musical ideas to be expressed. His marvelous natural gifts were broadly developed by the exacting discipline and the wide chances for travel provided by his wise and energetic father. In spite of the fact that he was cut off in early manhood, he went further than all his contemporaries in indicating the great paths of growth upon which the coming century was to set forth.
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (d. 1791) was born in 1756 at Salzburg, the second
of the two surviving children of Leopold Mozart, the violinist and composer
(see sec. 149). He was five years
younger than Maria Anna Mozart (d.
1829), who was his companion-artist
throughout his early life. Both were
precocious, Wolfgang beginning to
pick out intervals on the clavier at 3,
to play little pieces at 4, to compose in
form at 5, to read violin-music in trio
at sight and perform in public before
he was 6, and to play the organ between
6 and 7. Before he was 10 he
was said to have been able to play at
sight anything for either clavier, organ
or violin. At 7 his first sonatas were
published, at 8 he wrote his first symphony,
at 9 for a test produced two Italian
arias, at 10 similarly one act of an
oratorio, at 11 a musical comedy, at 12
his first full opera, and at 14 a grand
opera at Milan, besides demonstrating power in fugue-writing. This amazing
readiness was wholly natural, coëxisting with a perfect boyishness otherwise.
It was guided with the utmost care and even some sternness by his father,
who early divined his son's true rank and devised the plans for his systematic
development which were carried forward with infinite self-sacrifice until after
1780.
Apart from home instruction, Mozart's education was principally effected by a series of journeys planned by his father with the minutest care and carried out (until 1775) under his personal direction. Thus, during the 19 years before he was 25, Mozart was away from Salzburg over ten times for periods vary-
