Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart came to fame during the Age of Enlightenment. His compositions were informed by the spirit of that era, and Enlightenment ideas were integral to his music, particularly the operas. In fact, whether we would even have some of his most beloved operas without the guiding principles of the Age is doubtful.
Mozart’s genius did not spring forth in isolation. In fact, he was very much engaged in the world around him, and his “moment,” so to speak, coincided with the full flowering of the Age of Enlightenment. New thinkers – among them Voltaire, Rousseau, and Diderot – sought to flush away medieval attitudes about religion and the “divine right” of kings and replace them with a revolutionary faith in reason, order, and science.
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