Salzburg: Mozart's Birthplace and House [Romanza from Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K.467]

A Musical Tour of the City of Mozart
With music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Chapter IV
In 1747 Leopold Mozart married and with his wife rented third-floor rooms from Johann Lorenz Hagenauer at No. 9 Getreidegasse. It was here that their seven children were born, the two surviving Maria Anna in 1751 and Wolfgang Amadeus in 1756. The family lived in these very modest quarters until 1773, and during their tour to Paris and London from 1763 to 1766, we learn much of their journey from letters Leopold Mozart wrote to his landlord. The apartment is now a museum preserving family portraits and instruments belonging to Mozart. The former include the unfinished portrait of Mozart painted by his brother-in-law Joseph Lange in 1789, with paintings of Mozart as a child. The instruments include Mozart's Anton Walter fortepiano, bought and used in Vienna, his clavichord, and a violin from his childhood, with a later concert instrument. In 1773 the family moved to the present No. 8 Makartplatz, the so-called Tanzmeisterhaus (Dancing Master House). The building was largely destroyed in an air-raid in 1944, but has been restored, and now houses an exhibition of Mozart memorabilia. The house was originally owned by dancing-masters and used for balls and receptions. Mozart lived here with his parents until he finally left Salzburg in 1781. Leopold Mozart died there in 1787. The exhibition includes the oil painting of the family by Johann Nepomuk della Croce, with a portrait of Mozart's mother, who had died in Paris in 1778. The painting dates from 1780 or early 1781.


Music Mozart: Romanza from Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K.467
Mozart entered the Piano Concerto in C major, K.467, into his catalogue of compositions with the date 9th March 1785. It was performed by the composer in the fifth of the Lenten subscribtion concerts he had organized at the Mehlgrube on 11th March, the day after a concert at the Burgtheater for which he had used his new fortepiano with an added pedal-board. His father reported that this instrument was always being taken out of the house, either to the Mehlgrube or to an aristocratic salon for concerts which formed a major element in Mozart's life in Vienna. The slow movement, music of great beauty, has become very familiar since its use in the film Elvira Madigan.