Haydn's Haus

[Gurn Blanston]

I'm not a hater, Gurn!

Maybe it would help if I typed up a little essay about Haydn I found interesting?

....................

It never even entered my mind that you might be, Brian. However, if you were motivated to then enter this Holmboe essay, I can be pleased enough with that. It is quite interesting. It serves well to reinforce my contention in this thread about a year ago that musicians/composers who didn't appreciate the value of Haydn, indeed, didn't totally embrace his music, are thin on the ground indeed.

In one of the first issues of the Allegemeine Musikalisches Zeitung (AMZ), the leading musical journal of Austria/Germany from 1797 to 1850, there was a long article by a contributor called 'Z' (everyone knew it was Zelter, but they were allowed anonymity), which called to account all of the disciples of Haydn and Mozart. The long and short of it was that these 2 composers had developed wonderful and surprising little tricks and expressions that made their music unique. He went on to list several of them, all of which you would recognize. In any case, his argument is that the fact that these devices had been taken up by all the followers, so that every work heard in the last 10 years had contained many or all of them had totally taken away any sense of wonder at their uniqueness. Each composer needs to be original.

One of the reasons that Haydn slipped into disfavor after his death is that there were so many people writing music a la Haydn that people were tired of it. Beethoven's personal idiom was very strongly rooted in Haydnism, but he had to make a strong effort to distance himself in order to maintain his individuality. So in any case, I certainly am not looking for anyone to write music like Haydn did. I am just looking to encourage people to listen to Haydn's music on his terms, not "as opposed to...". It isn't easy to turn ones listening mind into a tabula rasa, but worth the effort with any composer at all, let alone one of Haydn's caliber. I realize that not everyone has my innate talent to have nothing whatsoever in my head at any given time....

[Florestan]

to both of you then.  

Hey, I'm completely innocent! Brian took that quote out of its proper context. 

[Florestan]

Excellent Holmboe essay, Brian, thanks for taking the time to type it for us!

[Karl Henning]

One of the reasons that Haydn slipped into disfavor after his death is that there were so many people writing music a la Haydn that people were tired of it.

Cf. Debussy: The 'Debussyists' are killing me.

[Gurn Blanston]

Cf. Debussy: The 'Debussyists' are killing me.

Précisément!

[SonicMan46]

My most recent Haydn acquisition - Symphonies 6,7, & 8 w/ the Apollo Ensemble - a Gurn recommendation here (and also as an Amazon review); I've had this CD for over a week; this is a PI group using a small orchestra (7 strings, 2 oboes, 1 flute, 1 bassoon, & 2 horns - no harpsichord); these works were composed in 1761 and the main goal was to 're-create' the scene at that time; the liner notes are excellent in describing this purpose.

But while listening (multiple times now), I was also reading about Haydn's orchestra at Esterhaza in the book below; in the appendix, the Esterhazy Kapelle of 1776 had about 20 members (7 violins, 2 violas, 1 cello, 1 DblBass, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, & 1 timpani).  In a chapter entitled 'The Life & Times of an Eighteenth-Century Orchestra Musician', about 6 pages are devoted to describing the Esterhazy Kapelle (c. late 1760s to 1770s) - while reading this section, I just jotted down some summary comments (w/ editing & paraphrasing), SO attached is just a short text file for those interested in becoming an 18th C. musician housed on a palace estate! Dave

 

[Gurn Blanston]

My most recent Haydn acquisition - Symphonies 6,7, & 8 w/ the Apollo Ensemble - a Gurn recommendation here (and also as an Amazon review); I've had this CD for over a week; this is a PI group using a small orchestra (7 strings, 2 oboes, 1 flute, 1 bassoon, & 2 horns - no harpsichord); these works were composed in 1761 and the main goal was to 're-create' the scene at that time; the liner notes are excellent in describing this purpose.

But while listening (multiple times now), I was also reading about Haydn's orchestra at Esterhaza in the book below; in the appendix, the Esterhazy Kapelle of 1776 had about 20 members (7 violins, 2 violas, 1 cello, 1 DblBass, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, & 1 timpani).  In a chapter entitled 'The Life & Times of an Eighteenth-Century Orchestra Musician', about 6 pages are devoted to describing the Esterhazy Kapelle (c. late 1760s to 1770s) - while reading this section, I just jotted down some summary comments (w/ editing & paraphrasing), SO attached is just a short text file for those interested in becoming an 18th C. musician housed on a palace estate! Dave

 

Ah, nice choice, Dave.

1776 was the year the opera house opened, and the band was about as big as it ever would be. This was also the only time that Haydn had clarinets to play with, but he declined. In the 18 months or so that they were there he didn't do anything with them. Pity really. from around 1760 when he must have known some clarinetists (at Morzin's??) to London, when he suddenly realized how cool they were, he was clarinet free.

Back in the earliest times of Esterházy's band, he had maybe 16 players. Hard to know exactly, since the valet could be a fiddler if need be....

[mahler10th]

The Symphony 45 "Farewell" - in many ways it I can almost hear Haydn laughing in it, and he's waving goodbye from the very start of it.  It's a great work.
Just sayin', like.   

[Opus106]

But while listening (multiple times now), I was also reading about Haydn's orchestra at Esterhaza in the book below; in the appendix, the Esterhazy Kapelle of 1776 had about 20 members (7 violins, 2 violas, 1 cello, 1 DblBass, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, & 1 timpani).  In a chapter entitled 'The Life & Times of an Eighteenth-Century Orchestra Musician', about 6 pages are devoted to describing the Esterhazy Kapelle (c. late 1760s to 1770s) - while reading this section, I just jotted down some summary comments (w/ editing & paraphrasing), SO attached is just a short text file for those interested in becoming an 18th C. musician housed on a palace estate! Dave

Thank you for the notes, Dave. Quite informative. Seems like the musicians had to bend over backwards for the prince to lead an upright life.

The Symphony 45 "Farewell" - in many ways it I can almost hear Haydn laughing in it, and he's waving goodbye from the very start of it.  It's a great work.
Just sayin', like.   

Haydn and Wodehouse -- two people who can somehow connect with me from their graves and make me laugh.

[mszczuj]

Pity really. from around 1760 when he must have known some clarinetists (at Morzin's??) to London, when he suddenly realized how cool they were, he was clarinet free.

Hypothesis: he had found the sound of clarinet independent and urbane, not proper for the rhetoric to be used in the country court (even if he had used this rhetoric as the ground for the intellectual persiflage) - in London Haydn did not realize that the clarinet is enough cool for his music, he relized that London is enough cool for the clarinet.

[Karl Henning]

Part of my Nemo listening last night (in the post-Bruckner cool-down) were the great C Major and E^b Major sonatas, played by Beghin. Overall, I find his box a great service and a rich resource, certainly.  It is no black mark to him if I feel I've heard both these sonatas done better yet.

Once again: thanks to all you denizens of dis here Haus for all you do!

[Gurn Blanston]

Discovering Haydn's Music
Part 1
Introduction

During and since my previous series of Haydn essays, where I tried to give some biographical details, and a sampling of recordings, I spoke with many people in the Haus and via PM who wanted to give Haydn a chance for a listen, but just didn't know where to start. I wanted to address this in some way, but it has taken me quite some time to come up with some sort of format that might work for most people. And be simple enough for me to work with. 

I think that some obstacles to getting into Haydn's music lie in the sheer amount of it, the cataloging that seems senseless and the outright falsehoods that are perpetuated against it.

Yes, Haydn was a professional composer and part of his job was to write music most days.  After 40 + years, things began to accumulate, so there is a lot of it. I will try to sort this for you, at the same step as we deal with the Hoboken Catalog; that is, one at a time. Only way to do it, isn't it? As for the stories one hears ('no point even listening to piano trios before the very last ones' is one, another is 'all the symphonies sound alike'), I think we will be able to dispel those with a little judicious listening and some open-minded thinking. Which I say because after 10 years spent here virtually every day, I know that a lot of people already have their minds made up about music from 1750 to 1780. So we will try to get it off from your personal dustheap and onto your player where it belongs.

The Hoboken Catalog
Since I intend to order these essays by Hoboken group, let's have a view of how it is laid out. Since Haydn wrote in so many genres, and even today precise chronologies are non-existent, Hoboken was faced with quite a task of organization. Anthony von Hoboken was from Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and he came from an engineering background, which probably was an aid in organizing Haydn; "First we clear the swamp!". 

Unlike your standard catalog (like Mozart/Köchel) Hoboken decided to divide into genres. He gave each group a Roman numeral, and each work within it a Arabic numeral. What could be simpler?  Let's look at the list of genres;

Hob.       Category
I            Symphonies (1–108)
Ia         Overtures (1–16)
II         Divertimenti in 4 and more Parts (1–47)
III        String Quartets (1–83b)
IV        Divertimenti in 3 Parts (1–11)
V         String Trios (1–21)
VI        Various Duos (1–6)
VII       Concertos for Various Instruments
VIII      Marches (1–7)
IX        Dances (1–29)
X         Various Works for Baryton (1–12)
XI        Trios for Baryton, Violin or Viola and Cello (1–126)
XII       Duos with Baryton (1–25)
XIII      Concertos for Baryton (1–3)  (all lost)
XIV       Divertimenti with Piano (1–13)
XV            Trios for Piano, Violin or Flute and Cello (1–40)
XVa            Piano Duos  (Violin sonatas)
XVI            Piano Sonatas (1–52)
XVII            Piano Pieces (1–12)
XVIIa    Piano 4 Hands (1–2)
XVIII    Keyboard Concertos (1–11)
XIX            Pieces for Mechanical Clock (Flötenuhr) (1–32)
XX            Works about The Seven Last Words of Christ
XXa            Stabat Mater
XXI            Oratorios (1, 2, 3)
XXII            Masses (1–14)
XXIII    Other Sacred Works
XXIV    Cantatas and Arias with Orchestra
XXV            Songs with 2, 3, and 4 Parts
XXVI    Songs and Cantatas with Piano
XXVII    Canons (Sacred 1–10; Secular 1–47)
XXVIII       Opera (1–13)
XXIX    Marionette Operas (Singspiele)
XXX            Incidental Music
XXXI    Arrangement of Scottish (273) and Welsh (60) Folksongs

As you can see, this was a major task!  Within the groups, Hoboken made an effort to organize the works with at least a stab at chronology, but generally speaking he was so in the dark about it that he didn't get a lot of them right. For that reason, there have been a few group reorganizations in recent years, mostly by Robbins-Landon and his crew, but even groups that have been updated (which is no guarantee of accuracy either!) rarely get referenced as such, because the Hoboken numbers are so well established. Still, where they exist I will try to remember to use both sets of numbers. All of us anal people would like the chronology correct, eh? 

So Part 2 (II?) will begin with the symphonies. I hope you will join me in this journey through the music, and that you will discover some new listening opportunities. As I always do, I invite feedback and questions or answers or additional input or any of that stuff.

[Opus106]

Gurn, it's good to see another little Haydn project coming up. If I may make a suggestion, perhaps you could do this in a separate thread with only your entries, mainly for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the flow and continuity will be maintained throughout: discussions can happen here, so that the essays and the general Haus chatter won't disrupt each other, and each will get the attention it deserves. Secondly, you can provide a single link as a reference instead of worrying about many (of course, if the need arises, you could always link to a single post).

[Florestan]

Excellent, Gurn, I can hardly wait for the installments.

[mahler10th]

Discovering Haydn's Music
Part 1
....I hope you will join me in this journey through the music, and that you will discover some new listening opportunities. As I always do, I invite feedback and questions or answers or additional input or any of that stuff.

Magnificent.  I am going to take part in this too.  Only yesterday I listened to the 28th Symphony and the 'Farewell' Symphony.  During listening to the 28th I was struck by how much Haydn was willing to incorporate his new ideas into the work.  This will be great.  Cheers Gurn.   

[SonicMan46]

Thanks Gurn for starting this 'new' project on Papa Joe - looking forward to upcoming installments!  Dave

[Appy34]

Can't wait to read the essays. Every week this year I've tried to listen to a composer intensively, and Haydn's turn is this coming week. I just wonder where to begin with 106 symphonies and all the other works of his!

[Gurn Blanston]

Thank you all for the encouraging response. Hope I can live up to it. Haydn deserves better, but unfortunately he is stuck with me.

Gurn, it's good to see another little Haydn project coming up. If I may make a suggestion, perhaps you could do this in a separate thread with only your entries, mainly for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the flow and continuity will be maintained throughout: discussions can happen here, so that the essays and the general Haus chatter won't disrupt each other, and each will get the attention it deserves. Secondly, you can provide a single link as a reference instead of worrying about many (of course, if the need arises, you could always link to a single post).

Seems like a good idea, but the only way to make it practicable like that is to keep it locked all the time. Would that seem rude? 

[Opus106]

Seems like a good idea, but the only way to make it practicable like that is to keep it locked all the time. Would that seem rude? 

No, not to me. But it would if I were the only other poster on the forum. Well, I suppose most people here won't mind keeping off if you tell them gently. And even if the odd errant post ends up there by mistake, you could always move it to the Haus; if it's a troll, I'm sure you have a better idea of what to do.

[Brian]

Seems like a good idea, but the only way to make it practicable like that is to keep it locked all the time. Would that seem rude? 

Another way to go about it, perhaps, since you started this thread, is to go back to the original post and add in links to each part of the continuing essay. That way if I think "oh snap I wonder what Gurn said about XYZ," I at least know where to find the link in a directory post of sorts.