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Everything you (n)ever wanted to know about Mozart
Inner peace isn't catching up on a new original series (a Making a Murderer marathon isn't exactly what your spouse meant by "Netflix and chill"), and it's not killing yourself on the elliptical machine. Nope, the scientifically backed way to become more mindful, more relaxed, and more engaged is to start practicing meditation. The Beatles did it. The Dude does it. Even Jerry Seinfeld went from "a show about nothing" to thinking about nothing.
Mario Orsatti is a director at Transcendental Meditation at the David Lynch Foundation (yes, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Dune, Dennis Hopper as a gas-huffing pervert, David Lynch) and a pretty centered guy. He says that meditation is great for your overstressed lifestyle, but it may be even better for your kids.
"Twenty-three percent of teens have anxiety," he points out. "Children as young as 6 and 7 have learning disorders. Suicide is the third leading cause of death among teenagers—and you know all of it is stress related." Those are troubling stats, but here's a more hopeful one: In one San Francisco high school horrifyingly nicknamed "Fight School," there was a 75% decrease in suspensions after the kids were introduced to "Quiet Time"—a modified version of Transcendental Meditation first introduced in schools about a decade ago.
Meditation is ancient stuff, but there's no ancient secret to getting toddlers to sit quietly in a lotus position. However, for kids 10 and older, there are plenty of benefits meditation might provide. Here's how Orsatti suggests helping your child see the light.
Lead By Example
If you've watched your kid flip between iPad apps, you know that they're generally trending toward less attention and more distraction. "Our mind is constantly moving toward something more interesting from something less interesting," says Orsatti. But there's an easy way to get your toddler to sit still: You sit still. Start your own meditation practice (yes, it is for you, too—here's proof) and give yourself a time out before you give them one.Meditation For Kids Versus Adults
All meditation involves sitting in a quiet spot and not thumbing through your Instagram account. But there are some different ways you can do your practice. Some are good for kids; some are better left to the adults. Zen monks, for example, used a focused attention technique where they concentrate on a single thought (like a lotus floating on a pond—or squirrels water skiing) and use that to avoid their mind from wandering. This is the black belt of meditation and probably not right for your kid, unless your kid is the Golden Child.For Kids 10 And Older
The most common form of meditation for kids is "open monitoring," which flips the zen stuff around and involves observing their thoughts without reacting—more like the aforementioned Quiet Time than astral projection time. There are plenty of parent-friendly books and apps you can use to introduce this stuff to little ones, or you can enlist someone like Orsatti to provide guidance.If you take your kid to one of Transcendental Meditation's centers, they'll go through a seven-step course that introduces the concept of a mantra (a wordless sound that helps them focus) to a practice similar to open monitoring. Full disclosure: it ain't cheap, but ostensibly goes to giving others free lessons, like those students at Fight School. It also isn't particularly time-consuming. "A 10-minute deep meditation is all junior high kids need," says Orsatti. "In high school, 15 minutes, and adults, 20 minutes for the full effect."
For Younger Kids
Like expensive coffee, books without pictures, or Captain Beefheart, there are certain things that are wasted on young children—Transcendental Meditation doesn't work with kids younger than 10 because they need a developed prefrontal cortex in order to do that deep, inward reflection. That doesn't mean you can't get your toddler to join you during your own meditation session; just get them to sit quietly and explain what you're doing—so next time they'll let you get centered, goddamn it!Still Skeptical?
Orsetti knows that when you think of meditation, you think a bunch of hippies are going to brainwash you and force feed you tempeh. "This doesn't involve changing your lifestyle or even belief," he says. "It's as automatic as eating an orange to get vitamin C. You don't need to believe in the vitamin; you just get it."Instructions
Do the Preparation task first. Then go to Text and read the article (you can also listen to the audio while you read). Next go to Task and do the activity.
Instructions
Do the Preparation task first. Then go to Text and read the article (you can also listen to the audio while you read). Next go to Task and do the activity.
Everything you (n)ever wanted to know about Mozart
Instructions
Do the Preparation task first. Then go to Text and read the article (you can also listen to the audio while you read). Next go to Task and do the activity.
Everything you (n)ever wanted to know about Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91) of Austria was a keen and skilful billiards player. A slight deformity of his left ear was hidden by his wig. Mahler’s last word before he died was “Mozart”.Among composers of the classical period, the most prolific was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91) of Austria, who wrote c. 1,000 operas, operettas, symphonies, violin sonatas, divertimenti, serenades, motets. Concertos for piano and many other instruments, string quartets, other chamber music masses and litanies, of which only 70 were published before he died at the age of 35. His opera La Clemenza di Tito (1791) was written in 18 days, and the symphonic masterpieces, Symphony No. 39 in E flat major, Symphony No. 40 in G minor and Symphony No. 41 in C major (the Jupiter), were reputedly written in the space of 42 days in 1788. His overture Don Giovanni was written in full score at one sitting in Prague in 1787 and finished on the day of its opening performance.
The longest interval between the known composition of a piece by a major composer and it s performance in the manner intended is from 3 March 1791 until 9 October 1982 (over 191 years), in the case of Mozart’s Organ Piece for a Clock, a fugue fantasy in F min (K 608), arranged by the organ builders Wm. Hill & Son and Norman & Beard Ltd. at Glyndebourne, Great Britain.
In what is believed to be the largest-ever recording project devoted to a single coposer, 180 compact discs containing the complete set of authenticated works by Mozart were produced by Philips Classics for release in 1990/91 to commemoreate the bicentennial of the composer’s death. The complete set comprises over 200 hours of music and would occupy 6.5 feet (1.98 metres) of shelving.
Researchers at University College, Cardiff, in 1970 announced an important discovery concerning the formation of musical taste in rats. A group of experimental rats were played Mozart all day long during their infancy. They heard The Magic Flute, the Fifth Violin Concerto K.219, and two symphonies (unspecified), each four times a day. In later life these rats grew up preferring Mozart to Schoenberg, given the choice. Sceptics might claim that any with taste would do so anyway.
Research shows that newborn babies enjoy Mozart and Vivaldi but tend to sleep through any Beethoven which may be played at them.
Mozart was a keen and skilful billiards player. Haydn once tore the cloth on Mozart’s billiard table. Coincidentally, the invention of the game of builliards dates back to 1591, exactly 200 years before the death of Mozart.
Mozart had a slight deformity of his left ear, usually kept covered by his wig.
The principal theme of the last movement of Mozart's Piano Concerto K.453 was suggested to the composer by a tune whistled by his pet starling. The bird also knew his Concerto no. 17, for Mozart had devoted some idle moments to teaching the bird the principal theme of the last movement, a theme that is, admittedly, rather chirpy and bird-like in nature. Yet the starling was an imperfect student. One note it sang wrong every time and, according to the composer, another note was consistently held too long. It seems that even the example of the concerto's creator was insufficient to convince Mozart's starling to sing the piece exactly as written. On May 27, 1784 a strange funeral was held. As usual, hymns were sung at the graveside. Then Mozart recited a poem he'd penned. Finally, the composer's pet starling was laid to rest.
If a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing slowly. Though Mozart had only 35 years of life in which to compose all his works, the task of cataloguing these 624 or so pieces of music took Ludwig von Kochel twelve years.
Gustav Mahler’s last word before he died was “Mozart”.
Source: The Ultimate Irrelevant Encyclopaedia by Bill Hartson & Jill Dawson, George Allen & Unwin, 1984
“Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" is an anagram (a word or phrase made by using the letters of another word or phrase in a different order) of "Among us a grand maestro of opera, waltz music”
“Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart” is an anagram of “A famous German waltz god” and “Gorgeous waltz fan, madam” and “Zealous, warm 'n' mad faggot” and “Warm gazes to a manful god”
Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" is an anagram of "Common arts as opera, waltz, fugue: I am so grand!"
“Johannes Chrystostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus ‘Amadeus’ Mozart” is an anagram of “Just some Austrian. (Composed many half-hour songs/waltzes, though!)”
The Mozart effect refers to disputed scientific studies that test a theory suggesting that classical music increases brain activity more positively than other kinds of music, and that listening to certain kinds of complex music may induce a short-lived (fifteen minute) improvement in the performance of certain kinds of mental tasks known as "spatio-temporal reasoning". Two pieces of Mozart's music; Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major (K. 448) and Piano Concerto No. 23 (K. 488), were found to have this effect, giving it its name. Later research also suggested that K. 448 can reduce the number of seizures in people with epilepsy.
In the frequently playful letters of his youth Mozart sometimes would spell his name backwards, viz., Mozart Wolfgang or Trazom. More often he would sign letters 'Mzt'.
The Mozartkugel (English: Mozart ball), known originally as the “Mozartbonbon”, was created by the Salzburg confectioner Paul Fürst in 1890 and named after Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The confectionary Fürst still produces the original Salzburg Mozartkugeln by hand according to the original recipe and only sells them in its shops or over its website. As the Fürst confectionary does not own a trademark for Mozartkugeln, there are numerous imitation products, most of which are produced using industrial techniques.