Mozart's sister was as great as her brother
Mozart's sister was as great as her brother
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"My girl plays the hardest scores we have ... with incredible precision and excellent manner," shouted composer Leopold Mozart, father of Maria Anna, Mozart's sister: a musical prodigy silenced by the restrictions of a time made for men.
Mozart's sister was as great as her brother, do you know why he left the music?
Maria Anna, the sister of Mozart, or Nannerl as she affectionately called herself, born in 1751, received music lessons at a very young age, taught by her father, Leopold Mozart, who, in addition to being a composer, was a violinist and musical director in the archbishopric of Salzburg. She was credited with wonderful praises, since at eight years old she was able to interpret musical pieces of great complexity, with a beauty worthy of her prodigiousness.
Note to note, his family rejoiced in pride, especially his little brother, Wolfgang Amadeus, younger for four years. He sat beside her in silence to admire the precious melodies that deserved to be heard by the rest of the world and remembered over time, but it was not like that. She was the one who woke up in her brother, one of the most influential musicians in history, the passion for music.
While it was possible, Nannerl gained a few followers during the tours that he shared with his father and Wolfgang in the Old Continent. Leopold Mozart proudly exclaimed that, at only 12 years old, his daughter was one of the most skilled musicians in Europe. Mozart's sister was not only a leading harpsichord player, but also a brilliant composer. However, because of her condition as a woman in a time when men were better off, social pressures forced her to abandon the idea of being a violinist to replace her with the performance of harpsichord and singing, which are more acceptable for her genre. This was only the prelude to a path of disappointment.
"I have the fear of not composing as well as you, the song you wrote is beautiful" - confessed his famous brother, which awakens us even more our intrigue: how did the music of Mozart's sister sound? It is impossible to know when his work was absolutely nothing, for the machismo of the era that marked his destiny.
At the age of 18, Maria Anna had to give up the dream of exploiting her musical gift to the full because it was a "demerit" for a young lady to live on music, since it would have meant practically the same as engaging in prostitution, according to old prejudices. This is how Mozart's sister not only had to forget her aspirations forever, but she also had to get Franz Díppold, her tutor and the man who won her heart out of her heart.
sister
She sacrificed herself for her family to save them from a deep economic crisis, marrying a man of high stratum. As she was old enough to be married, her father arranged the marriage, in 1783, with Johann Baptist von Berchtold zu Sonnenburg, a man fifteen years older than her, a widower, with five children and magistrate of St. Gilgen, in Austria. Thus, the young Wolfgang received the support that Mozart needed to become a prominent musician. Perhaps in the early compositions of this musical genius something has to do with Maria Anna, who often gave her her impeccable pieces by order.
Unfortunately, Nannerl, as surely as many other talented women of the time, was condemned to the absence of any legacy of her masterly melodies, because they had to fulfill a role imposed by society: that of mother and wife, repressing their longings. From the admirable Maria Anna who left everything for the welfare of the family, little is said about it, but based on the testimony of the musical genius Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, we know that there was not one prodigious Mozart, but two.
