Missouri Classical Music News

As Austria and the world gear up for a jubilee year of concerts and celebrations marking [Mozart's] birth, his hometown of Salzburg is on the verge of becoming Schmaltzburg.

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Shelves are stacked high with bottles of Mozart beer and wine, Mozart baby bottles, Mozart milkshakes, Mozart knickers, Mozart umbrellas and Mozart jigsaw puzzles. There's Mozart torte ("a symphony of tastes," its creator promises) and even Mozartwurst, a sausage of beef, pork and pistachios courtesy of a Salzburg butcher who claims the recipe came to him in a dream.

Complaints of excessive kitsch aside, it's a fitting frenzy of tribute for a musical genius who gave the universe "Don Giovanni," "The Marriage of Figaro," "The Magic Flute," his haunting "Requiem" and hundreds of other works.

"Mozart is back - big time," said Ilse Blank, who works for a Vienna tuxedo rental shop that's scrambling to dress clients who want to look like Amadeus at balls and parties.

Poking fun at the unprecedented hype, the organizers of Mozart 2006 events in Vienna have come up with a playful logo: a famed 18th-century portrait of the composer doctored to show his eyes rolling back in his head.