Yesterday was the 270th anniversary of the birth of the greatest composer of orchestral music to ever draw breath: the incomparable Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I can hear you Beethovenn snobs sniffing and pouting and harrumphing from all the way over here. Just pipe down awready; you ain’t ever gonna get me to diss Ludwig Van, I wholeheartedly love his stuff. Bit considering that A) his output is simply not in Mozart’s league just in terms of sheer numbers; let’s see now, Beethoven’s Nine (9) symphonies against Mozart’s forty-one? One (1) Beethoven opera versus twenty-two for Mozart? Granted, Beethoven’s work is all top-notch (except for that one opera, which kinda sucks if you ask me), and Mozart had more active working years than Beethoven did. Mozart began composing seriously as a child, completing his Symphony No 1-—among his best creations, still performed to this day, a mature, fully realized, exquisitely put-togeher work, in no sense the slapdash, hit-and-miss, half-baked product from the mind of a child—at the tender age of eight (8) years!

Somewhat more telling, there’s also B) Beethoven himself was profoundly influenced by Mozart, an influence which is easily discerned in several Beethoven compositions. Ludwig Van maintained deepest respect for his gifted peer, even going so far as to lift  sections from Mozart pieces and insert them, whole and intact, into his own work, even giving official, written credit to Mozart on one of them. Beethoven also wrote some of the all-time best cadenzas for Mozart compositions. Extra-secil fine are the cadenzas for several Mozart piano concertos.

Taken all together, these gestures are indicative of Beethoven’s high regard for Mozart’s creative ability, ingenuity, impeccable taste and sense of style,, and positively uncanny talent. Whenever somebody tried to cop something from one of my songs to use himself, I considered it a tremendous complimen: sincere. honest, and stright from th heart, mo way of faking it. To me, that’s high praise indeed.

Anyhoo, yes, sinçe I was a young kid taking piano lessons I have considered Mozart the absolute best ever, although there quite a few other greats I revere as well: Beethoven, Haydn, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Dvorak, Chopin, to name but a few. At ay rate, here’s the third movement of the wee tyke’s First Symphony, one of my personal faves since I was about nine (9) my own self. Never tried to write up an arrangement of it for solo piano but I never did, it just never occurred to me until recently and now, with my hands crippled into near-uselessness, it’s too late.

Happy birthday, Wolfgang. We will never forget you.