Johann Stamitz

Johann Wenzel Anton Stamitz (; 18 June 1717 – 27 March 1757) was a Czech composer and violinist. Stamitz is considered the founding father of the Mannheim school, a composition style that his two surviving sons, Carl and Anton Stamitz, continued. His music is stylistically transitional between the Baroque and Classical periods and he is recognised for many innovations. Life Stamitz was born in Deutschbrod, Bohemia (now Havlíčkův Brod, Czech Republic), into a family that came from Marburg (now Maribor, Slovenia). Stamitz spent the academic year 1734–1735 at the University of Prague. After only one year, at the likely age of seventeen he left the university to pursue a career as a violin virtuoso. His activities during the six-year period between his departure from the university in 1735 and his appointment in the German city of Mannheim around 1741, are not known in detail and historical accounts of his life contain many presumptions or approximations. He was appointed by the Mannheim court in 1741 or 1742, likely at the age of twenty-four. His engagement there most likely resulted from contacts made during the Bohemian campaign and coronation of Charles VII of Bavaria, a close ally