half-brother, Fridolin, married Cäcilia Stamm and had four daughters, Josepha, Aloysia, Constanze, and Sophie, all of whom became notable singers. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart attempted to woo Aloysia, composing several pieces for her. After she rejected his advances, Mozart went on to marry Constanze; thus Mozart's wife was a cousin of Carl Maria von Weber. A gifted violinist, Franz Anton had ambitions of turning Weber into a child prodigy like Mozart. Weber was born with a congenital hip disorder and did not begin to walk until he was four. But by then, he was already a capable singer and pianist. Education Franz Anton gave Weber a comprehensive education, which was frequently interrupted by the family's moves. In 1796, Weber continued his musical education in Hildburghausen, where he was instructed by the oboist Johann Peter Heuschkel. After moving to Salzburg in autumn 1797, Weber studied from 1798 with Michael Haydn, younger brother of the better known Joseph Haydn, who agreed to teach Weber free of charge. His time in Salzburg was overshadowed by the death of his mother, who succumbed to tuberculosis on 13 March 1798, and that of his one-year-old sister Antonetta on 29 December 1798 in Munich. After the death of Carl's mother, Adelaide, his father's sister, took over the care of him. A visit to Joseph Haydn in Vienna, presumably in hope of advanced teaching, was fruitless. In autumn 1798, Weber moved to Munich where he studied singing with Johann Evangelist Wallishauser and composing with Johann Nepomuk Kalcher, who supervised Weber's first opera, Die Macht der Liebe und des Weins (The Power of Love and Wine). Like his other compositions of that period, this opera is lost. Six fughettas for piano of the twelve-year-old Weber were published in Leipzig. Weber's musical education was extended by a mastering of lithography which he learned in the workshop of Alois Senefelder, the inventor of the process, and Franz Gleißner (autumn 1799). A set of his Variations for the Pianoforte was lithographed by Weber himself. In 1800, the family moved to Freiberg in Saxony, where Weber, then 14 years old, wrote an opera called Das stumme Waldmädchen (The Silent Forest Maiden). It was produced at the Freiberg and Chemnitz theatres and later in Saint Petersburg (1804), Vienna (1805/1805) and Prague (1806). The young Weber also began to publish articles as a music critic, for example in the Leipziger Neue Zeitung in 1801. In