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True, but his influence was still tremendous. The Well-Tempered Clavier was almost like the equivalent of The Federalist Papers for equal-temperament tuning. And I think other composers realized his genius a lot quicker. Mozart, for instance, is known to have drawn inspiration from Bach.
Everything I know about pain, and death, I learned from Requiem. Powerful. Chicken Soup for the Grieving Soul.
I think eccentricity is what propelled him above the regular great composers. Just did his own thang while creating magic out of nothing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart_and_scatology
Interesting question being raised. I tend to think of "academic" geniuses as people who come up with the major original ideas. For instance, Einstein was a genius (obviously) and there are many incredibly smart people who can understand what he was thinking and even build on it, but they would have never been able to make the leap that he did. In my book, the list of geniuses is not that long. Artistic genius is even more subjective and is influenced greatly by emotions. Still, I think you can make distinctions between genius and great artists and certainly genius and technical (or technological) innovators. <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/RVva6K_jj3o" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Mozart is far and away my favorite composer. I find his music genius, brilliant, spell-binding, and running the gamut of emotions. Hell, Requiem does this all by itself from intense grief to elated salvation. It's quite possibly my favorite piece of music by anyone, ever. I've referenced it in my sig here for years now. Mozart transcends all.
There are a lot of accounts of Mozart's genius. There's a story about when he was 5 or 6, and his father took him to the symphony. Before the curtains opened, Mozart went behind stage while the orchestra was tuning, and told one of the violinists that his violin was an 1/8th tone sharp. Also, there's a story about how he was on tour and lost one of his arias. He had to hurriedly re-write one on the fly from memory to perform in front of the audience. When one of the stagehands found the lost manuscript the next day, they compared the two arias, and they were exactly identical. Same notes, same rests, same arrangement. He also wrote the entire 25th symphony in G-minor when he was 17, and he never once stepped up to a piano or violin. He wrote the entire thing in his head. If that's not genius, I don't know what is. You don't have to be quantified in order to be a genius.
Mozart died when he was 35. Thirty-effing-five. Take a look at the volume of work that he wrote in that short life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart How can anyone look at that and not call him a genius?!? "Genius" doesn't just mean math and science. The man achieved a level of musical perfection that is borderline inhuman.
My favorite classical composer is Vivaldi, although others that have been mentioned here are very close in his trail. With that said, Mozart WAS a true genius. In middle school I played his "table music" for two violins. It wasn't a hard piece to play by any means, but for those who don't know what it is: It's where you take the music sheet and play the notes normally as printed on the paper, BUT if you flip the music upside down, it's the harmony for the part you were just playing. If that isn't the definition of genius... then I don't know what is. In fact Einstein once said about Mozart, "there are two types of intellectual minds: accidental geniuses and Mozart." Actually I lied, Einstein didn't say that. But Mozart was still a genius!
"The Marriage of Figaro" is my sh-t. <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/8OZCyp-LcGw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
RR, it's one of those things that you know when you see it or, in this case, hear it. In my opinion, Bob Dylan is a genius. Jimi Hendrix was a genius. Mozart, as rimrocker points out, was a genius. Consider how incredibly complex his music is yet, at the same time, how beautiful. No ordinary man or woman could even attempt creating something similar and not look foolish. Extraordinary, brilliant, a genius... all words, and there are many more, to express the wonder we feel when we hear, see, experience their creations. Mere words, because we simply can't do what they can do, or what they did, and find it difficult to understand what thought processes led them to "discover" their art. It's beyond me, anyway, but I know it when I see it.
Mozart definitely is very gifted and no doubt about it that he is genius. He does show a sign of autism and I wouldn't be surprise he's a savant. Beethoven and Van Gogh also show sign that they are savant on a much more mild case like Mozat.
Question : For someone who hates or doesn't "appreciate" classical music, should they think Mozart is genius? I ask because for someone who hates or doesn't appreciate math, watching a mathematical "genius" like Priyanshi Somani at her age or a Daniel Tammet usually blows their mind. When someone who can't paint or appreciate great paintings sees what a child prodigy like Akiane Kramarik painted as a young kid, they'll probably be amazed. The same can be said of watching people like Daniel Tammet, Kim Peek, great physicists, etc. do their work. There's a "wow" factor. But for some reason, I'm not sure they'll have that wow factor when they listen to Mozart (well, not in all cases, I mean). Why is that? Is it just that the subjectivity in appreciating music may be much greater? I've watched little music prodigies play piano, and I was impressed, but nothing on the order of those others I mentioned.
I think it's a slightly unfair comparison because when we're listening to Mozart's works, we are only seeing the final product and nothing concerning the creative process that went into that final product existing. I think if we were to only see the final product of mathematicians or physicists (for example, just a sheet of paper with the work written out on it), it would not be as impressive. It would just be a bunch of numbers and letters that laymen would not understand and because of this, it would have no significance to those who don't understand it. I think it's the process of watching that final product coming into existence that gives people the 'wow' factor. Of course, I don't really have anything to base this off of. It's all just my own speculation, but I think if we had some way of watching Mozart compose, it might be impressive.
I've thought about what you said in the past, but to be honest, I still would disagree, but I see where you're coming from. For example, most people that look at what Einstein did - the theories, the calculations, etc. probably have no clue what the hell he was talking about, but we describe smart people as being "Einsteins", we glorify "E=mc^2", etc. I see people being confused by looking at Mozart's works, as well, but I think the end result isn't as earth-shattering to most. Or at least they don't perceive it to be. As for the "final work" of mathematicians or physicists, what exactly do most people know about Einstein other than "theory of relativity" (there was only one, you know!) and "E=mc^2" (over 1 minus vee squared over see squared...). Most people don't know what the final work is or how to interpret it when it comes to someone like Einstein, but ... they know he's a genius. His name = genius. I think you saying you could appreciate watching Mozart compose is pretty cool. Do you have a music background? I don't and I think that may be why I wouldn't appreciate it like you would. I'd just see a madman scribbling away. Ok, maybe I'm oversimplifying that.
Mozart's genius... NSFW and Big Spoiler OK it's not really NSFW, I just never had the chance to post a NSFW content and I've always wanted to. So flip the music sheet upside down, and you get the harmony.
