Bach and Mozart
Western music acquires its common practice and its two defining figures.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 106 years
- Known to
- ± 2 years
- Era
- Early Modern, Holocene
Bach, working as a church and court employee and largely unknown beyond Germany in his lifetime, brings counterpoint to a degree of complexity nobody has surpassed and demonstrates the possibilities of equal temperament. Mozart, a prodigy who toured Europe as a child, composes over 600 works before dying at 35. Between them the tonal system, the symphony, the concerto and the modern orchestra reach the form they hold for the next two centuries.