A choirboy at St Zeno`s near Reichenhall, Spitzeder came to Salzburg in 1748 as a student. From 1760-1796 he was court tenor. Spitzeder sang the role of the Christen-Geist in Mozart`s Die Schuldigkeit des ersten Gebots (1767) and he was apparently the first Don Polidoro in La finta semplice (1769); in 1775 he probably sang in Mozart`s Il re pastore. According to Benedikt Pillwein`s Biographische Schilderungen oder Lexikon salzburgischer, theils verstorbener, theils lebender Künstler (Salzburg, 1821), he gave music lessons to the young Mozart although no other evidence confirms this. Lit.: Rainer, `F. A. spitzeder als Klavierlehrer am Kapellhaus`; Schuler, `Der Hoftenorist Franz Anton Spitzeder`; Clive, Mozart and his Circle, 141