'You don't have to be able to hum Mozart to find this book utterly engrossing . . . I couldn't
put it down' - Joanna Lumley At thirteen years old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a child
prodigy who had captured the hearts of northern Europe but his father Leopold was now
determined to conquer Italy. Together they made three visits there the last when Mozart was
seventeen all vividly recounted here by acclaimed conductor Jane Glover. Father and son
travelled from the theatres and concert salons of Milan to the church-filled streets of Rome to
Naples poorer and more dangerous than the prosperous north and to Venice the carnivalesque
birthplace of public opera. All the while Mozart was absorbing Italian culture language style
and art and honed his craft. He met the challenge of writing Italian opera for Italian singers
and audiences and provoked a variety of responses from triumph and admiration to intrigue and
hostility: in a way these Italian years can be seen as a microcosm of his whole life.
Evocative beautifully written and with a profound understanding of eighteenth-century
classical music Mozart in Italy reveals how what he experienced during these Italian journeys
changed Mozart - and his music - for ever.
