Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1756–91), Austrian composer whose brief career produced some of the world's greatest music. A child prodigy of the harpsichord, violin, and organ at the age of 4, he was concertmaster to the archbishop of Salzburg (1771–81). In 1781 he moved to Vienna, where he became Court Composer to Joseph II in 1787. He became a close friend of Haydn and set Lorenzo Da Ponte's opera librettos The Marriage of Figaro (1786) and Don Giovanni (1787) to music. In 1788 he wrote 3 of his greatest symphonies (numbers 39 to 41). Mozart composed over 600 works, including 50 symphonies, over 20 operas, nearly 30 piano concertos, 27 string quartets, and about 40 violin sonatas. In all these genres his work shows great expressive beauty and technical mastery.