Georg Solti once said that if he believed in a higher power it was because of Mozart's music. And of course Riccardo Muti, in a touching hommage to his favorite composer, wrote that
Mozart is clearly the expression of other worlds and other possibilities, which are revealed in him. Hence I would like to meet him face to face to see who this man was, who was charged with such boundlessness".
And it's really difficult to think of music that, more than Mozart's, makes us think that, indeed, there must be an inspiration behind it that's more than human -- that lies above. Maazel has mentioned the Adagio of Beethoven's Ninth; others, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Or Bach's Cantata 54.
Everybody's right, of course, in such matters. Opera Chic herself would probably say Mozart, 100%; but then she also thinks of Haendel -- Theodora, for example. And it's difficult not to think of that as the music of the Gods. The Messiah? Xerxes? Everybody loves "Ombra Mai Fu", also; and today, essential Barcelona blogger GTL Torn T makes a solid argument for Haendel's case, with a little help from Fritz Wunderlich, that angel of a man who left us at the age of 35. So let's listen to Fritz, forever young in the glory of his voice.