Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (German: [ˈvɔlfɡaŋ amaˈdeus ˈmoːtsaʁt], English see fn.),[1]baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart[2] (27January 1756 – 5 December 1791), was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era.
Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood. Alreadycompetent onkeyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. At 17, he was engaged as a court musician in Salzburg,but grew restless and travelled in search of a better position, always composing abundantly. While visiting Vienna in 1781, he was dismissed from his Salzburgposition. He chose to stay in the capital, where he achieved fame but little financial security. During his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-knownsymphonies, concertos, and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his death. The circumstances of his early death havebeen much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons.
Mozart learned voraciously from others, and developed a brilliance and maturity ofstyle that encompassed the light and graceful along with the dark and passionate. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnaclesof symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral music. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers, and his influence on subsequent Western art music isprofound; Beethoven composed his own early works in the shadow of Mozart, and Joseph Haydn wrote that "posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years."[3]