Mozart as inspiration in times of crisis

Throughout history, the genius and beauty of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's music have often offered solace in times of crisis, and continue to do so today. "As a composer, he is a guiding figure, especially in times when there is a sense of overload and polarization," says Evelyn Meining, artistic director of the Mozartfest Würzburg.

When the world seems to be falling apart, people look for something to lean on. 

"Now, more than ever, with the world stricken by crisis and at risk of being engulfed by war, the desire for unity is growing," says Evelyn Meining, artistic director of Mozartfest Würzburg.

Throughout history, the genius and beauty of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's music have often offered solace in times of crisis and continue to do so today. 

“As a composer, he is a leading figure, especially in times when there is a sense of overload and polarization,” says Meining. For this reason, the motto of Germany’s largest Mozart festival this year is: “Evocative Beauty: Mozart as Idol.”

The opening concert of the festival, with the participation of the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, showed how powerful and moving Mozart's music can be. The orchestra from Salzburg performed Mozart's penultimate Symphony.

The program also included modern works by Maurice Ravel and Sergei Prokofiev, who admired Mozart.

Ravel admired Mozart as “the idol of a bygone era.” According to Evelyn Meining, “He shared with Mozart the conviction that music should enchant.”

Ravel's work, "Le Tombeau de Couperin," is a homage to the Baroque composer, François Couperin. 

“It is a musical work of beauty, characterized by clarity, elegance and melodic line, just like Mozart's music,” Meining explains.

Ravel composed this work between 1914 and 1917, during World War I, and dedicated it to his friends who had fallen in the war.

Sergei Prokofiev also admired Mozart's classical symphonies for their elegance. He wrote his Second Violin Concerto in the mid-30s. After returning from exile, he arrived in Russia under the regime of Joseph Stalin, during which mass arrests and atrocities were being carried out against the population. A successful testimony of this period is his “Violin Concerto”, which the Chinese violinist Tianwa Yang performed as a soloist, captivating the audience from its delicate beginning to its stormy finale, with the beauty and expressive power of her performance. She was rewarded with wild applause.

While Mozart's music is often perceived today as beautiful and light, it is constructed with extraordinary precision and is often difficult to interpret. "In his time, Mozart's music constantly confused people, even provoked and overwhelmed them," says Evelyn Meining, citing as an example the increasingly dissonant sounds and musical complexity of his works.

After Mozart's death in 1791, his wife, Constanze Mozart, elevated him to the status of a genius. "He was hailed as a national spiritual figure, a person on whom people could agree in a time of national division."

At the beginning of the 19th century, Europe was marked by the collapse of the old feudal system after the Napoleonic Wars. Citizens sought freedom and national unity, while princes sought to restore absolutist rule.

In the 20th century, after the collapse of old Europe due to the world wars, Mozart became an object of desire and nostalgia. "Many artists and intellectuals were looking for something that embodied prudence, order and humanity, something that would give them stability in times of ruin and terror." According to Meining, Mozart brought light to those dark times.

Solo violinist Tianwa Yang continues to see Mozart and his music as an idol today: “For us musicians, he is someone who does not belong to this world. Someone from another universe.” However, she says that one should not be paralyzed by adoration in the face of this idol. 

"When you listen to music and you like it, you feel close to the composer and you think you understand him, which may not be true. But there is a certain connection with him while performing his music, and that is what matters," she says.

This year, Tianwa Yang is the main guest artist, or “Artiste Étoile,” of the Mozartfest. She not only performs the classics, but also focuses on contemporary music. It was especially for Yang that the renowned composer and clarinetist Jörg Widmann wrote the Etude No. 7 for solo violin, also known as the “Jupiter Etude.” He also often returns to the classical repertoire, this time with Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony. Like the Symphony in G minor, it ranks among Mozart’s most famous works. This work will be performed for the first time on June 26 in Würzburg.

As an idol, Mozart is not beyond criticism, and his music can be made accessible even to young people.
In his humorous lecture-performance “Nothing Is Sacred,” German-Turkish-Armenian composer and writer Marc Sinan reveals the mechanisms of power, culture, and history behind the “untouchable saints on pedestals” of music history: Mozart, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Ludwig van Beethoven. He erodes a little of their pedestals.

Thanks to his German father, Sinan was introduced to classical music from an early age. Together with the “Eliot Quartet”, he questions these musical giants. 

“And through his non-European background, he connects his questions to the present-day reality of a migration society,” says artistic director Meining. “He is interested in knowing what the musical histories of other countries look like.”

However, Evelyn Meining reveals that in the end Mozart will survive and not be toppled from his pedestal.