According to Merriam-Webster ‘patronage’ is money and support to an artist, organization etc. Merriam Webster 'Patronage'. By means of a musician or artist, the ways patronage is shown evolves over time. In the 1700’s money and support were met for a performer through commissions from a particular social group or if permitted, some freedom to give his or her own performances. Today, patronage has expanded greatly in ways that musicians in Mozart’s time would have never thought was possible. In this modern era, patronage is spread through licensing to companies advertisements, social media web pages, seasonal performance catalogs and so much more. When one views the major differences of giving patronage to musicians, it may make one wonder how the evolving ways of showing support and money for these artists affect them and what has influenced such a change? A large portion of these differences is the social values of music, the array of music genres, and how musicians echo samples of traditional music.
In modern era, patronage has drastically changed and developed in various ways through the influence of social media. The arrays of media as stated above, allow the musicians to gain higher royalties, increase followers, as well as advertise other companies who pay musicians to use their music to represent themselves. This Nissan Sentra TV commercial from 2014 uses Billy Idol’s Mony, Mony Song to represent their company: 2014 Nissan Sentra TV Commercial. A musician who allows the license of their music in a car commercial, can earn $50,000 to $300,000 depending on a song’s popularity (User, Quora, Quora, 23 May 2011). Imagine how much royalties Mozart could make today if he licensed his music to advertisements? In his time, Wolfgang Mozart would make eight hundred florins (446.93 U.S. dollars) a year through commissions from Joseph II along with some freelancing. Discounting the fact that Mozart often frivolously spent his money, he also frequently pleaded a few hundred florins through his brother Freemason (Gay, Mozart, pg 87). The patronage during Mozart’s era was minimal compared to today because Mozart gained royalties solely on commissions. Musicians today, obtained royalties because they have more access to networking and landing commissions as well as more freedom to freelance, and obtain royalties for licensing their music. Mozart never achieved royalties for others using his music because licensing and issues of pirating wasn’t a social issue. Given the fact that Mozart’s networks was so limited and he didn’t receive earnings through others using his music, it’s no wonder Mozart didn’t earn the royalties he deserved for his compositions. 
However, just as today many artists “sample” (Or take a part of another artist song and apply it to their own music), Mozart and composers like him would often find melodies from past works of others and expand on the idea in a new piece. A famous example is Brahms in his 4th movement of his 4th symphony used a line from Bach’s Nach dir, Herr, verlanget mich, BWV 150. It is often considered (especially in the modern era) a form of flattery to use another artist’s work in your own music and create new ideas off of that line. However, more and more artists are offended by this notion every year. Artists, such as Taylor Swift, believe that covers and samples inflict on intellectual property, and therefore shouldn’t be used by other people. It is interesting to see a shift in ideology over what you can and cannot do with other music over time. In Mozart’s day, there wasn’t really the concept of “intellectual property”, so in theory he wouldn’t think much about others using his melodies for their own work. Music making has become heavily run by money, almost a monopoly, which in turn has made it much more popular to compose simply because of the chance you could make money off of something considered “trivial” (We don’t believe it is is trivial but that will be a later essay). Dependant in the economy, it could change the ideology over sampling music again. 
Today there exists quite an expansive array of genres, including, but not limited to all of the ones listed by This man. Classic Rock, Hard Rock, Smooth Jazz, Heavy Metal, Country, Pop, and many more genres exist in our modern world, even some mixed genres such as “dubstep classical” which is just a remix of classical pieces with some extra electronic flare (Mozart Alla Turca Dubstep, Beethoven Dubstep). These wonderful new genres seem to have sprung up out of the generous patronage of not only the wealthy, but society, as every CD, MP3, or Vinyl record bought is money to support the artist in the content they have created, and encourages them to expand and explore the vast concept that is music. Back in Mozart’s era and region, the most popular genres were simple and few; Opera, Concerto, Sonata, Symphony, and String Quartet. This was what the patrons liked, and wanted to hear. As technology advanced over the years, giving rise to the electric guitar, the synthesizer etc., it allowed for a great deal of new musical possibilities. Composers utilized these instruments to create entirely new genres, such as the groovy Disco of the 1970s, a type of music that’s all about showing off those funky fresh moves; dancing type music. Along with the new physical instruments came a new purpose for composers, they can do so much more musical experimenting now than they could in Mozart’s day, pushing the envelope of what is considered music. Any of the modern genres of today can feature songs that are complex and meaningful, like that of Mozart or Haydn. Music has evolved in such a beautiful way, such that it never loses its touch or place in our hearts and ears as something essential to everyday living. People buy incredible amounts of music each year, and whatever is most purchased off of an album by a certain artist signals to the artist that their audience and supporters want more music of that sort. Patronage is imperative in a creative career, especially a musical one.
Citations:
User, Quora, How much do top pop songwriters generally get paid for a song? Quora. 23 May 2011. Retrieved from: https://www.quora.com/How-much-do-top-pop-songwriters-generally-get-paid-for-a-song
Nissan, Jonker. 2014 Nissan Sentra TV Commercial Mony Mony Song by Billy Idol. YouTube. 30 Jul. 2014. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/CR2MG9Czf_Y
Gay, Peter. Mozart: a life. Penguin Books. London, England. 1999
Credits:
Erika Query: 2nd body paragraph, pictures, editing
Nick De Los Santos: 3rd body paragraph, Conclusion, pictures, editing
Holly Winter: Introduction, 1st body paragraph, pictures, editing
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