<P> Mozart's arrival in Vienna in 1780 brought an acceleration in the development of the Classical style . There, Mozart absorbed the fusion of Italianate brilliance and Germanic cohesiveness that had been brewing for the previous 20 years . His own taste for flashy brilliances, rhythmically complex melodies and figures, long cantilena melodies, and virtuoso flourishes was merged with an appreciation for formal coherence and internal connectedness . It is at this point that war and economic inflation halted a trend to larger orchestras and forced the disbanding or reduction of many theater orchestras . This pressed the Classical style inwards: toward seeking greater ensemble and technical challenges--for example, scattering the melody across woodwinds, or using a melody harmonized in thirds . This process placed a premium on small ensemble music, called chamber music . It also led to a trend for more public performance, giving a further boost to the string quartet and other small ensemble groupings . </P> <P> It was during this decade that public taste began, increasingly, to recognize that Haydn and Mozart had reached a high standard of composition . By the time Mozart arrived at age 25, in 1781, the dominant styles of Vienna were recognizably connected to the emergence in the 1750s of the early Classical style . By the end of the 1780s, changes in performance practice, the relative standing of instrumental and vocal music, technical demands on musicians, and stylistic unity had become established in the composers who imitated Mozart and Haydn . During this decade Mozart composed his most famous operas, his six late symphonies that helped to redefine the genre, and a string of piano concerti that still stand at the pinnacle of these forms . </P> <P> One composer who was influential in spreading the more serious style that Mozart and Haydn had formed is Muzio Clementi, a gifted virtuoso pianist who tied with Mozart in a musical "duel" before the emperor in which they each improvised on the piano and performed their compositions . Clementi's sonatas for the piano circulated widely, and he became the most successful composer in London during the 1780s . Also in London at this time was Jan Ladislav Dussek, who, like Clementi, encouraged piano makers to extend the range and other features of their instruments, and then fully exploited the newly opened up possibilities . The importance of London in the Classical period is often overlooked, but it served as the home to the Broadwood's factory for piano manufacturing and as the base for composers who, while less notable than the "Vienna School", had a decisive influence on what came later . They were composers of many fine works, notable in their own right . London's taste for virtuosity may well have encouraged the complex passage work and extended statements on tonic and dominant . </P> <P> When Haydn and Mozart began composing, symphonies were played as single movements--before, between, or as interludes within other works--and many of them lasted only ten or twelve minutes; instrumental groups had varying standards of playing, and the continuo was a central part of music - making . </P>

The most important center for music in the classical period was