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Christoph Wilibald Gluck
Christoph Willibald Gluck was born in 1714 in a village in Germany.
Gluck's importance is due to the fact that he advocated the first major reform of opera. Gluck's influence on the young Mozart is also evident. However, in contrast to Mozart's opera, Gluck's characters are still mythological heroes of the highest order. What the Gluckinian reform was really intended to do was to do away with the excesses of overloaded Italian baroque opera, that is, to purify and ennoble the genre. -
Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) was a renowned Austrian composer. His long life resulted in a very extensive compositional oeuvre that includes symphonies and operas, overtures, cantatas, oratorios and other pieces.Thanks to the support for three decades of his patron, Prince of Esterházy. Haydn became one of the most important composers in instrumental music. Curious and innovative in new musical forms and formations, he earned the nickname ‘father of the symphony’ and ‘father of the string quartet’. -
María Anna Mozart
Maria Anna Mozart was born on 30 July 1751 in Salzburg, the same city where her brother Amadeus was born four and a half years later. She was the fourth child of a married couple of musicians. Only she and her brother Amadeus survived to adulthood. The instruments on which she performed best were the pianoforte and the harpsichord. Many people said that Maria Anna's talent was even superior to that of her brother, but when she turned 18, her father decided to take her away from the stage -
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart was born on 27 January 1756. He was born into a family of musicians in Salzburg and showed great talent for music from an early age. At the age of five Mozart had already mastered the violin and keyboard and had composed several pieces of music on his own.
Mozart's musical career was full of debt and waste.
Mozart died in Vienna on December 5, 1791, at the age of 35. His most famous works are: ‘Symphony No. 40’, ‘The Marriage of Figaro’, ‘Requiem Mass’ and ‘The Magic Flute’. -
Maria Theresia von Paradis
Maria Theresia von Paradis was a virtuoso pianist, singer, composer and blind educator who achieved unprecedented success throughout Europe as a performer and intellectual. She was admired by great personalities of different statuses, including leaders such as King George III, Joseph II, Louis XVI, Empress Maria Theresa I and even Marie Antoinette; writers and poets such as Bürger, Burney and Klopstock; and musicians such as Haydn and Mozart, who even dedicated a concert to her. -
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) was a German composer of classical and romantic music, and is considered one of the greatest musicians in history. Most famous for his nine symphonies, piano concertos, piano sonatas and string quartets, Beethoven was a great innovator and probably the most influential composer in the history of music. The most important works :
Symphony No. 5 in C minor, with its famous opening motif and Symphony No. 9 in D minor, also known as the ‘Chorale’ -
Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert was born on 31 January 1797 in Lichtenthal near Vienna.He was the twelfth of fourteen children. Franz Schubert received his first lessons at the age of eight. His father, who played the cello, introduced him to music.
At the age of ten he wrote his first works.
In 1813 he began teaching at his father's school. A year later he created his first opera, Des Teufels Lustschloss, his first mass (in F major) and seventeen songs. -
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann(1810-1856) fue un compositor alemán de la época romántica. En un principio aspiraba a ser pianista, pero una lesión en la mano le obligó a centrarse en la composición. Es conocido por sus expresivas obras para piano, lieder (canciones artísticas) y sinfonías, entre ellas Carnaval, Kinderszenen y Dichterliebe. Schumann estuvo casado con la pianista Clara Schumann, que influyó enormemente en su carrera. En sus últimos años luchó contra una enfermedad mental y murió en un manicomio. -
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms (1833–1897) was a German composer and pianist of the Romantic era. Known for works like Symphony No. 1, Hungarian Dances, and A German Requiem, he combined classical traditions with deep emotion. A close friend of Clara Schumann, he was a perfectionist who shaped orchestral and chamber music. Brahms spent much of his career in Vienna and remains one of classical music’s great composers. He was the greatest representative of the conservative circle in the ‘War of the Romantics’.