Haydn's Haus

[Gurn Blanston]

If someone says in the 21st Century that Haydn is generally regarded as a composer of the same importance as Mozart and Beethoven, that person would be inaccurate. Haydn is still not generally considered as important as Mozart and Beethoven. How many members of this board revere Haydn like we Haydnistas? The number is small actually. And the number who want HIP Haydn symphonies even smaller generally if commercial success is any indication: not a single HIP cycle completed, or likely to be completed (I have little faith in the long term viability of the Haydn 2032 project) vs four MI cycles.

While not denying the importance the HIP movement has had on Classical era music (it's been enormous obviously), I also will not deny the importance that Dorati's Symphonies and Operas had, or that McCabe's Sonatas had, or that the Beaux Arts' Trios had on the discovery of Haydn's worth beyond the named and the obvious. There was glorious Haydn being made before the HIPsters: Szell, Bernstein, Klemperer, Davis, Dorati, Jones, Goberman. Only musical bigots (yeah, you Gurn  ) refuse to listen to it. By the way, Szell always stripped down the Cleveland when he played Haydn and Mozart: the size comparable to what those composers had in Paris and London. And if he didn't have natural horns at his command, Myron Bloom certainly made up for that 

But despite all that (the efforts of both the PI and MI crowds), Haydn is still relegated to the second team in the minds of most classical music lovers. Sad, and maddening.

Sarge

All true. Although I wouldn't say 'bigot' as much as I would say 'aural snob'.   And probably always will be true. People don't want to have to reject the received notions they got early in life, and they continue to pass them down to newbies (as I have seen here many times). It's hard to win minds and hearts.  0:)

[Karl Henning]

It's hard to win minds and hearts.  0:)

This composer agrees!

[Jo498]

My main point was that the "Haydn revival" began in the late 50s or so, quite a long time before HIP got to Haydn (HIP performances of Bach etc. had already started, albeit on the fringes and did not become a major thing until the 1970s). And as several HIP Haydn projects floundered, it seems safe to say that HIP and appreciation of Haydn should be considered separately. There is still no complete HIP recording of Haydn's symphonies compared to  about 4 of Mozart's (ter Linden, Harnoncourt, Hogwood, Pinnock). Sure, Haydn's are MANY more, but more than half of Mozart's are juvenilia and they are recorded anyway.

My other point was that there is quite a bit of "appreciation space" between "regarded as highly as Mozart" and "mostly neglected". There is also a difference between "highly regarded by some experts" and "highly regarded by the general public". If you read Tovey's comments on a bunch of symphonies you find that this guy regarded Haydn very highly already in the early 20th century.
It's of course true that only a small fraction of Haydn's works was regularly performed but this was also true of e.g. Handel and Bach and still all three would have been regarded as "great composers" despite being represented in a distorted fashion. Whereas Vivaldi was virtually unknown before the 1940s or so.

[Gurn Blanston]

My main point was that the "Haydn revival" began in the late 50s or so, quite a long time before HIP got to Haydn (HIP performances of Bach etc. had already started, albeit on the fringes and did not become a major thing until the 1970s). And as several HIP Haydn projects floundered, it seems safe to say that HIP and appreciation of Haydn should be considered separately. There is still no complete HIP recording of Haydn's symphonies compared to  about 4 of Mozart's (ter Linden, Harnoncourt, Hogwood, Pinnock). Sure, Haydn's are MANY more, but more than half of Mozart's are juvenilia and they are recorded anyway.

My other point was that there is quite a bit of "appreciation space" between "regarded as highly as Mozart" and "mostly neglected". There is also a difference between "highly regarded by some experts" and "highly regarded by the general public". If you read Tovey's comments on a bunch of symphonies you find that this guy regarded Haydn very highly already in the early 20th century.
It's of course true that only a small fraction of Haydn's works was regularly performed but this was also true of e.g. Handel and Bach and still all three would have been regarded as "great composers" despite being represented in a distorted fashion. Whereas Vivaldi was virtually unknown before the 1940s or so.

But Tovey's appreciation was absolutely unique in its time. When he wrote about Haydn in Essay in Music Analysis, he represented no one except himself, not some hard-core group of Haydn appreciators!

There have actually been 3 or 4 'Haydn revivals' in the 20th century, so it is wrong to base any conclusions off from any one of them. Tovey began the first, then (IIRC) Jens Peter Larsen began a second one before WWII when he uncovered so many previously unknown Haydn works. He is the person who inspired Robbins-Landon to begin yet another when he founded the Haydn Society in the early 50's and began recording works which were previously unheard of, and publishing not only huge gobs of biographical material but also Urtext scores. This lasted until well into the 70's, at which time the HIP movement adopted Haydn as their Classic Era poster child. This wave has yet to recede and so it is the one we are most familiar with.

It isn't the performers who began the first three waves, it was the musicologists. The fourth wave, the current one, pretty much WAS begun by performers, but they were also using musicology to construct their performances. Dorati, BTW was part of the 3rd wave, he worked hand-in-hand with Landon, and he did use Urtext scores. FWIW, I think his efforts with the operas are better than those with the symphonies, but that's just me. 

[Madiel]

The first three Peter Gabriel albums do not, and Geffen ultimately compelled him to add a title to his fourth

I knew it. I knew someone would bring up Peter. It's actually his first 4 albums.

Seal has a bit of trouble as well, as his 1st, 2nd and 4th albums are all just "Seal".

But hey, they've all got different pictures on the covers!

[North Star]

And then there are Led Zeppelin's first four albums.

[Wakefield]

And then there are Led Zeppelin's first four albums.

Not to mention the "White Album."

[The new erato]

No intense photosessions, but here at least is my son (he looks far better than me) and wife in front of the Eszterhazy castle in Eisenstadt.

[Gurn Blanston]

But hey, they've all got different pictures on the covers!

So do all my Beethoven Op 125's...   

[Gurn Blanston]

No intense photosessions, but here at least is my son (he looks far better than me) and wife in front of the Eszterhazy castle in Eisenstadt.

Was it as nice inside as we've been led to believe? Nice stuff? A Haydn harpsichord maybe?   

[The new erato]

Oh yes, The Haydnsaal was beautiful, and there was a nice Haydn exhibition with letters and instruments and variosus tableaux. Much of the period furniture of the period seems to be lost though (the same with the Haydnhaus).

[The new erato]

I also accidentally stumbled across this in Bratislava, quite close to the countess (?) Erdødyi house (of Beethoven fame).

[Gurn Blanston]

Oh yes, The Haydnsaal was beautiful, and there was a nice Haydn exhibition with letters and instruments and variosus tableaux. Much of the period furniture of the period seems to be lost though (the same with the Haydnhaus).

Ah, yes, I understand WW II was really hard on that part of the world...     The rest sounds very nice though! 

[Gurn Blanston]

I also accidentally stumbled across this in Bratislava, quite close to the countess (?) Erdødyi house (of Beethoven fame).

Yes, and Pressburg was also the birthplace of Joseph Joachim, Brahms' friend and virtuoso fiddler. It was a big deal place back in the day.

[Wakefield]

PS: In Spanish, Balakirev is at his lyrical best. Very nice! 

Actually, I thought the same when I read your translation into English of my signature. 

[Brian]

I've been closely scrutinizing the Haydn 2032 project booklets and website. It appears to me that they record a symphony album first, and then perform the works on tour 8-11 months later. In addition, the first two recording sessions took place 8 months apart (October 2013 and June 2014) and the third album tour is this upcoming November. So I think it's fair to assume that Vol. 3 "Solo e Pensoso" was recorded in March of this year for a November/December release, and Vol. 4 will be recorded around Christmas.

Solo e Pensoso is confirmed as the title of Vol. 3. No word on which symphonies will be included, but I imagine our Nickname Experts will be able to make some educated guesses.

You can sign up for a newsletter.

Looks like the recording project will also involve the Basel Chamber Orchestra, and is backed by a nonprofit organization. But y'all might have seen that in the booklet notes already.

[Gurn Blanston]

I've been closely scrutinizing the Haydn 2032 project booklets and website. It appears to me that they record a symphony album first, and then perform the works on tour 8-11 months later. In addition, the first two recording sessions took place 8 months apart (October 2013 and June 2014) and the third album tour is this upcoming November. So I think it's fair to assume that Vol. 3 "Solo e Pensoso" was recorded in March of this year for a November/December release, and Vol. 4 will be recorded around Christmas.

Solo e Pensoso is confirmed as the title of Vol. 3. No word on which symphonies will be included, but I imagine our Nickname Experts will be able to make some educated guesses.

You can sign up for a newsletter.

Looks like the recording project will also involve the Basel Chamber Orchestra, and is backed by a nonprofit organization. But y'all might have seen that in the booklet notes already.

Solo e Pensoso (Alone and Pensive) (Hob 24b:20) is a concert aria Haydn wrote in 1798. It is challenging to think what symphonies might be associated with those thoughts.

Thanks for the news and the link too!

[Jo498]

Thanks, Gurn, for the elaboration of the several "waves". Admitttedly I was not aware that Larsen had been some time before Robbins Landon. We certainly agree that the musicological efforts should be distinguished from the recordings that took place in their wake and further from the differences in public appreciation.
As I cannot easily get the Cambridge Companion (I have one academic library nearby but what they do not have is usually too much of a hassle to get for a hobby interest, i.e. it takes time and costs a little fee). I would have to check my random older books on music for mentionings of Haydn.
Again, it's academics, not the general public, but somewhat later (30s/40s) Walter Riezler in his book on Beethoven seems to both know his Haydn as well as appreciate him. Although he probably cannot escape valuing Beethoven higher, he does mention a few pieces/passages as interesting for the understanding of Beethoven and compares the finale of the b minor piano sonata favorably with the similar finale from Beethoven's op.10/1.

So I would suppose that maybe in Germany and Austria Haydn was better known and more highly regarded at least in come circles as Tovey's complaining (and he does complain about many aspects of musical life in the UK) might suggest. It seems well documented how immersed in classical music the bourgeois culture of Germany and Central Europe before the first World War (and to a large extent still in the inter-war-period) used to be. And I am pretty sure that included quite a bit of Haydn, e.g. played by amateur string quartets as Hausmusik.

But I do not disagree with you that Haydn's status did not equal Mozart's, even less Beethoven's or the obsession many educated people had with Wagner in the early 1900s. As Sarge has pointed out, this is still not the case in general in 2015 although I think that most musicologists/historians and many musicians nowadays show a very high appreciation of Haydn (e.g. Rosen's "The Classical Style" is almost dominated by Haydn, and that book is more than 40 years old by now).

[Gurn Blanston]

Thanks, Gurn, for the elaboration of the several "waves". Admitttedly I was not aware that Larsen had been some time before Robbins Landon. We certainly agree that the musicological efforts should be distinguished from the recordings that took place in their wake and further from the differences in public appreciation.
As I cannot easily get the Cambridge Companion (I have one academic library nearby but what they do not have is usually too much of a hassle to get for a hobby interest, i.e. it takes time and costs a little fee). I would have to check my random older books on music for mentionings of Haydn.
Again, it's academics, not the general public, but somewhat later (30s/40s) Walter Riezler in his book on Beethoven seems to both know his Haydn as well as appreciate him. Although he probably cannot escape valuing Beethoven higher, he does mention a few pieces/passages as interesting for the understanding of Beethoven and compares the finale of the b minor piano sonata favorably with the similar finale from Beethoven's op.10/1.

So I would suppose that maybe in Germany and Austria Haydn was better known and more highly regarded at least in come circles as Tovey's complaining (and he does complain about many aspects of musical life in the UK) might suggest. It seems well documented how immersed in classical music the bourgeois culture of Germany and Central Europe before the first World War (and to a large extent still in the inter-war-period) used to be. And I am pretty sure that included quite a bit of Haydn, e.g. played by amateur string quartets as Hausmusik.

But I do not disagree with you that Haydn's status did not equal Mozart's, even less Beethoven's or the obsession many educated people had with Wagner in the early 1900s. As Sarge has pointed out, this is still not the case in general in 2015 although I think that most musicologists/historians and many musicians nowadays show a very high appreciation of Haydn (e.g. Rosen's "The Classical Style" is almost dominated by Haydn, and that book is more than 40 years old by now).

Thanks for your comments, Jo. I have yet to crack into what was going on in Central Europe during all this time, since the books are invariably written in German, of which I have only the most cursory understanding. I think it is important to keep Austria and Germany as two separate entities in all this though, because, as I read just last night, Austria never waned in its appreciation of Haydn, while Germany had other musical fish to fry. In the new book I just received, the first ever book on Haydn's masses in English, I might add, and from 2008, the authors both spent much of their adult lives in Austria, one of them worked for the Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt, and was also a church music director. In his forward he recounts the unbroken line of Haydn's church music in Austria from the time of its composition to the present day, for example, along with other examples of the continuing veneration of Haydn in Austria. While it is true that post-war Germany had a big Haydn revival, I think for many years before then he was ignored, which was certainly true at the end of his life.

In short, Tovey's comments WERE directed mainly to England, as you say. He was a professor at Oxford or Cambridge, after all, so they were a natural target for him!  Even though the future has long overtaken him, his essential views on music are still unimpeachable after all this time, and his books are superb reading, highly recommended.

As for Riezler, I don't know him (German language?) but he just proves that knowledgeable people will always discover the best things, even if they aren't the trend du jour. I note, though, that despite appreciating Haydn, he wrote abut Beethoven... 

[Jo498]

Walter Riezler was a friend of Furtwänglers's (I think he had been one of his personal tutors in his youth). The book on Beethoven is his most famous, he also wrote one about Schubert; his other books are mostly on art and Greek pottery. Interestingly, he had started as as classical archaeologist and art historian and later studied music with Felix Mottl and Max Reger. (Apparently, Furtwängler's father who was a professor of archaeology (and Riezler's PhD advisor) used his assistants as tutors in cultural history for his son...).
His brother, Kurt Riezler, had some minor role as a diplomat around WW I. Both Riezler brothers are among the many cases of highly educated upper middle class Germans who started with a rather national conservative background but nevertheless collided with the Nazis in the 1930s. Walter lost his position as a director of a museum, Kurt emigrated in 1938 (because his wife was Jewish, and the daughter of the painter Max Liebermann) and was a professor in New York for some time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Riezler
(Walter has no English entry)
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Riezler

This is completely OT but still quite fascinating, I think. It gives an impression of the amazing erudition and intellectual breadth of those guys who could apparently switch between diplomatic corps and ancient Greek tracts on economy or between curating an art museum and writing books on Beethoven without missing a turn...