Few people these days would question Mozart's rating as the most popular of all classical composers. Yet there exists no substantial, up-to-date English-language study of the man and his works. In this new study of Mozart's early years, Stanley Sadie aims to fill this gap in the form of a traditional biography on a straightforward chronological basis. The volume covers the period up to 1781, the year of Idomeneo and Mozart's settling in Vienna. Individual works are discussed in sequence and related to the events of his life. Stanley Sadie draws substantially on the family correspondence, quoting the letters and discussing what they tell us about Mozart and his world and his relationships with his family and his professional colleagues. Also included is a discussion of all aspects of Mozart's life and his music, relating them to the environment in which he worked, social, economic and cultural as well as musical. Much new material connected with Mozart has come to light in recent years. There have been discoveries of musical sources and new ways of studying known ones. Such finds and methods have changed our view of the chronology of many works and they often have significant biographical ramifications. Understanding of the context for Mozart's music, and indeed his life, has broadened immensely. Stanley Sadie's biography digests and interprets this corpus of new information.

xv + 216 pp.

The vibrant intellectual, social and political climate of mid eighteenth-century Europe presented opportunities and challenges for artists and musicians alike. This book focuses on Mozart the man and musician as he responds to different aspects of that world. It reveals his views on music, aesthetics and other matters; on places in Austria and across Europe that shaped his life; on career contexts and environments, including patronage, activities as an impresario, publishing, theatrical culture and financial matters; on engagement with performers and performance, focusing on Mozart's experiences as a practicing musician; and on reception and legacy from his own time through to the present day. Probing diverse Mozartian contexts in a variety of ways, the contributors reflect the vitality of existing scholarship and point towards areas primed for further study. This volume is essential reading for students and scholars of late eighteenth-century music and for Mozart aficionados and music lovers in general.

A celebration and exploration of a monumental achievement

This volume is a collection based on the Royal Musical Association's Mozart Conference of 1991, the principal scholarly event in the English-speaking world in commemoration of the bicentenary. It includes essays placing Mozart in the context, in Salzburg and Vienna, in which he worked, explaining aspects of his life and work hitherto obscure; essays interpreting his instrumental music; and a substantial series of studies on different aspects of his operas, from Lucio Silla to La clemenza di Tito, with particular stress on the creative processes in the Da Ponte operas.

xv + 186 pp.