Mozart's connections with the Munich court dated back to just before his sixth birthday, when he was taken there to be exhibited: it was his first venture as a musician, probably his first of any kind, outside his native Salzburg. He was there again the following year, at the beginning of the lengthy tour that was to take him to Paris and London, and once more, on the way back, three and a half years later. The fourth visit was in 1774-5, when his opera buff a La finta giardiniera was given at the Salvator Theatre during the carnival season; anxious to make an impression in Munich beyond the opera house, he wrote a number of liturgical works, among them a powerful Misericordias Domini (K. 222/2O5a) in a learned, contrapuntal style.

The years 1777-8 saw Mozart's crucial journey to Mannheim and Paris, seeking career opportunities away from the provincialism and pettiness of Salzburg and its court. Munich was his first important stop. In a letter home to his father (2 October 1777) he fantasised about staying there and earning a living composing operas:

He added that a German serious opera was in prospect ‘and they are very anxious that I should compose it’.