Mannheim school

[1] Besides him, two generations of composers wrote compositions for the orchestra, whose reputation was due to its excellent discipline and the individual skill of its players; the English traveler Charles Burney called it "an army of generals".

Under the guidance of Kapellmeister Carlo Grua, the court hired such talents as Johann Stamitz, who is generally considered to be the founder of the Mannheim school, in 1741/42, and he became its director in 1750.

The most notable of the revolutionary techniques of the Mannheim orchestra were its more independent treatment of the wind instruments, and its famous whole-orchestra crescendo.

[2] The role of the Mannheim school's composers in the evolution of the classical symphony is thus significant, although most scholars now agree that these changes occurred nearly simultaneously at various other centers, e.g. in Berlin and Vienna.

(Cannabich, one of the directors of the orchestra after the death of J. Stamitz, was also a good friend of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart from the latter's visit to Mannheim in 1777 onwards.)

Members of the Mannheim school abandoned quickly the praxis of the basso continuo in their compositions, which was almost universal in the Baroque era, and they used the minimum of contrapuntal elaboration.