Background
Haydn was already a famous composer when Mozart was a child. His six string quartets of Opus 20 (1772), called the "Sun" Quartets, were widely circulated and are conjectured (for instance, by Charles Rosen) to have been the inspiration for the six string quartets K. 168-173 that the 17-year-old Mozart wrote during a 1773 visit to Vienna.
The two composers probably would not have had an opportunity to meet until after Mozart moved permanently to Vienna in 1781. Haydn was required to reside most of the time at the remote palace of Eszterháza in Hungary, where his employer and patron Prince Nikolaus Esterházy preferred to live. During the winter months, the Prince moved to the ancestral palace of his family in Eisenstadt, bringing Haydn with him. In these periods it was often feasible for Haydn to make brief visits to Vienna, about 40 km away.
Read more about this topic: Haydn And Mozart
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