Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: A Life From Beginning to End is the first book in Hourly History’s series of Composer Biographies. If you are new to Hourly History, their books cover a very wide variety of historical people and events and each book is designed to be read in about an hour. With a limited amount of space to work within, it’s amazing how much information these books provide. I have been a piano teacher for many years and have read several full-length books about Mozart’s life as well as books and articles containing letters he wrote. Even so, there were some things in this book that I didn’t know. Mozart crammed a huge amount of music as well as living into his very brief 35 years, and this book provides an excellent overview of his life and accomplishments including his often-strained relationship with his father and how he revolutionized the music of his time as well as well as his influence on music to come later. In other books and movies, many ideas have been put forth as factual events in Mozart’s life, and I really appreciate Hourly History’s admission that there is much that we will never know with certainty (including the exact cause of death and the true nature of Mozart’s relationship with Salieri) because so much has been destroyed - or simply wasn’t kept.

If you have any curiosity about who Mozart was and what he did, this little book will give you a wealth of information. If you just want a brief but concise overview of the great composer’s life, this book will do that, too. If you are a student looking for some information about classical composers and music, it’s here. If you just want something interesting to read, it’s for you, too! This book and many others are available from Amazon and HourlyHistory.com. Very highly recommended!