They say that classical music is “the universal language” but what music are we talking about these days? From the homogeneous shrillness of what we hear on the radio, be it cumbias, reggaetones or disco music? Perhaps this phrase belonged to other times, very old, in which melodies were capable of transporting the listener to different worlds, regardless of the language they spoke. Or that they generated emotions -not always pleasant or positive, since many composers of the so-called “classical music” They have written melodies that we could not necessarily associate with peace or tranquility, but with anguish and sadness, fear and even madness. Ancient, classical music originated that of the "universal language" and this description was transferred over the years to various musical manifestations of a popular nature, even when genres such as those mentioned no longer qualify as much in the sense of the phrase because they need to be heard in certain languages and sociocultural context to be fully understood. Two fundamental characters of classical music are remembered today, January 27:Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Giuseppe Verdi .
In the eighteenth century an artist emerged whom many experts consider "the greatest composer in history", the Austrian Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , born on January 27, 1756, in Salzburg.
Since he was a child he showed signs of his genius, since he started playing the piano at the age of 3 and at 6 he was already composing his first melodies on this instrument. His biographers say that little Mozart he was able to play entire melodies with surprising accuracy after only having heard them once, or that he performed complex piano exercises but blindfolded, or with the keyboard covered, to the amazement of the spectators.
Mozart , first from the hand of his father, Leopoldo; and then by his own means, he became one of the most admired composers due to his creativity and artistic nature of him. Possessor of an extremely rebellious personality, he stood out not only for his piano concertos, his serenades, symphonies and operas, but also for his libertine character and careless air, which generated more than one annoyance in the coquettish courts of the nobility, to whom he left stunned by his compositions.
After leaving Salzburg, the city of his birth, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart settled in Vienna, where he premiered several of his best-known works:the Piano Sonata No. 11 in A major, K. 331, whose last movement is the famous Turkish March (1783), the Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major, K. 525, better known as A Little Nocturnal Serenade (1787), or his operas The Marriage of Figaro (1786), Don Giovanni (1787) or The Magic Flute, which ended the year of his death, in 1791, as his overwhelming Mass or Requiem, one of the most used melodies to this day for funeral honors.
On the same day, January 27, the death of the Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi is remembered. , perhaps the best known and most popular character in the world of opera, generally associated with a minority and even elite audience. However, this "elitist" concept of classical music and opera is a creation of contemporary cultures, since in the past these artists entertained the upper classes but their music was also enjoyed and appreciated by families from much less well-off economic sectors.
The genre that Verdi dominated the most It was, of course, the opera, this combination of music and dramatic art in which a cast of singers, of various vocal ranges (tenors, baritones, basses among the men; sopranos, mezzo sopranos among the women) enact a complete story, usually divided into acts. The tone of the opera is usually solemn, romantic and tragic, unlike operettas and zarzuelas, which are more festive and light. Verdi composed more than 20 operas, some of them based on plays written by William Shakespeare , the brilliant British playwright.
Among his most recognized titles we can mention:Nabucco (1842), Rigoletto (1851, which contains the well-known aria La donna é mobile), La traviata (1853), Un baile de masks (1859), Aída (1871, one of the most performed operas today, which tells the story of Aída, an Ethiopian princess who is captured and made a slave in Egypt) and Othello (1887, a tragic story based on the drama Shakespearean Othello, known as "the Moor of Venice"). In all his operas, Verdi has love and its dramatic consequences as its central theme, combining them with other universal themes such as loyalty, compassion, betrayal and forgiveness.
Both Mozart as Verdi They live among us to this day, through various manifestations. In the case of the first, we all know today the so-called “Mozart Effect “, a variant of early musical stimulation, based on exposure to infants and even pregnant mothers, to various compositions by the Salzburg artist, based on the results obtained in various investigations about the positive effects recorded in children after having listened to Mozart melodies , selected by specialists, taking these two great representatives of classical music .
On the other hand, the operas of Verdi They are performed in the most important theaters around the world, and their best-known arias have been used in commercials, novels, movies and even ringtones for the latest generation cell phones. Being compositions written more than 100 years ago, we can definitely say that they fully represent that phrase that describes music as a universal language, since they still move and excite sensitive listeners.
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