Talk:Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The Miserere Myth

Charles Burney makes clear in his 'Present State &c' [Italy) that it was not 'forbidden' to copy this work; rather, its manner of performance was so unique that transcribed scores were inadequate to indicate exactly how to reproduce it; hence, copying was futile. It could only be 'learned', for example, by becoming a guest conductor. Whether Mozart wrote it out from memory or not is irrelevant. Doubtless he could have, but it would have been rather a waste of time. 193.114.140.166 (talk) 03:24, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Featured picture scheduled for POTD

Hello! This is to let editors know that File:Mozart Family Croce.jpg, a featured picture used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for January 27, 2026. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2026-01-27. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. 270th birthday of Wolfgang Mozart If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! ―Howard • 🌽³³ 20:57, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition and proficiency from an early age resulted in more than 800 works representing virtually every Western classical genre of his time. Many of these compositions are acknowledged as pinnacles of the symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral repertoire. Mozart is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music, with his music admired for its "melodic beauty, its formal elegance and its richness of harmony and texture". The painting Portrait of the Mozart Family depicts him with his family around 1780.

Painting credit: attrib. Johann Nepomuk della Croce

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Requested move 14 February 2025

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Overwhelming consensus not to move the article, WP:SNOW applies. Closing so as not to waste time further. (closed by non-admin page mover) ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 13:16, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart → Mozart – WP:CONCISE and WP:COMMONNAME, see ngrams 𐩣𐩫𐩧𐩨 Abo Yemen (𓃵) 10:19, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:CONCISE, which notes that "given names and family names are usually not omitted or abbreviated for the purposes of concision". This is consistent with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven and Franz Schubert and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Johannes Brahms and Claude Debussy and so forth. SilverLocust 💬 11:54, 14 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose as per SilverLocust. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:09, 14 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. See above. Zacwill (talk) 12:20, 14 February 2025 (UTC)
• Me thinks you read WP:COMMONNAME wrong. I dunno why people would even bother with 'oppose' votes. Or are even pretending to take this seriously. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 13:25, 14 February 2025 (UTC)
• Comment: Two days ago Portraits of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was moved to Portraits of Mozart, with the edit summary "make consistent with other Mozart pages". Those Mozart pages appear to be Biographies of Mozart and some others linked to from Template:Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. I would be in favour of moving at least those two to Biographies of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and (back to) Portraits of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, assuming that this RM fails. Ham II (talk) 14:33, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

  I think that would be a misunderstanding. While I agree that for the biography, the guideline is to have the full name, I don't believe that it is meant also for related articles. I once started an article Reger works, and find Mozart operas useful for easy search. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:50, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

  I quite agree with Reger works and Mozart operas existing as redirects, but those articles' titles are (now, at least) List of compositions by Max Reger and List of operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Ham II (talk) 15:01, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

  I don't go for making the shortcuts article names, but without a redirect, searching for such a list, especially with a first name as long as Wolfgang Amadeus, is tedious. There are longish discussions about different names than Bach cantata in its archives. - It's not without irony that Mozart never used Wolfgang Amadeus. The Salzburg Festival - his festival - uses W. A. Mozart. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:20, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose per others, also largely agreeing with Gerda. Reger works would not be ideal as the actual title, but Mozart operas would be fine imo. Johnbod (talk) 15:03, 14 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. Renaming the page sets bad precedence for naming conventions in my opinion, See J.S. Bach and his family, not to mention P.D.Q. Bach. VARice22 (talk) 13:04, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

Oppose and snow close. Killuminator (talk) 23:17, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose per above. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:29, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amadeus

I feel this page should have something about Amadeus, both Peter Shaffer's play and Milos Forman's film. I have many doubts about its historical accuracy (Salieri was apparently a good composer held in esteem by Mozart) but it is none the less an important work. On Schubert (a Good Article) we learn "Schubert has featured as a character in several films including Schubert's Dream of Spring (1931), Gently My Songs Entreat (1933), Serenade (1940), The Great Awakening (1941)—whose plot is based on a fictional episode of him fleeing Vienna to Hungary to avoid conscription—It's Only Love (1947), Franz Schubert (1953), Das Dreimäderlhaus (1958), and Mit meinen heißen Tränen (1986)." None of those are as famous or as influential as Amadeus. Charlie Faust (talk) 12:49, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

To be clear, I think it should be under "Influence". On the Schubert page, there's a subheading "In film and television". I'm not sure we need that here, but Amadeus is more important than the films listed on Schubert's page. Like Amadeus or not (and I can see why classical music scholars might not), it's hard to ignore its influence. Charlie Faust (talk) 14:11, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

In the section "Influence" is a link to Mozart in popular culture where all this and more has been listed since 2008. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:45, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Yes, I know of Mozart in popular culture. But Schubert (a Good Article, per the robust standards of Wikipedia editors) notes films featuring him as a character, films much less famous than Amadeus. Charlie Faust (talk) 12:38, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Verdi (also a Good Article, per the robust standards of Wikipedia editors) informs us that "Verdi has been the subject of several film and stage works. These include the 1938 film directed by Carmine Gallone, Giuseppe Verdi, starring Fosco Giachetti; the 1982 miniseries, The Life of Verdi, directed by Renato Castellani, where Verdi was played by Ronald Pickup, with narration by Burt Lancaster in the English version; and the 1985 play After Aida, by Julian Mitchell (1985). He is a character in the 2011 opera Risorgimento! by Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero." Again, none of those works are as influential as Amadeus. Charlie Faust (talk) 13:40, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Hello, the Manual of Style now provides guidelines about "pop culture" sections; see MOS:CULTURALREFS. Opus33 (talk) 16:56, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Re Schubert and Verdi: those articles are not swamped, like Mozart's was in 2008, with references to popular culture. That's why that section was split off. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:51, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

OK, but is Mozart's section swamped now? It doesn't seem to be.

Of course, most of the items in Mozart in popular culture should stay there. (The Requiem features briefly in The Big Lebowski, but Mozart's music is not integral to the plot.) Mozart, his character and his work, are integral to the plot of Amadeus.

From the MOS:CULTURALREFS, I read "A good 'Cultural references' section might, for example, set out a logically-presented overview... A well-crafted article or section on a topic’s cultural representation should be based on reliable sources that address the topic broadly. These sources may cover the entire topic (e.g. cats), its cultural representation (e.g. cats in fiction), or specific aspects (e.g. cats in 1960s Italian fiction). The primary aim should be to present an analysis of the topic's cultural representations as found in these sources. Editors must avoid introducing their own interpretations, as this would violate Wikipedia’s no original research policy.

A limited number of examples can be valuable for illustrating and reinforcing this analysis, but they should complement, not replace, broader discussion. If examples are included, they should be drawn from sources that discuss the primary topic rather than being selected arbitrarily. Their inclusion should reflect their prominence in relevant literature. For an example of good practice, see Mars in fiction, a featured article."

I actually think Mozart in fiction would be something worth including. The myth of Mozart that Shaffer builds on starts, as I understand it, with Pushkin's play Mozart and Salieri, later an opera by Rimsky-Korsakov. I think works where Mozart is a central character are worth including (a "limited number of examples", as the MOS says. Mozart is apparently a character in Bill and Ted Face the Music but not, as I understand it, a central character, so it's not worth including on Mozart's page.) Mozart is a central character in Amadeus. And it's more than mere pop culture. Peter Shaffer's play and Milos Forman's film won Tony for Best Play and Oscar for Best Picture, respectively. And it has, for better or worse, shaped the public perception of Mozart ever since. Charlie Faust (talk) 12:33, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

the public perception of Mozart is a huge subject, so it's better dealt with in its dedicated article. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:20, 5 May 2025 (UTC)