Haydn's Haus

[Mandryka]

I think it is important for a performer to know that, even if he/she chooses to play it in a different mood, at least it can be a consideration. Context is everything in things like opera, but it doesn't hurt to know it for smaller forms either.   

Beghin plays the theme so melodramatically, theatrically,  that you would think it was an opera! He then seems to lose the tombeau mood, maybe.

[PerfectWagnerite]

I may be preaching to the choir but l am just in awe of how GOOD a composer Haydn was. Just the symphonies for example #82 - 104 every single one of them is a masterpiece, there is not a weak sister in ANY of them - 23 consecutive great symphonies or such variety and mood using basically the same form. I don't know how he did it. This is taking nothing away from his other symphonies.

Listening to his string quartets again not a weak one in the bunch. Just an amazing composer.

[Gurn Blanston]

I may be preaching to the choir but l am just in awe of how GOOD a composer Haydn was. Just the symphonies for example #82 - 104 every single one of them is a masterpiece, there is not a weak sister in ANY of them - 23 consecutive great symphonies or such variety and mood using basically the same form. I don't know how he did it. This is taking nothing away from his other symphonies.

Listening to his string quartets again not a weak one in the bunch. Just an amazing composer.

That's just the thing with Haydn: you can listen to his entire oeuvre and not find a weak piece, not one which is intrinsically weak, that is. And it isn't because he burned his rejects, in fact, some of his best works could well have been burned in the series of fires (at least 3) which plagued him.

If one were to speak out on this, it would be controversial in and of itself: 1> he believed he had a god-given talent which required him to do his best every time and 2> he was raised in a time where the sole purpose of music was to entertain and provide pleasure for listeners (and players). No big challenges to understand what he was "trying to say", just 20-40 minutes of wonderful listening pleasure.

One of the marks of his quality is that he didn't have much juvenilia, by 1754 he had mastered the elements of structure. And he always had great ideas, even before then when he struggled to put them together. So if you go back to 1757-58 and his first quartets and symphonies, then relative to other music of the time, he was already a master even at the beginning like that. There is a fallacy about composers that their proficiency is like a tree which keeps growing ever upward. This may be true when you are talking about developing a form or a style, but, at least in Haydn's case, it isn't true vis-à-vis quality. Simple or grand, every work he wrote was full of good ideas and always the best he could make it. To me, this is what separates him from the herd.

It would have been prudent for him to struggle more, or else to be less discreet about his girlfriends. He would have become a cult idol! 

[Gurn Blanston]

I am not a fan of Beghin's version of this piece.

I have at least 15 versions on period instruments and a couple on modern ones. I am hard-pressed to pick out my favorite(s). Badura-Skoda for one. Bobby Mitchell, Carole Cerasi, Gary Cooper... there really are some fine ones out there... 

[Gurn Blanston]

I ordered the Badura-Skoda, feeling fairly confident that his would be good, so thanks for confirming that - but I will also try to hunt down the other two.  I've got others as well, Brautigam, Schornsheim, but this work flew under my radar in those complete boxes.

I strongly recommend the Bobby Mitchell to you. It is his debut album, he plays it like an actual recital of the time, with an improvised chromatic bridge from one work to the next, which is exactly what players used to do in those days. Plus, his instrument sounds great, and he plays superbly. Finally, I like the spaniel on the cover. What can I say?  I would be majorly surprised if you didn't greatly enjoy that disk. 

[PerfectWagnerite]

One of the marks of his quality is that he didn't have much juvenilia, by 1754 he had mastered the elements of structure.

Yes you nailed it. With Haydn you throw terms like "early", "middle", and "late" out the window as his quality is remarkably consistent. The only other composer I can think of like that is Bach. Another composer I compare him to is Dvorak, both wrote in every genre and excelled in every one of them.

Every few years I come back to listen to Haydn's music and every time I discover something new.

[Gurn Blanston]

Yes you nailed it. With Haydn you throw terms like "early", "middle", and "late" out the window as his quality is remarkably consistent. The only other composer I can think of like that is Bach. Another composer I compare him to is Dvorak, both wrote in every genre and excelled in every one of them.

Every few years I come back to listen to Haydn's music and every time I discover something new.

  Maybe that's why I'm such a Dvorak fan! He is analogous to a modern-day Haydn.    The one big trend I see in Dvorak is towards concision, and Haydn didn't need that, he was already terse by nature. If you slide up to 1761, his first year with the Esterházy's, his 6 scherzandi are absolutely perfect 4 movement miniature (10 mins. each) symphonies. It wasn't until Beethoven began writing bagatelles for keyboard that another composer even approached this idea or the execution of it.  Dvorak got the idea after a while, and his works became progressively shorter but richer right to the end. The fact hat he had Haydn's talent for writing original tunes that sounded like folk music is just a bonus.   

[Florestan]

he was raised in a time where the sole purpose of music was to entertain and provide pleasure for listeners (and players). No big challenges to understand what he was "trying to say", just 20-40 minutes of wonderful listening pleasure.

Yes and no. There are many instances of Haydn's music being more than meets the ear.

[Gurn Blanston]

Yes and no. There are many instances of Haydn's music being more than meets the ear.

Not in the Romantic sense though. Yes, there are all sorts of musical jokes, more than you can imagine, but if you don't "get them", it doesn't interfere with your enjoyment of the music. Whereas if you 'don't get' the story of a symphonic poem, for example, or that certain motifs are meant to convey some particular tone painting, then you have missed the entire reason for the piece's existence.

What the hell is wrong with being entertaining for its own sake?   Why is it such a difficult concept to deal with?  As Freud said, "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar". Smoke it without fear!

[Florestan]

Not in the Romantic sense though.

Just what is this "Romantic sense", pray tell?

if you 'don't get' the story of a symphonic poem, for example, or that certain motifs are meant to convey some particular tone painting, then you have missed the entire reason for the piece's existence.

If you were a cultured man in 1850s you would "get" the story and the motifs alright --- just as if you were Eszterhazy or something similarly cultured in the 1780s you would "get" whatever Haydn wanted you to get.

What the hell is wrong with being entertaining for its own sake?

AFAIC, absolutely nothing.

[Gurn Blanston]

Just what is this "Romantic sense", pray tell?

See below. So much of the music tells a story. in 18th century, the story is told by singers, not instrumentalists. It's an entirely different POV.

If you were a cultured man in 1850s you would "get" the story and the motifs alright --- just as if you were Eszterhazy or something similarly cultured in the 1780s you would "get" whatever Haydn wanted you to get.

I should hope that were true. There is a much larger pool of listeners to draw from in the 19th century, the elite aren't better educated, but the hoi polloi probably are. Given that the lower classes weren't educated at all in the 18th. So Haydn is talking to a lot fewer people than Wagner did, for example. Did everyone 'get' Wagner? 

AFAIC, absolutely nothing.

Yet it seems to bother you. I seem to recall you writing that if Haydn wasn't genuinely emotional when he portrayed musical emotion then you didn't want to listen to him any more, or something to that effect. My answer to that is that he may have wanted to make YOU feel something, but it doesn't mean he (or Mozart) felt it himself. In my opinion, this is a difference between 18th and 19th century music.

[Florestan]

in 18th century, the story is told by singers, not instrumentalists.

Dittersdorf´s Symphonies after Ovid´s Metamorphoses?

I should hope that were true. There is a much larger pool of listeners to draw from in the 19th century, the elite aren't better educated, but the hoi polloi probably are. Given that the lower classes weren't educated at all in the 18th. So Haydn is talking to a lot fewer people than Wagner did, for example. Did everyone 'get' Wagner?

Depends on what you mean by "get". I´d say that educated people "got" the mythology behind his operas all right. Whether they "got" his aesthetics and philosophy (in the sense of agreeing with them) is a different matter.

Yet it seems to bother you.

No, it really doesn´t. I love music which is intended for pure enjoyment and pleasure and with no "philosophical" pretentions as much as you do.

I seem to recall you writing that if Haydn wasn't genuinely emotional when he portrayed musical emotion then you didn't want to listen to him any more, or something to that effect.

Ah well...You didn´t take that seriously, I hope. 

My answer to that is that he may have wanted to make YOU feel something, but it doesn't mean he (or Mozart) felt it himself.

At the time of the composition they probably didn´t but it doesn´t mean they never felt it themselves. Even with wild Romantics such as Berlioz or Schumann or Liszt there is a gap, sometimes a very long one, between the moment of experiencing an emotional or psychological state and the moment of actually composing a work which reflects it. I think the same applies to Haydn or Mozart. After all, you said it yourself that Haydn´s Variations in F minor reflects his feelings over Marianne Grienzinger´s death, and then there´s the famous violin sonata Mozart wrote as a lament for his mother´s death.

And it has right now occurred to me that, given most of the time Haydn wants the listener to have fun and even a good laugh, I doubt that he didn´t have fun or did not laugh himself while composing this or that work. 

[PerfectWagnerite]

I also credit Haydn for greatly expanding the RONDO form into something really expressive and rich. Just listen to Sym #88's finale where such economy of material can develope into a RONDO of such fecundity.

[Gurn Blanston]

I also credit Haydn for greatly expanding the RONDO form into something really expressive and rich. Just listen to Sym #88's finale where such economy of material can develope into a RONDO of such fecundity.

I love that finale (the whole symphony, really). Haydn and Mozart were both greatly taken with the rondo form and had different approaches to it, leaving behind a great legacy to both listeners and future composers. It's a long way from the French rondeaux of the earlier 18th century and the Classic Viennese rondo of the '80's and '90's! 

[Old Listener]

See below. So much of the music tells a story. in 18th century, the story is told by singers, not instrumentalists. It's an entirely different POV.

I should hope that were true. There is a much larger pool of listeners to draw from in the 19th century, the elite aren't better educated, but the hoi polloi probably are. Given that the lower classes weren't educated at all in the 18th. So Haydn is talking to a lot fewer people than Wagner did, for example. Did everyone 'get' Wagner? 

Yet it seems to bother you. I seem to recall you writing that if Haydn wasn't genuinely emotional when he portrayed musical emotion then you didn't want to listen to him any more, or something to that effect. My answer to that is that he may have wanted to make YOU feel something, but it doesn't mean he (or Mozart) felt it himself. In my opinion, this is a difference between 18th and 19th century music.

I always feel that there are emotions shared between Haydn and his listeners that are present in much of his music: a love of music and a joy in the creation of music and in hearing that creation.  Music was important to Haydn, to his employer and to an audience that grew larger as time passed.  Haydn's music is about that shared joy in music.

[Wakefield]

I was reading some previous posts by my good friends Gurn and Florestan, when I recalled this old anecdote of Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier during the movie "Marathon Man" (1976). A story circulated for a long time that Hoffman (being a "method actor") stayed up all night to play a character who has stayed up all night. Arriving on the set, Laurence Olivier asked Hoffman why he looked the way he did. Hoffman told him, to which Olivier replied in jest, "Why not try acting? It's much easier."

In some measure, this funny anecdote illustrates one of the biggest differences between Romanticism and Classicism.   

 

[Gurn Blanston]

I was reading some previous posts by my good friends Gurn and Florestan, when I recalled this old anecdote of Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier during the movie "Marathon Man" (1976). A story circulated for a long time that Hoffman (being a "method actor") stayed up all night to play a character who has stayed up all night. Arriving on the set, Laurence Olivier asked Hoffman why he looked the way he did. Hoffman told him, to which Olivier replied in jest, "Why not try acting? It's much easier."

In some measure, this funny anecdote illustrates one of the biggest differences between Romanticism and Classicism.   

 

  That's funny, and it works for me.

[PerfectWagnerite]

I love that finale (the whole symphony, really). Haydn and Mozart were both greatly taken with the rondo form and had different approaches to it, leaving behind a great legacy to both listeners and future composers. It's a long way from the French rondeaux of the earlier 18th century and the Classic Viennese rondo of the '80's and '90's! 

Haydn's #88 and Mozart's #39 would likely be my picks for anyone who wants to know what a great Classical Era symphony sounds like...

I can't recall Mozart using the Rondo to end a mature symphony, the finales I remember are always in sonata form.

[Gurn Blanston]

Haydn's #88 and Mozart's #39 would likely be my picks for anyone who wants to know what a great Classical Era symphony sounds like...

I can't recall Mozart using the Rondo to end a mature symphony, the finales I remember are always in sonata form.

Yes, 39 is one of my very favorite Mozart symphonies, moreso than 41!

No, I wasn't limiting myself to symphonies, I was thinking about the many concertos beginning way back with the last 4 violin ones right up through the wind and keyboard ones. He was crazy about the form, I think. 

[PerfectWagnerite]

Yes, 39 is one of my very favorite Mozart symphonies, moreso than 41!

No, I wasn't limiting myself to symphonies, I was thinking about the many concertos beginning way back with the last 4 violin ones right up through the wind and keyboard ones. He was crazy about the form, I think. 

Concerti is less serious than a symphony so Mozart ended many with the RONDO.

Anyway Mozart's 39th is really special in the way he uses a pair of clarinets to add a lot of color to the work, especially in the Menuette and Trio movement where it is magical. Mozart is great at getting the most colors out of an orchestra with minimal instrumentation.