Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart 27 January 1756 5 December 1791 was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic concertante chamber piano operatic and choral music. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers. Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood in Salzburg. Already competent on keyboard 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 Salzburg position. 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 bestknown symphonies concertos and operas and portions of the Requiem which was largely unfinished at the time of Mozarts death. The circumstances of his early death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons.