'Everything you've heard is true' (and that's 'official')
(Trailer to the film 'Amadeus) '
We continue our irreverent series on the legendary musical career of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) with another free article, this time dealing with musical and biographical matters related to Mozart's first musical tour of Italy which he made in 1770. During which time (as you already know) he wrote 90 operas before breakfast, 20 concertos before lunch, 23 concertos before sunset and designed 29 suspension bridges. And wrote from memory several volumes of Homer, the Bible, and the notes of a mass performed in Rome. All of which prove his 'genius' status, as you know.
This section examines the thorny problem of 'Who Taught Mozart Musical Composition' ? (If anyone). (Cough, cough !).
In recent years (as you may appreciate) the need to provide the identity of the composition teacher of this mercurial genius from Salzburg (now that Padre Martini of Bologna has been discounted from the list) has become something of a priority to identify in official/conventional 'Mozart Studies'. One influential teacher and writer (as you will see) has been bravely suggesting it was probably a musical aristocrat of the time named the Marquis de Ligniville (1730-1788). Which, if true, solves a centuries old mystery. And rescuing the Austrian Tourist Board and German musicology from that small problem.
Ligniville, for sure, was described in a letter by Leopold Mozart (who met one another at this time) as being one of the best composition teachers in Italy at the time. So he sounds promising, doesn't he ? We examine this theory. We also examine other exaggerations, falsehoods and crude errors which relate to Mozart's presence in Florence during that year of 1770 and the contents of reports made on them during their stay. Thanks especially to Luca Bianchini of Italy and to those interested in the subject of musical history (aka as the struggle to introduce criticism in to the teaching of musical history). And best wishes to investigative journalism and those relying on the oxygen of criticism.
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