| The Lovers | |
|---|---|
| Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756-91) was born in Salzburg, the son of Leopold Mozart and Anna Maria Pertl. From the age of five he performed all over Europe with his sister, Maria-Anna. In 1763 alone they toured Bavaria, Austria, and Hungary. By 1772 he had composed 25 symphonies and two string quartets. He was appointed honorary concert master to the court in Salzburg in 1774, and after more tours--to Italy, Manneheim, and Paris--and a spell as court organist in Salzburg (1778-80), he moved to Vienna in 1781. Mozart wrote most of his best work in the years that followed: 12 piano concertos (1784-86); six quartets; and the operas The Marriage of Figaro (1786), Don Giovanni (1787), and Cosi Fan Tutte (1790). In 1791, the year of the Requiem and The Magic Flute, he died of heart failure, at age 35. |
Constanze Weber
(1762-1842) was the third of four daughters of Fridolin Weber, a musical copyist. Constanze's elder sister, Aloysia, a soprano, was romantically involved with Mozart for a short time when the family lived in Manneheim. After the death of her father, Constanze moved with her mother and younger sister, Sophie, to Vienna, where her courtship with Mozart began. She married him on August 4, 1782, in St. Stephen's cathedral, and bore him six children, only two of whom--Franz Xaver Wolfgang and Karl Thomas--survived. Constanze was too ill to attend Mozart's funeral. After his death she was granted a pension by the emperor, Leopold II, and she soon married again, this time to a Danish diplomat, George Nikolaus von Nissen who became Mozart's biographer. She died in Salzburg in 1842. |
