MPR: About Us: 250 Years of Mozart

As part of Minnesota Public Radio's celebration of 250 years of Mozart we asked, "How has Mozart's music touched your life?" and you shared. Read about people's favorite pieces and how Mozart's music has affected their lives!

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
The five violin concertos (Don't ask me to choose just 1!) by Itzhak Perlman and the Vienna Philharmonic

Why?
I find Mozart's music to be calm and relaxing. At the same time, its complexity draws and attracts me with wonder and awe. It captures my attention, and holds it; it never grows old. It's truly music. It's music constructed of a lovely profile, decorated with various ornate and precious gems of astonishing beauty and romance. It inspires me; it uplifts me; it moves me!

How has Mozart's music affected you?
When something is constructed with astonishing beauty, balance, complexity, fine detail, and perfection, it challenges us to imitate that in our own work, recreation, and worship of God. So Mozart's music has inspired and moved me to strive for perfection in all that I do.

Michael Koziolek
Wells, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Ave Verum Corpus, K.618

Why?
Mozart wove together several melodies without repeating any of them more than once, and yet he used the music to make the text flow beautifully and seamlessly between phrases. This is an excellent, but short, example of how Mozart could make the whole of a piece of music greater than the sum of its wonderfully ethereal parts.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
Mozart's music affects me in different ways, depending on the mood of the piece. But his setting of the "Ave Verum Corpus" is one of those very few pieces of music capable of bringing tears to my eyes.

This is just one of the reasons that classical music, not just that of Mozart, is by far the greatest form of music that has ever existed.

Torleif Sorenson
Red Wing, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
"The Magic Flute"

Why?
It is a majestic, lighthearted, and revealing overture about the positive nature of the world. And that's delightful.

Jay Willms
Minneapolis, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Symphony No. 40 and Symphony No. 41

Why?
I like the orchestration, the way these works are put together. My favorite part though is the wonderful melodies. They stay in my head forever (that's good!). No one can write melodies like Mozart could.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
Mozart's music was one of the main reasons I started playing clarinet. He's music also inspired me to become more and more interested in music. Now, I play clarinet and piano, and I am interested in composition. Mozart's music has really changed me into what I am now.

Benjamin Peterson
Golden Valley, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Requiem mass in D minor

Why?
Although it is tough to choose my favorite Mozart piece, I believe that the Requiem mass shows Mozart at his greatest depth and genius. It evokes tragedy, which is not often seen in pieces by Mozart. And although most of Mozart's music is often described as being delightful genius, and having a consistency of light playfulness, the Requiem mass shows a deep period in his music that sets it apart from the music we typically associate with Mozart.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
Most of Mozart's music gives me a sense of happiness and sublimity. The first Mozart piece I heard was most likely, as for most of us, the first movement of the "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" string serenade. When I heard it, I thought that it sounded very playful. I also thought, "This man must have been a very happy man for composing such happy music." I immediately became drawn into the style of music that Mozart produces, and I always like to listen to it when it I want to get my spirits up.

Daniel Perry
Fairfax, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Alleluia & Eine Kleine Nachtmusik

Why?
They are two of the first Mozart compositions that I heard.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
At the last big Mozart birthday celebration, his 225th, my wife and I decided that a party was in order. So she made a cake, and we celebrated Mozart's birthday. The kids thought we were nuts, but they liked the cake and ice cream. We've been celebrating Mozart's birthday every year since. The bakery people sometimes look at us kind of strange when we order a cake with "Happy Birthday Mozart" on it, but it is fun explaining the reason.

Thomas Frankson
Austin, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Whichever piece I am practicing

Why?
I dream of playing it well.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
Mozart's music drives me crazy. As an adult piano student, I was thrilled when my teacher recommended that I start working on one of his sonatas. It felt like I was finally getting somewhere. I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I thought that if I practiced enough, it would become the lilting, flowing music that stays in the background of my mind all day. It looked simple enough; it was readable.

After months of practice, I told my teacher that I liked Mozart, but I did not like the way I played it. That's when I learned that I am in the company of 99 percent of all pianists. According to my teacher, we all feel like we can't do Mozart's music justice. Even the best of the concert pianists are hardly ever satisfied with their own performance. (What a relief! I am apparently in the company of all the great pianists.)

But, the truth of the matter is this: even played badly, Mozart's music is magical. The occasional phrase that I play well sustains me. I will keep playing. I hope to play well some day. But if not, I have had the pleasure of trying and hearing, at least in my inner ear, what I think he intended. It is enough.

Nancy Kukulka
White Bear Lake, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
The Requiem

Why?
It is a beautiful piece conveying the emotion and veracity of an original work that transcends formal compositional standards. I also sing and enjoy the individual arias.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
I would enjoy living during the 18th century. As the last century before the Industrial Revolution, it was a time of great artistic productivity leading to higher levels of achievement. I believe that Mozart was the grand master of the creative muse of his times. Also, through incidents affecting his employment as the Archbishop's chief musician, we see Mozart's refusal to put pedestrian considerations ahead of his passionate gift to produce incomparable art.

Anne Stohr
Minneapolis, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Symphony No. 40

Why?
It is difficult to pick out one piece of Mozart's vast output, but to me, Symphony No. 40 represents the culmination of his genius and his experience. This symphony catapults the symphonic form forward into the 19th and 20th centuries, but also represents the perfection of the form itself.

How has Mozart's music affected you?
I don't think I could capture better what my philosophy professor and advisor in philosophy told me: "If you told me that angels had composed this music, I would completely believe it."

Jon Erik Kingstad
Afton, MN

What is your favorite Mozart piece?
Clarinet Concerto in A

Why?
Not only was it the last entry in his record of compositions, but it is both sublime and thrilling. How did he manage to do it while dying of trichinosis?

How has Mozart's music affected you?
It's essential to life.

Terrence Hill
St. Paul, MN

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