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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-01-27 - 1791-12-05) was a composer and musician.

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  • If Germany, my beloved fatherland, of whom you know I am proud, will not accept me, then must I, in the name of God, again make France or England richer by one capable German; — and to the shame of the German nation.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (Vienna, 1782-08-17), from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906)

  • "She will never learn the most necessary, most difficult and principal thing in music, that is time, because from childhood she has designedly cultivated the habit of ignoring the beat."

  • I know myself, and I have such a sense of religion that I shall never do anything which I would not do before the whole world; but I am alarmed at the very thoughts of being in the society of people, during my journey, whose mode of thinking is so entirely different from mine (and from that of all good people). But of course they must do as they please. I have no heart to travel with them, nor could I enjoy one pleasant hour, nor know what to talk about; for, in short, I have no great confidence in them. Friends who have no religion cannot be long our friends.

  • The most stimulating and encouraging thought is that you, dearest father, and my dear sister, are well, that I am an honest German, and that if I am not always permitted to talk I can think what I please; but that is all.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (Paris, 1778-05-29), from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906)


  • A fellow of mediocre talent will remain a mediocrity, whether he travels or not; but one of superior talent (which without impiety I cannot deny that I possess) will go to seed if he always remains in the same place.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (1778-09-11), from Wolfgang Amadé Mozart by Georg Knepler (1991), trans. J. Bradford Robinson [Cambridge University Press, 1994, ISBN 0-521-58823-5], p. 12

  • As I love Mannheim, Mannheim loves me.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart, (Mannheim, 1778-11-12], from Mozart's Letters, Mozart's Life: Selected Letters, ed. Robert Spaethling [W.W. Norton, 2000, ISBN 0-393-04719-9], p. 193

  • My fatherland has always the first claim on me.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (1781-11-24), from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906)

  • I care very little for Salzburg and not at all for the archbishop: I shit on both of them.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (1783-07-12), from The Complete Operas of Mozart: a critical guide By Charles Osborne [Da Capo, 1983, ISBN 0-306-80190-6], p. 208

  • As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence, I have formed during the last few years such close relationships with this best and truest friend of mankind that death's image is not only no longer terrifying to me, but is indeed very soothing and consoling, and I thank my God for graciously granting me the opportunity...of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness. I never lie down at night without reflecting that —- young as I am — I may not live to see another day. Yet no one of all my acquaintances could say that in company I am morose or disgruntled.
    • Letter to Leopold Mozart (1787-04-04), from The Mozart-Da Ponte Operas by Andrew Steptoe [Oxford University Press, 1988, ISBN 0-198-16221-9], p. 84

  • It is a mistake to think that the practice of my art has become easy to me. I assure you, dear friend, no one has given so much care to the study of composition as I. There is scarcely a famous master in music whose works I have not frequently and diligently studied.
    • Spoken in Prague, 1787, to conductor Kucharz, who led the rehearsals for Don Giovanni, from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906)

  • Melody is the essence of music. I compare a good melodist to a fine racer, and counterpointists to hack post-horses; therefore be advised, let well alone and remember the old Italian proverb: Chi sa più, meno sa— Who knows most, knows least.

  • Stay with me to-night; you must see me die. I have long had the taste of death on my tongue, I smell death, and who will stand by my Constanze, if you do not stay?
    • Spoken on his deathbed to his sister-in-law, Sophie Weber (1791-12-05), from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906)
    • Variant: The taste of death is on my tongue, I feel something that is not from this world (Der Geschmack des Todes ist auf meiner Zunge, ich fühle etwas, das nicht von dieser Welt ist).

  • The passions, whether violent or not, should never be so expressed as to reach the point of causing disgust; and music, even in situations of the greatest horror, should never be painful to the ear but should flatter and charm it, and thereby always remain music.
    • Letter by Mozart, as quoted in a journal entry (12 December 1856) The Journal of Eugene Delacroixas translated by Walter Pach (1937), p. 521

  • All I insist on, and nothing else, is that you should show the whole world that you are not afraid. Be silent, if you choose; but when it is necessary, speak — and speak in such a way that people will remember it.
    • Letter as published in The Letters of Mozart & His Family (1938) translated and edited by Emily Anderson, p. 1114

  • I pay no attention whatever to anybody's praise or blame. I simply follow my own feelings.
    • Musician's Little Book of Wisdom‎ (1996) by Scott E. Power, Quote 416.

Misattributed

  • Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius.
    • True genius without heart is a thing of nought - for not great understanding alone, not intelligence alone, nor both together, make genius. Love! Love! Love! that is the soul of genius. - Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin, entry in Mozart's souvenir album (1787-04-11) from Mozart: A Life by Maynard Solomon [Harper-Collins, 1966, ISBN 0-060-92692-9], p.312


Karl Barth

  • It may be that when the angels go about their task praising God, they play only Bach. I am sure, however, that when they are together en famille they play Mozart.
    • Possibly a misattributed quotation which actually originated with Vicki Baum - Results of an Accident, 1931

  • Mozart creates music from a mysterious center, and so knows the limits to the right and the left, above and below. He maintains moderation.

  • Mozart's music always sounds unburdened, effortless, and light. This is why it unburdens, releases, and liberates us.

  • Mozart's music is an invitation to the listener to venture just a little out of the sense of his own subjectivity.

  • Mozart's music is free of all exaggeration, of all sharp breaks and contradictions. The sun shines but does not blind, does not burn or consume. Heaven arches over the earth, but it does not weigh it down, it does not crush or devour it.

Leonard Bernstein

  • It is hard to think of another composer who so perfectly marries form and passion.

  • Mozart combines serenity, melancholy, and tragic intensity into one great lyric improvisation. Over it all hovers the greater spirit that is Mozart's — the spirit of compassion, of universal love, even of suffering — a spirit that knows no age, that belongs to all ages.

  • Mozart's music is constantly escaping from its frame, because it cannot be contained in it.

Charles Gounod

  • Before Mozart, all ambition turns to despair.

  • Mozart, prodigal heaven gave thee everything, grace and strength, abundance and moderation, perfect equilibrium.

  • Who has reached the extreme limits of scale with the same infallible precision, equally guarded against the false refinement of artificial elegance and the roughness of spurious force? Who has better known how to breathe anguish and dread into the purest and most exquisite forms?

  • Mozart exists, and will exist, eternally; divine Mozart - less a name, more a soul descending to us from the heavens, who appeared on this earth, stayed for a little over thirty years, and left it all the more rejuvenated, richer and happier for his appearance.

  • As with all great artists, Mozart expressed not only the soul, the taste and the aroma of his epoch, but also the spiritual world of man-man for all ages, in all the complexity of his desires, his struggles and ambivalence. Some of us, who only identify in Mozart a certain aristocratic refinement, may find these words strange. Often we meet with a condescending attitude towards him, to his music, reminiscent of chiming bells in a music box! ...'It's very nice, but not for me' say such people, 'give me passion - Beethoven, Brahms, tragic, monumental...' Such comments only reveal one thing, these people don't know Mozart.

George Szell

editor, Viva Mozart: An Anthology of Appreciation
  • 21 piano sonatas, 27 piano concertos, 41 symphonies, 18 masses, 13 operas, 9 oratorios and cantata, 2 ballets, 40 plus concertos for various instruments, string quartets, trios and quintets, violin and piano duets piano quartets, and the songs. This astounding output includes hardly one work less than a masterpiece.

  • Lengthy immersion in the works of other composers can tire. The music of Mozart does not tire, and this is one of its miracles.

  • Listening to Mozart, we cannot think of any possible improvement.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

  • I find consolation and rest in Mozart's music, wherein he gives expression to that joy of life which was part of his sane and wholesome temperament.

  • Mozart is the highest, the culminating point that beauty has attained in the sphere of music.

  • Mozart is the musical Christ.

Others

  • We cannot despair about mankind knowing that Mozart was a man. ~ Albert Einstein

  • When Mozart composed he didn't have aims of genius, he simply was one. ~ Sir Roger Norrington

  • Mozart has the classic purity of light and the red ocean; Beethoven the romantic grandeur which belongs to the storms of air and sea, and while the soul of Mozart seems to dwell on the ethereal peaks of Olympus, that of Beethoven climbs shuddering the storm-beaten sides of a Sinai. Blessed be they both! Each represents a moment of the ideal life, each does us good. Our love is due to both. ~ Henri-Frédéric Amiel

  • Mozart shows a creative power of such magnitude that one can virtually say that he tossed out of himself one great masterpiece after another. ~ Claudio Arrau

  • Most of all I admire Mozart's capacity to be both deep and rational, a combination often said to be impossible. ~ Allan Bloom

  • Mozart combined high formality and playfulness that delights as no other composition in any other medium does. ~ Roy Blount, Jr.

  • In my dreams of heaven, I always see the great Masters gathered in a huge hall in which they all reside. Only Mozart has his own suite. ~ Victor Borge

  • Together with the puzzle, Mozart gives you the solution. ~ Ferruccio Busoni

  • If we cannot write with the beauty of Mozart, let us at least try to write with his purity. ~ Johannes Brahms

  • It is a real pleasure to see music so bright and spontaneous expressed with corresponding ease and grace. ~ Johannes Brahms

  • Mozart encompasses the entire domain of musical creation, but I've got only the keyboard in my poor head. ~ Frédéric Chopin

  • Mozart tapped the source from which all music flows, expressing himself with a spontaneity and refinement and breathtaking rightness. ~ Aaron Copland

  • Mozart does not give the listener time to catch his breath, for no sooner is one inclined to reflect upon a beautiful inspiration than another appears, even more splendid, which drives away the first, and this continues on and on, so that in the end one is unable to retain any of these beauties in the memory. ~ Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf

  • Mozart began his works in childhood and a childlike quality lurked in his compositions until it dawned on him that the Requiem he was writing for a stranger was his own. ~ Will and Ariel Durant

  • Mozart is sweet sunshine. ~ Antonín Dvořák

  • Mozart is the greatest composer of all. Beethoven created his music, but the music of Mozart is of such purity and beauty that one feels he merely found it — that it has always existed as part of the inner beauty of the universe waiting to be revealed. ~ Albert Einstein

  • Mozart's music is particularly difficult to perform. His admirable clarity exacts absolute cleanness: the slightest mistake in it stands out like black on white. It is music in which all the notes must be heard. ~ Gabriel Fauré

  • There are three things in the world I love most: the sea, Hamlet, and Don Giovanni. ~ Gustave Flaubert

  • Mozart's joy is made of serenity, and a phrase of his music is like a calm thought; his simplicity is merely purity. It is a crystalline thing in which all the emotions play a role, but as if already celestially transposed. Moderation consists in feeling emotions as the angels do. ~ André Gide

  • A phenomenon like Mozart remains an inexplicable thing. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  • Mozart did not die too early, but rather too late. ~ Glenn Gould

  • For one moment in the history of music all opposites were reconciled; all tensions resolved; that luminous moment was Mozart. ~ Phil Goulding

  • In Mozart's music, all intensity are crystallized in the clearest, the most beautifully balanced and proportioned, and altogether flawless musical forms. ~ Phil Goulding

  • In Bach, Beethoven and Wagner we admire principally the depth and energy of the human mind; in Mozart, the divine instinct. ~ Edvard Grieg

  • Mozart never did too little and never too much; he always attains but never exceeds his goal. ~ Franz Grillparzer

  • How can such a disproportionately large number of people have a definite, and unusually positive relationship to Mozart? ~ Wolfgang Hildesheimer

  • The riddle of Mozart is precisely that "the man" refuses to be a key for solving it. In death, as in life, he conceals himself behind his work. ~ Wolfgang Hildesheimer

  • Mozart's music is the mysterious language of a distant spiritual kingdom, whose marvelous accents echo in our inner being and arouse a higher, intensive life. ~ E.T.A. Hoffmann

  • Mozart said profound things and at the same time remained flippant and lively. ~ Michael Kennedy

  • Mozart has reached the boundary gate of music and leaped over it, leaving behind the old masters and moderns, and posterity itself. ~ A. Hyatt King

  • Mozart's music is so beautiful as to entice angels down to earth. ~ Franz Alexander von Kleist

  • The works of Mozart may be easy to read, but they are very difficult to interpret. The least speck of dust spoils them. They are clear, transparent, and joyful as a spring, and not only those muddy pools which seem deep only because the bottom cannot be seen. ~ Wanda Landowska

  • Mozart resolved his emotions on a level that transformed them into moods uncontaminated by mortal anguish, enabling him to express the angelic anguish that is so peculiarly his own. ~ Yehudi Menuhin

  • Mozart is happiness before it has gotten defined. ~ Arthur Miller

  • Mozart wrote everything with such ease and speed as might at first be taken for carelessness or haste. His imagination held before him the whole work clear and lively once it was conceived. One seldom finds in his scores improved or erased passages. ~ Franz Niemetschek

  • There was nothing exceptional about the physical presence of this extraordinary man; he was small and his appearance gave no sign of his genius, apart from his large intense eyes. [...] But in this ungainly body there dwelt an artistic genius such as Nature rarely bestows even upon her most treasured darlings. ~ Franz Niemetschek

  • Mozart was able to do what he wished in music and he never wished to do what was beyond him. ~ Romain Rolland

  • Beethoven I take twice a week, Haydn four times, and Mozart every day! ~ Gioacchino Rossini

  • Give Mozart a fairy tale and he creates without effort an immortal masterpiece. ~ Camille Saint-Saëns

  • What gives Bach and Mozart a place apart is that these two great composers never sacrificed form to expression. As high as their expression may soar, their musical form remains supreme and all-efficient. ~ Camille Saint-Saëns

  • A light, bright, fine day this will remain throughout my whole life. As from afar, the magic notes of Mozart's music still gently haunts me. ~ Franz Schubert

  • A world that has produced a Mozart is a world worth saving. What a picture of a better world you have given us, Mozart! ~ Franz Schubert

  • Does it not seem as if Mozart's works become fresher and fresher the oftener we hear them? ~ Robert Schumann

  • Designing an opera by Mozart is like doing something for God — it's a labor of love. ~ Maurice Sendak

  • The best of Mozart's works cannot be even slightly rewritten without diminishment. ~ Peter Shaffer

  • What was evident was that Mozart was simply written down music already finished in his head. And music, finished as no music is ever finished. Displace one note and there would be diminishment. Displace one phrase and the structure would fall. I was staring through the cage of those meticulous ink strokes at an absolute beauty. ~ Peter Shaffer (spoken by Antonio Salieri in Shaffer's play Amadeus and slightly reworded in the movie adaptation of the play)

  • Mozart's music represents neither the prolonged sigh of faith that characterizes so much of the music written before his time, nor the stormy idealism which cloaks most music after him. Rather he is that mercurial balance of the skeptic and the humane. Like him, and in him, we can always discover new worlds. ~ Joseph Solman

  • Mozart makes you believe in God because it cannot be by chance that such a phenomenon arrives into this world and leaves such an unbounded number of unparalleled masterpieces. ~ Georg Solti

  • Sometimes the impact of Mozart's music is so immediate that the vision in the mind remains blurred and incomplete, while the soul seems to be directly invaded, drenched in wave upon wave of melancholy. ~ Stendhal

  • I listened to the pure crystalline notes of one of Mozart's concertos dropping at my feet like leaves from the trees. ~ Virgil Thomson

  • Mozart touched no problem without solving it to perfection. ~ Donald Francis Tovey

  • Mozart's mental grip never loosens; he never abandons himself to any one sense; even at his most ecstatic moments his mind is vigorous, alert, and on the wing. He dives unerringly on to his finest ideas like a bird of prey, and once an idea is seized he soars off again with an undiminished power. ~ Walter J. Turner

  • Mozart's music is very mysterious. ~ Walter J. Turner

  • The most tremendous genius raised Mozart above all masters, in all centuries and in all the arts. ~ Richard Wagner

  • I never heard so much content in so short a period. ~ Pinchas Zukerman
 
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