Mozart Birthplace and Mozart Living Place

It wouldn’t be Salzburg if Mozart-sites were not pimped out to the tourism industry twice: there are two Mozart memorial museums in Salzburg, one in the birthplace of the genius, the other in his former living place. Both are worth a visit, but be careful that you don’t suffer a Mozart over-kill on your Salzburg visit!

The house in Getreidegasse 9 was the living place of the Mozarts between 1747 and 1773 and here Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whose name was actually quite a bit more complicated, was born on the 27th of January 1756. The famous "Birthplace".

The museum in his birthplace now hosts precious relics such as the violin that Mozart used to play when he was a child, the time of baby Mozart, his concert violin, his Clavichord, portraits, letters and other memorabilia of the Mozart family. Some famous paintings of Mozart are also on display, such as “Mozart on the piano”, an unfinished painting by his brother in law Joseph Lange.

Mozart Bithplace: Salzburg's Most Popular Museum

Another room at the birthplace is fully dedicated to the stage settings of Mozart operas through the centuries. Models and dioramas give an idea on how manifold the ways were in which people approached Mozart’s work. The back part of the birthplace building faces the Kollegienkirche and the Universitätsplatz, but actually never hosted any member of the Mozart family.

It was the flat of the Mozart’s neighbours and purchased by the International Mozart Foundation in 1981 to show a typical Salzburg middle-class flat from the 18th century, including original furniture and items of daily use. The birthplace museum exists since 1880, when the International Mozart Foundation opened it; today it is among Salzburg’s top-attractions and draws thousands of tourists into the old town of the city. The birthplace building itself is called “Hagenauerhaus” and named after owner and friend of the Mozarts, Johann Lorenz Hagenauer.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s living house, however, is the “Tanzmeisterhaus” on the Markartplatz, just by the Trinity Church. They were originally two houses, and there is record of them from 1617. In 1685 the houses were merged and in 1711, the owner Lorenz Speckner got a license for a dancing school – “Tanzmeister” means “dance teacher”.

Birthplace of a Mozart symphony

In fact, “dancing” included much more than movement to music – the lessons were targeted to young nobles and the children of wealthy people and instructed them in the protocol and behavioural codex of the court. The second Tanzmeister, Franz Gottlieb Speckner was a friend of the Mozart family.

In 1765, the Mozart started to think about moving house to a new place, as the facilities in the Getreidegasse were not sufficient for the family anymore. Speckner died in 1767 and his cousin Maria Anna Raab didn’t maintain his business, but rented out the facilities for weddings or alike. In the meantime, Mozart was touring Europe mostly with his father, but it was clear to them that once they would return to Salzburg, they would need a bigger place.

In 1773, Mozart finally moved into the Tanzmeisterhaus on the square that was called “Hannibalplatz” back then (now “Markartplatz”). Here he found sufficient amounts of space for rehearsals, social gatherings and living. He composed like obsessed in these rooms and wrote many letters – 232 that are known.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart everywhere

The Mozart family as the residents in the Tanzmeisterhaus changed over the years – Mozart’s mother died in 1778, six years later his sister Nannerl got married and moved to St. Gilgen in the Salzkammergut, Leopold Mozart died in 1787 a long time after Wolfgang had moved to Vienna. After that, the property was sold several times.

In 1944, two thirds of the Tanzmeisterhaus were destroyed in the bombardments of World War II. The owner of the property – who was definitely not very happy about the mess the bomb had done to it – sold the land to an insurance company that used it to erect an office building after the war. The remaining third of the Tanzmeisterhaus was sold to the International Mozart Foundation in 1955, which used it as a museum.

The insurance’s office building was purchased by the International Mozart Foundation in 1989, which then destructed it in 1994 to re-build the Tanzmeisterhaus as it was at the time when the Mozart’s lived in it. Beyond that, most of the building is now used as a museum. The Mozart’s, however, are now a few blocks up: the family’s tomb is on St. Sebastian cemetery by the onset of Linzergasse.

Links

Click here to find the Mozart birthplace on our Salzburg Map

http://www.mozarteum.at/
International Mozart foundation

http://www.mozartproject.org/
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