4 ms·

I am afraid that mozart at the age of 4, more or less played the works of Bach et al. to audiences after 2 years of strict practice with his father. (He saw tha

I am afraid that mozart at the age of 4, more or less played the works of Bach et al. to audiences after 2 years of strict practice with his father. (He saw that his son had interest in music when he would patiently sit through his sister's lessons and then he started pushing him to see how far he could go) The Mozart we know didn't emerge until he was a teenager and he started composing at the grand old age of 13. Yes, he did have a talent, but perhaps that talent was the gift of accelerated learning. Not the gift of magical music.

cynicalkane 16y ago
I don't understand why you think this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i-SzzhUtws&feature=fvw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i-SzzhUtws&feature=fvw
- todayiamme 16y ago
  No actually I read that his so called "compositions" at that age were heavily guided by his father and were merely modified improvisation of Bach/other pieces he was taught. The Mozart we know didn't emerge till a later age. By the way, I don't mind being wrong. So, let's figure out the truth and I'll email you, okay?
  - cynicalkane 16y ago
    Where did you read this? Musicology journal? Popular biography? Oprah Magazine? In academic musicology unsubstantiated theories and hearsay are unfortunately the rule and not the exception, but in general it should be considered bad practice to so plainly contradict conventional wisdom without giving a convincing reason to do so.
    - todayiamme 16y ago
      I think I read it in Scientific American.
      - sausagefeet 16y ago
        Isn't this in Gladwell's book Outliers? Also, perhaps this is the SCIAM you are referring: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=skeptic-origins-of-success http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=skeptic-ori...
    - makmanalp 16y ago
      Unubstantiated hearsay? Actually, it's insane to call any of what you're saying "conventional wisdom". It's sort of like saying that Abraham Lincoln chopped down trees with his hands and puffed his enemies away with his breath. All that we have for evidence is some compositions in her sister's notebook that could have been made by anyone, and her sister's account which is likely to be terribly biased.
      - cynicalkane 16y ago
        Hate to lengthen the thread, but it's too late to add this to the original post-- Remember that the Mozart family toured Europe only a few years after these pieces were written, and he was improvising pieces of considerable harmonic difficulty based on audience suggestions. The documentation of this tour is extensive, as the tour was a sensation, attended by many of the most important people of the day, and made young W. A. famous throughout Europe. The alleged four-year-old compositions are considerably simpler than the things he was reported to improvise a few years later. Really, with this level of talent, it's more wild to say that Mozart was not writing music at a young age; that his ability to imagine melodies and harmonies just popped into his head shortly before the tour started. I was arguing talent is very much natural, but not so natural as that!

cynicalkane 16y ago

I don't understand why you think this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i-SzzhUtws&feature=fvw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i-SzzhUtws&feature=fvw

todayiamme 16y ago
No actually I read that his so called "compositions" at that age were heavily guided by his father and were merely modified improvisation of Bach/other pieces he was taught. The Mozart we know didn't emerge till a later age. By the way, I don't mind being wrong. So, let's figure out the truth and I'll email you, okay?
- cynicalkane 16y ago
  Where did you read this? Musicology journal? Popular biography? Oprah Magazine? In academic musicology unsubstantiated theories and hearsay are unfortunately the rule and not the exception, but in general it should be considered bad practice to so plainly contradict conventional wisdom without giving a convincing reason to do so.
  - todayiamme 16y ago
    I think I read it in Scientific American.
    - sausagefeet 16y ago
      Isn't this in Gladwell's book Outliers? Also, perhaps this is the SCIAM you are referring: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=skeptic-origins-of-success http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=skeptic-ori...
  - makmanalp 16y ago
    Unubstantiated hearsay? Actually, it's insane to call any of what you're saying "conventional wisdom". It's sort of like saying that Abraham Lincoln chopped down trees with his hands and puffed his enemies away with his breath. All that we have for evidence is some compositions in her sister's notebook that could have been made by anyone, and her sister's account which is likely to be terribly biased.
    - cynicalkane 16y ago
      Hate to lengthen the thread, but it's too late to add this to the original post-- Remember that the Mozart family toured Europe only a few years after these pieces were written, and he was improvising pieces of considerable harmonic difficulty based on audience suggestions. The documentation of this tour is extensive, as the tour was a sensation, attended by many of the most important people of the day, and made young W. A. famous throughout Europe. The alleged four-year-old compositions are considerably simpler than the things he was reported to improvise a few years later. Really, with this level of talent, it's more wild to say that Mozart was not writing music at a young age; that his ability to imagine melodies and harmonies just popped into his head shortly before the tour started. I was arguing talent is very much natural, but not so natural as that!