The majors of Haydn and Mozart
The year was 1749. As the precocious 17-year-old Viennese chorister took his regular place in the hallowed choir-stalls of the magnificent St Stephen’s Cathedral — as he had for an entire decade — his breaking voice was by now heralding the end of his first tenure in music as a professional singer. Realising that his strict boss would soon send him packing and out onto Vienna’s unwelcoming…