The Mozart Cache

by


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Softcover
£39.99
£23.50
Softcover
£23.50

Book Details

Language : English
Publication Date : 25/06/2008

Format : Softcover
Dimensions : 8.5x11
Page Count : 228
ISBN : 9781434384157

About the Book

This book is a detailed critical inspection of a collection of objects that have their feet in two

worlds, namely Mozart Historical Research and Art Historical Study. Leopold Mozart, the

father of one of the world’s most supreme composers, died in 1787. At the time of his death, his

apartment held precious treasures given to his brilliant son and daughter during their lengthy

European tour of 1763-1766. Furthermore, it is likely that memorabilia and portraits collected in

the 21 years following that tour were also in Leopold’s apartment. There is little historical record

about what his collection might have contained at the time of his death, or what happened to it.

In 2003, an American antiques collector, traveling in Italy, bought what he thought were some

interesting pieces from a woman merchant. Though he was unaware of what he had stumbled

into at that time, these pieces now appear to have been a portion of Leopold Mozart’s estate. The

collection’s owner engaged the author of this book to examine and comment on the approximately

40 pieces in the acquisition. The telling of the story of each of the collection’s pieces and how they

survived for more than two centuries is rich with Mozart history.


About the Author

Daniel N. Leeson’s undergraduate and graduate degrees are all in mathematics. Following service in the US Army during the Korean War, he began his career in 1958 as a mathematician, businessman, technician, salesman, systems engineer, and both a scientific and commercial programmer for The International Business Machines Corporation. Following his retirement from IBM after almost 30 years of service, he then taught mathematics at De Anza College in Cupertino, California for an additional 15 years. During those 45 years, Leeson was also a professional performing symphonic musician, playing clarinet, basset horn, and bass clarinet with many professional organizations including the San Jose Symphony, San Francisco Opera, Oakland Symphony, San Diego Symphony, San Jose/Cleveland Ballet, San Francisco Midsummer Mozart Festival Orchestra, and many others. To occupy himself during the hours of travel and overnight stays during his business career, he began a self-study of musicology. He has published at least 50 technical papers in the Mozart Jahrbuch, Eighteenth Century Music, the International Journal of Musicology, the Musical Times, Music and Letters, Musical America, and other journals. He was also a writer of program notes for the London Proms concerts, the Salzburg Mozart Festival, the San Diego and San Francisco Symphonies, the San Francisco Midsummer Mozart Festival, and others. For the 1991 bicentennial commemoration of Mozart’s death, he was musicological consultant to the Ohio State University's Mozart Festival in May, the Columbia River (Washington State) Mozart Festival in early July, and guest lecturer and performer at the Chatauqua Institute in Chatauqua, New York at the end of July. Along with coeditor Professor Neal Zaslaw of Cornell University, Leeson edited the Neue Mozart Ausgabe volume containing the bulk of Mozart’s music for wind instruments, including K. 361, 375, and 388. He is the author of Opus Ultimum:

The Story of the Mozart Requiem (Algora Press, 2006), a novel entitled, The Mozart Forgeries,

(iUniverse, 2006), and co-author for one of the earliest texts on computer programming,

Basic Programming Concepts (Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1962). For ten years he was an officer and treasurer of the Mozart Society of America. In both 1992 and 1993, he was a faculty member of the Mozart Opera Studies Institute sponsored by San Francisco State University and California State University in Fresno. Leeson no longer plays professionally but he still contributes to musicological journals and writes fiction, mostly short stories, a number of which have been published.

 For his writings he was awarded the 1992 Artist Fellowship for Writers of Creative Nonfiction by the California Arts Council. He is married to the former Rosanne Dryfuss of New York City. They have two children and one grandchild. Leeson can be reached by email at dnleeson@sbcglobal.net. His website is www.leesonbooks.com.