I think this will be a good place to discuss sacred music, since the bulk of it is vocal, and in this case, some of it is darn near operatic too! 0:)
Masses in Classical AustriaPart 1 – Some background
I have recently (within the last year, let us say) gotten quite interested in the way that music was presented in Catholic churches in Austria in the 18th century. I will say straight out here that I am presenting the facts as I have discovered them, but I also am putting some personal spin on it, because related facts have turned up in many different places and it has been hard to put things into context. So I am creating the context, not just for the reader, but also to help myself to understand all that I have found out.
That may not sound unique relative to other places in Europe or other times either, but actually it is. It was a confluence of culture and talent which enabled the people in the major Austrian population centers, and more surprisingly, the minor population centers too, to come to church and celebrate their faith in a liturgical display unlike any other!
Some GeographyAlways useful to know where things are in relation to each other. I was surprised it was hard to find a good map online that represented the actual time and place, but I did grab this map which is of modern Austria. Since Salzburg, Vienna and Eisenstadt haven't moved too much, I guess it will have to do to be getting on with.
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/MapofAustria.jpg)
(Click image to make it larger)
The places that are circled are the ones of primary interest to us. Bear in mind that there were also dozens of monasteries throughout the countryside. These were hugely influential in influencing the music and disseminating it through the surrounding area. Without the monks, most of the music we know today, both sacred and secular, would be lost to us. Many boundaries that exist today as international ones were at that time more like state borders, since the Holy Roman Empire, which controlled most of what can be seen (and a lot that can't) was based in Vienna (Wien). So Hungary, Bohemia (now Slovakia) and much of Bavaria (north of Salzburg, so Munich then) were all under the same rule, although usually indirectly. These 'states' had an Elector in charge of them, and the Elector answered to the Holy Roman Emperor. It was a good system (if you were the HRE :) ).
Some time to go with that SpaceMany of us still have the fairly rigid boundaries that we learned when we first started studying music, whether formally or informally. "If it's 1750 it's still Baroque" or "if it's 1770 it's Classical" are hard things to dispense from our brains. As we learned more about music we discovered that there was some overlap in time since not everyone, everywhere suddenly abandoned what they did and took up something new and stylish.
And so there was an intermediate period and then everyone was on board with the new way, right?
And everyone was very trendy and stylish and so they wouldn't listen to anything older than the latest Top 40, eh?
Well, in the world of secular music, this is all pretty true. People
did want just the latest and greatest, and they also wanted that totally hip
galant swinging dance music too. However, and this is a big however; they didn't want it so much in Church, at least not in early times. Change in church music came far more gradually than it did in secular music. People in Salzburg still happily listened to the 1730's organ music of Eberlin well into the 1770's.
Galant was a dirty word on Sunday morning, although it was fine on Thursday afternoon. So we have to blur the lines a little bit. Baroque (which term hadn't been invented yet, of course) organ music was fine. Preferred in fact. It was called
stile antico and was just right. And despite the fact that there was only a little bit of composition going on for trumpets and timpani, they were still being used in most masses. So what were they playing? Well, the old stuff was apparently just fine. Heinrich Biber was better known in Salzburg as a composer of masses and trumpet music than he was as a fiddler (which is how he is remembered today).
The big development, and the one that caused the most consternation among the conservatives, and eventually nearly brought about the demise of the genre, was the convergence of solo vocal music styles. Where there used to be distinct 'church music' and 'opera music', by the end of the 18th century, for all intents and purposes, the texts were being sung as opera arias and duets etc. The reactionary feeling was that there was too much beauty there (in a good performance) to allow the listeners to remember that they were in church.
I want to end Part 1 with the entry for Viennese masses from The New Grove. It pretty well describes the trends that were instituted. In Part 2, I will recap a discussion that we had in the Haydn Haus recently, and introduce some other music that complements the masses that we all know and enjoy, in such a way as to make a far more interesting experience out of listening to disk of a mass. :)
From the article in the New Grove entitled "Mass", Section 2 "Viennese"
Quote (ii) Viennese.
Even in Austria the stile antico persisted in the mid- and late 18th century, with examples by Reutter, Werner, Wagenseil, Albrechtsberger, Michael Haydn, Leopold Hofmann and Salieri, and the Missa 'Sunt bona mixta malis' by Joseph Haydn. Nevertheless, the mainstream of the Viennese tradition derives largely from the work at the Viennese court, early in the century, of the highly influential Kapellmeister J.J. Fux and his Venetian colleague Antonio Caldara. Of the three important composers of masses in the Austrian tradition in the later 18th century, both Joseph and Michael Haydn were pupils of Reutter, also a Viennese court Kapellmeister, whose work their early essays in the genre resemble. Michael's
Missa in honorem sanctissimae Trinitatis has the same busy violin figuration for solos and rather dull choral parts, while Joseph's Missa 'Rorate coeli desuper' and Missa brevis in F show the same technique, though occasionally investing such words as 'incarnatus' with deeper feeling. His Missa in honorem BVM (hXXII:4, by 1774) has a concertante part for organ, and uses the solo quartet as a concertino to be set against orchestra and tutti, which, together with some modern (as opposed to stile antico) counterpoint, puts more emphasis on the voice without being operatic. Mozart, whose complete masses all date from the period 1768–80, showed his operatic leanings in his earliest works (k139/47a and k66) by following the Neapolitan model closely, in the former even using the brass to give a theatrical atmosphere in the 'Crucifixus'. A similar influence may be seen in his treatment of the 'Et incarnatus', usually with a hushed tone, chromaticism and often a move to the minor mode. Mozart's main preoccupation in the early 1770s, however, was with the missa brevis, forced on him by the reforming taste of the Salzburg archbishop, sometimes resulting in polytextual word setting and in less fugal writing (most of his longer mass settings, in the Salzburg tradition of Eberlin and Michael Haydn, have extended fugues on 'Cum Sancto Spiritu' to end the Gloria and 'Et vitam venturi' to end the Credo). From this period come his 'Credo' masses (k192/186f and 257), in which he used the Austrian tradition of having a figure set to the word 'Credo' recur throughout an entire section. He also introduced symphonic devices, especially in the 'Coronation' Mass (k317), which has virtually a complete thematic recapitulation in the Gloria and music from the Kyrie returning in faster tempo at 'Dona nobis pacem'; however, the solo Agnus Dei, with its strong suggestion of 'Dove sono' (Le nozze di Figaro), serves to recall that his ecclesiastical and operatic idioms were close. Both Haydn and Mozart produced fine masses in the year before the abolition of elaborate church music by the Emperor Joseph II in 1783. Haydn's Missa Cellensis ('Mariazeller', hXXII:8 ) is notable for its imaginative treatment of sonata principles in the context of choral music and for its concertante interplay of solo quartet and chorus. Mozart's unfinished C minor Mass k427/417a is a 'Neapolitan' mass, but with the stile antico element now interpreted as the Handelian manner of choral writing, with Baroque dotted rhythms, ground bass techniques and the use of double choir.
Haydn resumed writing masses in 1796 as a direct result of new duties for the Esterházy household on the assumption of Prince Nicolaus II, and the six works he wrote, finishing in 1802, are among the greatest settings ever made. All are 'solemn masses' scored for medium or large orchestra and show an expansion of scale over previous masses in the Viennese tradition. Although there are operatic-style sections, notably at times in the 'Benedictus', the predominant manner is that of the symphony. Three of the Kyries have slow introductions which lead into Allegro movements, that of the 'Theresienmesse' being specially close to those of Haydn's London symphonies; and it is usual for the Sanctus to be similarly constructed, the Allegro arriving at the words 'Pleni sunt coeli' or 'Osanna'. The Kyrie is also often in a variant of sonata form, as in the Missa in tempore belli, where, after the slow introduction, the Allegro exploits the customary key structure. In both the Missa Sancti Bernardi von Offida and the 'Theresienmesse' a similar pattern is combined with fugal textures; and in the 'Nelsonmesse' (hXXII:11) the form is close to the concerto, with a ritornello section preceding the 'exposition'. In this work the concertante nature is emphasized by a florid part for solo soprano; but normally the soloists are used in the early Baroque manner as a quartet contrasting with the ripieno, rather than with individual roles. Other reminiscences of Baroque practice occur in the fugues that end both Gloria and Credo, although the counterpoint derives not from Palestrina as much as from the Fuxian fugal style of the Op 20 string quartets. The orchestra is used in the longer movements to provide continuity, and there are still relics both of trio textures and of the rapid violin figurations of Reutter. There are also dramatic moments, in the 'Nelsonmesse' as in the Missa in tempore belli, where trumpets and drums play fanfares at the climax of the Benedictus and Agnus Dei, a tradition dating to at least the Fux era in Austria.
Well, I don't write that way, but if you wade in, you are bound to extract a lot of highly useful information.
I hope that this thread will become a gathering place for any of you that are interested in the time, place and music. Please contribute your knowledge, we are all here to learn, especially me. I will try to post one essay per week until I run out of resources, and between times I hope there will be plenty to discuss otherwise.
Cheers,
Gurn
8)
I've been waiting for a thread like this!
Great, great post there Gurn, I'm looking forward to exploring my love for the genre with friends here.
8)
There is so much to this subject, and so many great works!
I will report back soon.
Quote from: Leo K on June 12, 2012, 10:05:57 AM
I've been waiting for a thread like this!
Great, great post there Gurn, I'm looking forward to exploring my love for the genre with friends here.
8)
There is so much to this subject, and so many great works!
I will report back soon.
Thanks, Leo. I am opening the door here for all you guys to share your knowledge. I have a long way to go to catch up. :)
8)
I suggest a couple of Johann Naumann masses to listen to alongside the more familiar works of Mozart and Haydn. Although these masses are from Dresden, I offer them as a study of Haydn's influence on the wider musical world. Also, Johann Hasse is responsible for furthering Naumann's career. It is interesting to note that although Naumann was a protestant, he worked at a Catholic court. The years we are considering here are 1786-1806. Mozart criticized Naumann's work as dull stuff, but I humbly disagree!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/517EzQLFCDL._SL500_AA280_.jpg)
Johann Gottlieb Naumann: Mass No. 18, in D minor (1794), Mass No.21 in C Minor (1786-1806)
Collegium Instrumentale, Dir. Peter Kopp
These works are modest masses with great beauty. The period instruments, and the clarinets in particular, give the flavor of autumn to the orchestration. I really love this recording, and this is a very valuable addition to my 18th Century Mass collection, of which I turn to all the time for peace and reflection. Naumann's liturgical music is not flashy, but solid and very devotional.
Here is a review from fanfare:
Although little known today, during his lifetime Johann Gottlieb Naumann (1741–1801) occupied a very respected niche in the world of late 18th-century music. Born and raised near Dresden, his career was largely made there; after moving to northern Italy in 1757 for further musical training (his teachers there included Padre Martini), he was called to the Saxon imperial court in 1764 on the recommendation of Johann Adolf Hasse as second church composer, attaining promotion to Kapellmeister in 1776. Between 1777 and 1786 he was also active as a musical reformer of opera along Italian lines in Stockholm and Copenhagen; to retain him in Dresden, the Saxon elector promoted Naumann to Oberkapellmeister in 1786. Naumann remained there for the rest of his life, dying a wealthy and respected man. (For further details see Brian Robins's review of the composer's oratorio Betulia liberata in Fanfare 30:2.)
Much of Naumann's oeuvre remains unpublished; a catalog compiled by Heinrich Mannstein in 1841 lists 27 Mass settings, of which those in D and C Minor presented here are numbers 18 and 21. However, since it was a customary practice of the Hofkirche to combine parts to various masses by different composers for liturgical use, manuscript dates suggest that individual Mass movements may have been composed at various times and only later assembled into complete Mass settings. The D-Minor Mass is an apparent exception, with all its movements bearing the date of 1794; the various parts of the C-Minor Mass, by contrast, range from 1786 to 1801. The D Minor was once a well-established work; between 1876 and the mid 1930s it was performed almost annually on December 26, following a Mass on Christmas day by Hasse, and evidence suggests the practice may go back to Naumann's own lifetime. Psalm 96 dates from Naumann's return to Dresden in 1786, and Psalm 103 and the brief one-movement cantata Kommt herzu from 1790. While Naumann himself was a Protestant, the Dresden court was Catholic; Psalm 96 and the cantata are rare instances of Naumann having an opportunity to set German-language texts for Protestant devotions—the psalm for Duke Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and the cantata for the Herrnhuter Brüdergemeinde of the Moravian Church, inspired by a visit of Naumann to that devout Pietistic community (after its founding in 1727 it practiced an uninterrupted watch of prayer by its members for 100 years). Gustaf Wasa, an opera on the Swedish king who liberated his country from Danish thralldom, was for decades after its premiere the Swedish national opera (ArkivMusic has reissued the complete Virgin Classics recording with Nicolai Gedda). For unknown reasons the 1803 Breitkopf & Härtel edition of Psalm 96 included the opera's overture as a musical preface, and so it is offered here.
During a visit to Dresden in 1789, Mozart peremptorily dismissed a Naumann Mass as "very poor stuff," and doubtless that verdict affected Naumann's posthumous fortunes. A typical representative of the galant style, his music is neither fish nor fowl for typical expectations regarding either Baroque or Classical-era music; its straightforward simplicity lacks the complexity of the former's use of polyphony and the latter's emphasis upon extended thematic and formal development. Even in his own day, Naumann's music was stylistically in the conservative rearguard (which ideally suited him for the Dresden court); the Wasa Overture sounds startlingly like a work of Handel, and the various psalm and Mass movements demonstrate only a nodding acquaintance with the music of Haydn and no contact with that of Mozart. The harmonies are unenterprising, the melodies ordinary, the rhetorical gestures predictable. Somewhat surprisingly, however, Naumann's music is not dull; while only moderately pleasant rather than memorable, it fulfills its intended ecclesial functions ably and even winningly. Unlike, say, the Mozart, Berlioz, and Verdi Requiems or Beethoven's Missa solemnis, these are psalm and Mass settings that are subordinate to liturgical purposes; they do not draw attention to themselves in ways that distract one from devotional concentration, but rather humbly support it. They simply are not constructed to sustain the concentrated scrutiny of independent listening in the concert hall, and this as much as other factors explains why they have fallen largely into oblivion.
These two CDs are reissues, the first originally released in 1996 and the second in 1999. All the recordings are premieres and remain the sole versions available. The performances (by the same groups in both cases, despite their changes of names) leave nothing to be desired. The instrumental ensemble uses period instruments and plays with refined polish; the chorus is first-rate in every way; the soloists (Kai Wessel and Werner Güra having since achieved greater prominence) without exception all sing their brief parts ably. The digipaks contain informative booklets with texts in the original German and Latin with English translation. An online search has also located these two releases as a combined two-CD budget set for about the same price as each item individually, though I was not able to determine any product details such as inclusion of libretti. For those interested in filling in their collections with music from the secondary ranks of later 18th-century music in general and the galant composers in particular, these discs can be safely recommended.
FANFARE: James A. Altena
Say, do you know that thar Sunt bona mixta malis Mass, O Gurn?
Quote from: karlhenning on June 12, 2012, 10:50:27 AM
Say, do you know that thar Sunt bona mixta malis Mass, O Gurn?
Hob. XXII:2, apparently.
Quote from: karlhenning on June 12, 2012, 10:50:27 AM
Say, do you know that thar Sunt bona mixta malis Mass, O Gurn?
Yes indeed, it is a little fragment in d minor. Haydn wrote on the first page "a little mass with some good mixed with some bad". I love that! Anyway, I think the entire remaining parts total less than 10 minutes. :-\
8)
Quote from: Leo K on June 12, 2012, 10:29:26 AM
I suggest a couple of Johann Naumann masses to listen to alongside the more familiar works of Mozart and Haydn. Although these masses are from Dresden, I offer them as a study of Haydn's influence on the wider musical world. Also, Johann Hasse is responsible for furthering Naumann's career. It is interesting to note that although Naumann was a protestant, he worked at a Catholic court. The years we are considering here are 1786-1806. Mozart criticized Naumann's work as dull stuff, but I humbly disagree!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/517EzQLFCDL._SL500_AA280_.jpg)
Johann Gottlieb Naumann: Mass No. 18, in D minor (1794), Mass No.21 in C Minor (1786-1806)
Collegium Instrumentale, Dir. Peter Kopp
These works are modest masses with great beauty. The period instruments, and the clarinets in particular, give the flavor of autumn to the orchestration. I really love this recording, and this is a very valuable addition to my 18th Century Mass collection, of which I turn to all the time for peace and reflection. Naumann’s liturgical music is not flashy, but solid and very devotional.
Here is a review from fanfare:
Although little known today, during his lifetime Johann Gottlieb Naumann (1741–1801) occupied a very respected niche in the world of late 18th-century music. Born and raised near Dresden, his career was largely made there; after moving to northern Italy in 1757 for further musical training (his teachers there included Padre Martini), he was called to the Saxon imperial court in 1764 on the recommendation of Johann Adolf Hasse as second church composer, attaining promotion to Kapellmeister in 1776. Between 1777 and 1786 he was also active as a musical reformer of opera along Italian lines in Stockholm and Copenhagen; to retain him in Dresden, the Saxon elector promoted Naumann to Oberkapellmeister in 1786. Naumann remained there for the rest of his life, dying a wealthy and respected man. (For further details see Brian Robins’s review of the composer’s oratorio Betulia liberata in Fanfare 30:2.)
Much of Naumann’s oeuvre remains unpublished; a catalog compiled by Heinrich Mannstein in 1841 lists 27 Mass settings, of which those in D and C Minor presented here are numbers 18 and 21. However, since it was a customary practice of the Hofkirche to combine parts to various masses by different composers for liturgical use, manuscript dates suggest that individual Mass movements may have been composed at various times and only later assembled into complete Mass settings. The D-Minor Mass is an apparent exception, with all its movements bearing the date of 1794; the various parts of the C-Minor Mass, by contrast, range from 1786 to 1801. The D Minor was once a well-established work; between 1876 and the mid 1930s it was performed almost annually on December 26, following a Mass on Christmas day by Hasse, and evidence suggests the practice may go back to Naumann’s own lifetime. Psalm 96 dates from Naumann’s return to Dresden in 1786, and Psalm 103 and the brief one-movement cantata Kommt herzu from 1790. While Naumann himself was a Protestant, the Dresden court was Catholic; Psalm 96 and the cantata are rare instances of Naumann having an opportunity to set German-language texts for Protestant devotions—the psalm for Duke Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and the cantata for the Herrnhuter Brüdergemeinde of the Moravian Church, inspired by a visit of Naumann to that devout Pietistic community (after its founding in 1727 it practiced an uninterrupted watch of prayer by its members for 100 years). Gustaf Wasa, an opera on the Swedish king who liberated his country from Danish thralldom, was for decades after its premiere the Swedish national opera (ArkivMusic has reissued the complete Virgin Classics recording with Nicolai Gedda). For unknown reasons the 1803 Breitkopf & Härtel edition of Psalm 96 included the opera’s overture as a musical preface, and so it is offered here.
During a visit to Dresden in 1789, Mozart peremptorily dismissed a Naumann Mass as “very poor stuff,” and doubtless that verdict affected Naumann’s posthumous fortunes. A typical representative of the galant style, his music is neither fish nor fowl for typical expectations regarding either Baroque or Classical-era music; its straightforward simplicity lacks the complexity of the former’s use of polyphony and the latter’s emphasis upon extended thematic and formal development. Even in his own day, Naumann’s music was stylistically in the conservative rearguard (which ideally suited him for the Dresden court); the Wasa Overture sounds startlingly like a work of Handel, and the various psalm and Mass movements demonstrate only a nodding acquaintance with the music of Haydn and no contact with that of Mozart. The harmonies are unenterprising, the melodies ordinary, the rhetorical gestures predictable. Somewhat surprisingly, however, Naumann’s music is not dull; while only moderately pleasant rather than memorable, it fulfills its intended ecclesial functions ably and even winningly. Unlike, say, the Mozart, Berlioz, and Verdi Requiems or Beethoven’s Missa solemnis, these are psalm and Mass settings that are subordinate to liturgical purposes; they do not draw attention to themselves in ways that distract one from devotional concentration, but rather humbly support it. They simply are not constructed to sustain the concentrated scrutiny of independent listening in the concert hall, and this as much as other factors explains why they have fallen largely into oblivion.
These two CDs are reissues, the first originally released in 1996 and the second in 1999. All the recordings are premieres and remain the sole versions available. The performances (by the same groups in both cases, despite their changes of names) leave nothing to be desired. The instrumental ensemble uses period instruments and plays with refined polish; the chorus is first-rate in every way; the soloists (Kai Wessel and Werner Güra having since achieved greater prominence) without exception all sing their brief parts ably. The digipaks contain informative booklets with texts in the original German and Latin with English translation. An online search has also located these two releases as a combined two-CD budget set for about the same price as each item individually, though I was not able to determine any product details such as inclusion of libretti. For those interested in filling in their collections with music from the secondary ranks of later 18th-century music in general and the galant composers in particular, these discs can be safely recommended.
FANFARE: James A. Altena
Very interesting. I would love to enjoy more music from this period, whether masses, choral, opera or whatever. This goes to my wishlist. I may have an occassional piece to add myself, but it is not really a time period I know all that well beyond some orchestral pieces and operas (at least, compared to the romantic period, which I know very well).
Quote from: mc ukrneal on June 12, 2012, 12:00:37 PM
Very interesting. I would love to enjoy more music from this period, whether masses, choral, opera or whatever. This goes to my wishlist. I may have an occassional piece to add myself, but it is not really a time period I know all that well beyond some orchestral pieces and operas (at least, compared to the romantic period, which I know very well).
Ah, and precisely the reason for this thread, Neal. Hopefully, we shall all pool our knowledge and all know a bunch soon. :)
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I see Austria at the time as being dominated liturgically from 2 different centers; the first (but not necessarily the most important) was th Vienna/Eisenstadt axis. Vienna had all the composers of the Imperial Court, and they were a multitude;
Fux, Caldara, Hasse, Reutter, Wagenseil, Leopold Hoffmann, Florian Gassmann, Gottlieb Muffat the court organist and several others. Eisenstadt had Haydn and Werner. Until <>1757 Vienna also had Michael Haydn who started young in the church music business.
Salzburg, on the other hand, was perhaps the world leader in church music from Baroque times until the beginning of the 19th century. Heinrich Biber, Georg Muffat (Gottlieb's father), Eberlin, Michael Haydn, Leopold and Wolfgang Mozart and numerous others.
These so-called "South German" composers were not culturally tied to the North German Berlin/Potsdam/Dresden group. In the musical publications of the times, the Germans totally belittled the Austrians as being not serious about composition (or anything else). The main influence then came from Italy. Most of Italy was under the control of the HRE, thus from Vienna. The style that prevailed was significantly Neapolitan with a small dose of French for good measure. In secular music, some German ideas made their way in, such as the minuet into the symphony.
It is a sad truth that there aren't a lot of recordings of these composers available. And in some cases, like Hasse, even though he wrote a lot of sacred music, the recordings available are mainly of his operas, oratorios and some chamber music. Some exceptions are the ever-popular Requiems. His is a typical case. Still, there is enough out there to collect a nice amount of masses, and as a side note, to get a nice sampling of sacred/secular music too. Sacred/secular? Well, that's coming along. The plan here is to make listening to a mass into a time-adventure. The means certainly exist to do that. :)
8)
I suggest a couple of Johann Naumann masses to listen to alongside the more familiar works of Mozart and Haydn. Although these masses are from Dresden, I offer them as a study of Haydn's influence on the wider musical world. Also, Johann Hasse is responsible for furthering Naumann's career. It is interesting to note that although Naumann was a protestant, he worked at a Catholic court. The years we are considering here are 1786-1806. Mozart criticized Naumann's work as dull stuff, but I humbly disagree!
What a wonderful CD! I spent the last couple of days exploring Frank Martin, an exceptional composer, but it is great to come back to an earlier era.
I am glad you started this thread, but I will be doing more reading than posting because, while I like mass settings and I love Classical era music, I am not a fan of masses from that period. I tend to prefer masses from the pre-Baroque. But, I am open to learning more about Classical era masses - so I will be an avid lurker.
:)
Quote from: Arnold on June 12, 2012, 06:18:35 PM
I am glad you started this thread, but I will be doing more reading than posting because, while I like mass settings and I love Classical era music, I am not a fan of masses from that period. I tend to prefer masses from the pre-Baroque. But, I am open to learning more about Classical era masses - so I will be an avid lurker.
:)
:) Lurk away, Arnold. In any case there are some splendid masses in this era too. Actually, there is so much good mass music out there that this is why I delimited it to a certain place and time, else it would simply get out of hand! Also, I think that if one gains more familiarity with the masses of, for example, Michael Haydn, that interest will surely grow. Hope so. :)
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 12, 2012, 11:17:43 AM
Yes indeed, it is a little fragment in d minor. Haydn wrote on the first page "a little mass with some good mixed with some bad". I love that! Anyway, I think the entire remaining parts total less than 10 minutes. :-\
So inachevée, is it? Pity! (Though, to be sure, low in the rank of Things Haydn Which Might Have Been.) A complete Mass by "Papa" in stile antico would be an interesting score to peruse.
Quote from: karlhenning on June 13, 2012, 04:32:59 AM
So inachevée, is it? Pity! (Though, to be sure, low in the rank of Things Haydn Which Might Have Been.) A complete Mass by "Papa" in stile antico would be an interesting score to peruse.
Well, not so much incomplete as lost, as near as I can tell. Pages and whole sections of it gone off. The Mrs. probably used it for hair rollers, as I've heard she did with some of his manuscripts... :-\
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Part 2 - Outline of sacred and secular entwining
This essay, in its first form, was written for The Haydn Haus, and concentrated on the music of Joseph Haydn. I know that not everyone here who may be a fan of Sacred Music is also necessarily a fan of Haydn, and so may not have seen this. In any case, it is vital to my goal to review this material even with people who have seen some of it before. I have added some things and also made it less specifically Haydn, since the topic is way bigger than just him (as hard as that is for me to admit! :) ).
One of many topics which is still a mystery to me is the way that secular music was incorporated into the celebration of the mass at that time. Where does one fit a symphony or concerto into a mass? After all, it has no liturgical significance. Or maybe it does and we just don't realize. ??
In any case, I decided to do some research and see if I could discover this out. It goes without saying that nowhere in any of my reading does it say 'and then after the Credo, we play the first movement of the symphony in c minor...' ::) The first question that I wanted to get answered was 'how many parts of the mass are there?'. And the answer, of course, was 'it depends'. But after various false starts, I came up with a solution that satisfied me. The level that I needed to start at, the top level as it were, is divided into two parts. They would be the 'Ordinary' and the 'Proper'. I don't know about you, but Ordinary seems very... common to me. And actually, that's exactly what it is. It contains the five or six parts (not everyone agrees that the Benedictus is a standalone part) that are common to every mass, which is to say, they are what makes a Full Mass. They didn't all start out being the Ordinary at the same time, but over the centuries, and by the time we are interested in (second half of the 18th Century in Vienna), the Ordinary consisted in the Kyrie, the Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Benedictus and Agnus Dei. When you buy a recording of a mass from this era, no matter how many parts each of these is subdivided into, these six parts will be represented (of course, Requiems are a special case. Let's leave them out of this for now). The subdivision into many parts was far more prevalent in the Baroque and before, but still persisted in the Classical Era. It seems to have disappeared by the Romantic.
The prevailing model for masses at the time was the Neapolitan Mass. As you can imagine, being from Baroque Naples, the opera capital of the world, these masses were rather ornate. And of course, in pre-Josephinian Vienna, gilding the lily was standard procedure. So in a big mass, you would have your 6 parts of the Ordinary divided into a total of as many as 18 parts in Haydn's Mass in C, Hob 22_05. This was Haydn's largest mass. However, it didn't set any records for size in general, just for him.
I will follow this with a list of the parts that would be played at a typical Missa longa, or what we would call at other times and places a Missa solemnis. Parts of the Ordinary are in CAPS, while parts or the Proper, which changed with every day of the Liturgical Calendar, and in lower case. In parentheses I put a typical piece or movement of secular music that would have been played at that point. This might be a good time to point out that what we call Church Symphonies really were Church Symphonies! Different ones for different times of year, like Lamentation (#26) probably for Holy Week. Some of these already don't have a minuet movement, but for those that do, it wasn't used in church, and probably was added as an option to make the work more flexible in its uses outside of church. Following is a layout of how a Solemn Mass (or as the Austrians called it, a 'Missa Longa').
• Opening music: Organ solos and/or trumpet/timpani fanfares. Toccatas are a good choice here.
• Music (Ordinary): a 'Tantum ergo' or an 'Asperges me'
• Music (Proper) and SPOKEN PRAYER: Introit simultaneously with penitential prayers
• Music KYRIE:
o Kyrie eleison
o Christe eleison
o Kyrie eleison
• Music GLORIA
o Gloria in excelsis Deo
o Laudamus te
o Gratias agimus tibi
o Domine Deus, Rex coelestis
o Qui tollis peccata Mundi
o Quoniam tu solus sanctus
o Cum Sancto Spiritu
• Prayer: Collect
• Reading: Epistle
• Music: Gradual (1st movement of a symphony or concerto) or an Epistle Sonata in a shorter mass (Missa brevis)
• Music: Alleluia or Tract (could be a motet or an Alleluia)
• Spoken: Gospel and Homily (Sermon)
• Instrumental music: Trumpet & Timpani fanfares to remind people of the angels playing trumpets in heaven.
• Music CREDO:
o Credo in unum Deum
o Et incarnatus est
o Et resurrexit
• Music & PRAYER: Offertory (2nd movement of symphony or concerto)
• Prayer & Secret (Private Prayer)
• Prayer: Preface (Public Prayer)
• MUSIC: SANCTUS
o Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
o Pleni sunt coeli
• BENEDICTUS
• PRAYER: Eucharist Prayer
• PRAYER: Lord's Prayer
• MUSIC: AGNUS DEI
o Agnus Dei
o Dona nobis pacem
• Music: Communion (3rd movement of symphony (Finale really, since minuet (if any) was removed) or concerto
• Prayer: Post Communion
• MUSIC: Dismissal ('Ite, Missa est') (often such a short piece that it was not written out. Very few are extant)
• SPOKEN: Closing Blessing
• Music: organ postludium and/or trumpet/timpani fanfares
Anyway, I think this gives a much better idea of what a great event was made out of going to mass. Unlike current liturgical practice, it seems like all this artistic splendor could have inspired a true spiritual experience. That was its intention anyway. Combined with the physical art, the church itself, the statuary, painting, stained glass etc, it had to be a mind boggling display!
I point out here that I collected information from several places and consolidated it into this list. So any mistakes or misunderstandings are my own. I hope that some of you whose knowledge is more in depth than my own will take this opportunity to expand this discussion. For myself, I intend to take a Missa brevis from the early period and couple it with an organ concerto in the appropriate sequence and see how it sounds. Also, it should be noted that it was not unusual to start off with a Te Deum either in the event that the mass was celebratory. And to make a more expanded and/or unusual (once a year) work, the entire Stabat Mater was played instead of the Tract on the Feast of the Seven Dolors, which must have been quite an experience!!
Next installment I want to talk about a few mass music recreations that I have put together. It is something that you could do yourself with minimal effort and suddenly discover that listening to a Mass is, in fact, a wonderfully enjoyable experience which spans an entire range of musical genres and experiences.
Please feel free to expand on this outline. I know it doesn't go into great depth, but maybe it is enough to pique your interest, as it did mine. :)
8)
QuoteAnyway, I think this gives a much better idea of what a great event was made out of going to mass. Unlike current liturgical practice, it seems like all this artistic splendor could have inspired a true spiritual experience. That was its intention anyway. Combined with the physical art, the church itself, the statuary, painting, stained glass etc, it had to be a mind boggling display!
I checked out the second Heartz book on
Haydn, Mozart and the Viennese School, and have been reading the first chapter which covers the church music of the period 1740-1780. You are right about the tendency to add spectacle to the event, and he quotes some contemporary critics who remarked on the aspect of bringing in operatic singers and style to liturgical music - something they did not like very much. Their main complaint was that, to the contrary, this tendency did not enhance the spiritual experience and tended to undermine the atmosphere for contemplative prayer.
I tend to agree with them, and this is probably one reason why I am not as interested in the sacred music of this period (and later), and prefer to hear mass settings from the Baroque and before. Not that I look to this music for a spiritual experience, but when I want opera I'll listen to one, and prefer sacred music to be distinct from that style.
:)
Quote from: Arnold on June 16, 2012, 07:03:48 PM
I checked out the second Heartz book on Haydn, Mozart and the Viennese School, and have been reading the first chapter which covers the church music of the period 1740-1780. You are right about the tendency to add spectacle to the event, and he quotes some contemporary critics who remarked on the aspect of bringing in operatic singers and style to liturgical music - something they did not like very much. Their main complaint was that, to the contrary, this tendency did not enhance the spiritual experience and tended to undermine the atmosphere for contemplative prayer.
I tend to agree with them, and this is probably one reason why I am not as interested in the sacred music of this period (and later), and prefer to hear mass settings from the Baroque and before. Not that I look to this music for a spiritual experience, but when I want opera I'll listen to one, and prefer sacred music to be distinct from that style.
:)
Arnold,
I would reply thusly;
Because some conservatives in the 18th century claimed that masses had turned into operas, doesn't make it true. Neither are they 'concert masses' like Beethoven's
Missa Solemnis', or Britten's
'War Requiem' or Bernstein's
Mass. They are, and were always intended to be, masses. It would be fair, however, to call them 'Symphonic Masses' or 'Orchestral Masses' though, because it's true that they are 'style concertato' because there are independent instrumental parts playing along with the vocal and choral parts. This distinguishes them from the style called
da Capella where the instrumental parts double the vocal parts. Most Baroque masses that used instruments were
da Capella.
How are they not operatic? Let me count the ways;
1) The text was totally unchanged from mass to mass. There was never any varying, they were liturgically constant and 'within the rules' of sacred music. And always in Latin, the sacred language.
2) Choruses. They all have great sections of choral singing, a customary part of the mass but not part of the opera at that time.
3) Contrapuntal style; by tradition, counterpoint was a huge part of sung and played church music. It is NOT a part of opera, except (oddly enough) when they are referring to its use in church music. Listen to the final parts of almost any Credo or Gloria and there is always a fugue.
4) Operatic arias of that time nearly always included
da capo repeats. Church 'arias'
never include them.
5) Coloratura; never in church, always in opera.
6) Recitative; never in church, always in opera.
So, I am saying that Hearst is REALLY saying that this is what some people said back then, he is not saying that this is what actually was. Would you not agree on that basis?
FWIW, I am perfectly fine with your preference for Baroque and earlier church music. It is all and only a matter of personal preference after all. Just keep an open mind and in a few days I am going to post an idea here that I hope you will try. Maybe your feeling will change. Or not. :)
8)
I just require clarification, here, Gurn. In points 4 and 6, when you say church doesn't include a 'da capo' and "never in Church", do you actually mean "never in a mass"? I'm thinking particularly of Bach's Passions*, which were (meant to be) performed in a church and which include said features. Or am I simply comparing apples and oranges in a way that they shouldn't be?
*Since I'm most familiar with them, among similar works from the same period
Quote from: Opus106 on June 17, 2012, 09:18:15 AM
I just require clarification, here, Gurn. In points 4 and 6, when you say church doesn't include a 'da capo' and "never in Church", do you actually mean "never in a mass"? I'm thinking particularly of Bach's Passions*, which were (meant to be) performed in a church and which include said features. Or am I simply comparing apples and oranges in a way that they shouldn't be?
*Since I'm most familiar with them, among similar works from the same period
Yes, I do mean that. Oratorios, too, were sometimes performed in church, and had those features, but clearly weren't masses. My bad... :-[
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Thanks. :)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 17, 2012, 08:53:58 AM
So, I am saying that Hearst is REALLY saying that this is what some people said back then, he is not saying that this is what actually was. Would you not agree on that basis?
I agree with the points you raise in your post - but, what I got from the criticism was that they were saying that the
singers used were opera singers, with that style overtaking what up to then had been a different kind of singing for sacred works. I don't think anyone was saying that masses were becoming too much like operas, only that the singing and also even some of the melodies used were crossing over from the theater over to the church.
I still appreciate Haydn's masses and am very much interested in the historical aspect of this thread, i.e. reconstructing the various sections interpolated into the mass texts - very interesting stuff!
:)
Quote from: Arnold on June 17, 2012, 12:32:51 PM
I agree with the points you raise in your post - but, what I got from the criticism was that they were saying that the singers used were opera singers, with that style overtaking what up to then had been a different kind of singing for sacred works. I don't think anyone was saying that masses were becoming too much like operas, only that the singing and also even some of the melodies used were crossing over from the theater over to the church.
I still appreciate Haydn's masses and am very much interested in the historical aspect of this thread, i.e. reconstructing the various sections interpolated into the mass texts - very interesting stuff!
:)
Actually, Dr. Charles Burney, as an example said exactly that. I'll run across the quote again and print it, but basically he said the same thing you did in your post! :D
It's true that some of the same singers were used, but I have to say that I'm not entirely sure that this was unique in place and time. AFAIK, the same was done before and after in Austria and elsewhere. Except when only the nuns sang... :-\
Glad you're enjoying the history; me too! :)
8)
In looking over the Heartz book, there are several critics who complain of the insertion of operatic arias into the mass, Ditters complains of a music director, Tobias Gsur, at Schottenkieche:
QuoteThere is hardly any opera - buffa as well as seria - which he does not know how to plunder line by line (as the experts told me) and use most cleverly. ... I myself was present in this church wen they performed such arias that had been removed from operas and metamorphosed into sa Slave Regina or a Regina coeli ...
Also, this from Joseph Richter:
QuoteThus there soon slipped into the church style an unnoticed trio from a minuet, then the thrum-thrum of a symphony, then again fragments of waltzing music, and finally half and whole opera arias; moreover they thought nothing of profaning God's temple with the crowing of Italian capons. Comic opera singers of both sexes exchanged the theater for the church with regularity.
Burney was more kind, and later critics praise the reforms of Joseph II who did away with most of the "abuses" referred to in the excerpts as well as much of the ornaments, statues, flags and other decorations which had made the mass more of a spectacle.
All very interesting, but not intended to derail this thread, however.
:)
Quote from: Arnold on June 17, 2012, 01:59:13 PM
In looking over the Heartz book, there are several critics who complain of the insertion of operatic arias into the mass, Ditters complains of a music director, Tobias Gsur, at Schottenkieche:
Also, this from Joseph Richter:
Burney was more kind, and later critics praise the reforms of Joseph II who did away with most of the "abuses" referred to in the excerpts as well as much of the ornaments, statues, flags and other decorations which had made the mass more of a spectacle.
All very interesting, but not intended to derail this thread, however.
:)
:D Well, there's no accounting for what may have happened at any one place. Local music directors had a big measure of autonomy in putting a programme together. One can only assume that they were responding to the desires of their patrons.
One can't let the exception become the rule though; you can be very, very certain that Archbishop Colleredo in Salzburg didn't have a 3 ring circus in
his cathedral, nor did Prince Esterhazy in Eisenstadt. I would strongly suspicion that such excesses took place far from Vienna, out in the boondocks. :)
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 17, 2012, 02:30:45 PM
:D Well, there's no accounting for what may have happened at any one place. Local music directors had a big measure of autonomy in putting a programme together. One can only assume that they were responding to the desires of their patrons.
One can't let the exception become the rule though; you can be very, very certain that Archbishop Colleredo in Salzburg didn't have a 3 ring circus in his cathedral, nor did Prince Esterhazy in Eisenstadt. I would strongly suspicion that such excesses took place far from Vienna, out in the boondocks. :)
8)
Except that Richter quote
was about how church music had "degenerated" in Vienna. (See p. 15 of the Heartz book.)
:D
Quote from: Arnold on June 17, 2012, 02:41:59 PM
Except that Richter quote was about how church music had "degenerated" in Vienna. (See p. 15 of the Heartz book.)
:D
Well, Vienna proper was a large and rowdy city. Truly, anything could have happened there. And clearly it did, since it stimulated the "Josephinian Reforms". This doesn't indicate that bizarrerie was the rule throughout the country and Age. Certain elements of the 'spectacle', for example, the statues, painting, stained glass, architecture, trumpets and timpani (and trombones doubling voices), organ music; all of these are direct holdovers from much earlier times. For the most part, even the music played didn't change (for example, there was little trumpet music being written any more, and yet it was still played at every mass!). So the main difference from earlier times was the style I referred to earlier of having independent parts for the instruments rather than doubling the voices. As you note, there are exceptions to everything, but I think one should take the normative as the rule, not the bizarre exception. :)
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 17, 2012, 04:25:52 PM
Well, Vienna proper was a large and rowdy city. Truly, anything could have happened there. And clearly it did, since it stimulated the "Josephinian Reforms". This doesn't indicate that bizarrerie was the rule throughout the country and Age. Certain elements of the 'spectacle', for example, the statues, painting, stained glass, architecture, trumpets and timpani (and trombones doubling voices), organ music; all of these are direct holdovers from much earlier times. For the most part, even the music played didn't change (for example, there was little trumpet music being written any more, and yet it was still played at every mass!). So the main difference from earlier times was the style I referred to earlier of having independent parts for the instruments rather than doubling the voices. As you note, there are exceptions to everything, but I think one should take the normative as the rule, not the bizarre exception. :)
8)
Fair enough. But I think you and I just have different impressions about this aspect of the church music of this period and how it was perceived by some critics. The bottom-line, however, is not what some critics of the period thought of changes they did not approve of, but how we react to the music today. And I really didn't want what I'd read in Hertz's book to derail the thread.
:)
Part 4 – Some Listening Ideas
In trying to demonstrate the high listening quality of a Mass, I realized that the only thing that would work for me is a dose of historical authenticity. I'm not talking here about whether the damned fiddler uses vibrato or not, but instead, whether including all of the adjunct music that we've been talking about will enhance the listening experience.
With few exceptions, when one purchases a CD with Mass X on it, that's precisely what one gets; the Ordinary of Mass X. However, nowhere in the Catholic world, and especially not in Austria in the 18th century, would one ever hear the Ordinary of a Mass played on its own. Despite the beauty of the individual bits and even of the whole, nothing about the experience translates into any sort of enhanced spiritual ceremony when heard that way.
Which is the reason that I got interested in finding out the history and circumstances of a mass in my favorite period of musical history. Obviously, you aren't limited in any way by my preferences; if you prefer Paris in 1725, or Leipzig in 1740 or wherever, you have only to do some research and find the appropriate music and do it yourself. It is the idea + the execution that makes this work.
As I mentioned in an earlier essay, I started this project while working on a little Haydn project. So it was only natural that this first experiment would involve a mass of his. In order to demonstrate what I came up with, I will copy the mass outline from the previous essay, then add in the music I used to 'fill in the blanks'. I will include the performers and disks I used to do it, but really, that is secondary to what you might already have on hand.
A Missa solemnis from 1768; Eisenstadt
• Opening music: Organ solos and/or trumpet/timpani fanfares. Toccatas are a good choice here. Hasse Concerto in F for Solo Organ – Allegro then Altenburg Concerto in C for 7 Trumpets & Timpani – Allegro
• Music (Ordinary): a 'Tantum ergo' or an 'Asperges me'
• Music (Proper) and SPOKEN PRAYER: Introit simultaneously with penitential prayers
Hob XXII: 04 Mass in Eb 'Grosse Orgelsolomesse' – Joseph Haydn
• Music KYRIE:
o Kyrie: Kyrie eleison
• Gloria:
o Gloria in excelsis Deo
o Gratias agimus tibi
o Quoniam tu solus sanctus
• Prayer: Collect
• Reading: Epistle
• Music: Gradual (1st movement of a symphony or concerto
o Hob I: 22 Symphony in Eb – Adagio
• Music: Alleluia or Tract (could be a motet or an Alleluia)
o Hasse Concerto in F for Solo Organ – Andante
• Spoken: Gospel and Homily (Sermon)
• Instrumental music: Trumpet & Timpani fanfares to remind people of the angels playing trumpets in heaven.
o Altenburg Concerto in C for 7 Trumpets & Timpani – Andante
• Music CREDO:
o Credo in unum Deum
o Et incarnatus est
o Et resurrexit
• Music & PRAYER: Offertory (2nd movement of symphony or concerto)
o Hob I: 22 Symphony in Eb (2nd movement) - Presto
• Prayer & Secret (Private Prayer)
• Prayer: Preface (Public Prayer)
• MUSIC: SANCTUS
o Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
o Pleni sunt coeli
• BENEDICTUS
• PRAYER: Eucharist Prayer
• PRAYER: Lord's Prayer
• MUSIC: AGNUS DEI
o Agnus Dei
o Dona nobis pacem
• Music: Communion (3rd movement of symphony (Finale really, since minuet (if any) was removed);
o Hob I: 22 Symphony in Eb - Finale: Presto
• Prayer: Post Communion
• MUSIC: Dismissal ('Ite, Missa est') (often such a short piece that it was not written out. Very few are extant)
• SPOKEN: Closing Blessing
• Music: organ postludium and/or trumpet/timpani fanfares
o Altenburg Concerto in C for 7 Trumpets & Timpani - Vivace
o Hasse Concerto in F for Solo Organ - Minuet: Allegro
For my own edification, I wrote a set of liner notes to help me remember what I was listening to. :) They are pretty basic.
In critiquing this project ex post facto, there are some things I would change. For example, I wouldn't have used Hasse's concerto in F, I would have used the one in C major. I didn't have it at the time. Also, I wouldn't have missed the opportunity to use a motet after the Gradual. There again, I didn't have one at the time that was suitable, so better none at all. Ultimately though, I was very pleased with this project, and I commend it to you as strongly as I know how, if you are a fan of church music. I listened to it with some friends to see what they thought, and the consensus was very positive. If you do try it, please let me know how it went for you, and post here what works you used. I will be posting some others soon, hopefully they will be a bit more sophisticated, and maybe one or another will appeal to you.
The 'liner notes'
The Mass
In choosing a mass for this recreation, I had a few criteria that I wanted to satisfy. Obviously, the first was that it be a Haydn Missa longa. Before this Mass in Eb, one must go all the way back to 1749-50 for another mass, and both of those two, in F and in G, were Missa brevis forms, and student works besides. When Haydn was hired by the Esterházy family in 1761, it was as assistant Kapellmeister, basically in charge of everything to do with music except writing masses. That duty remained with the head man, Gregory Werner. But Werner died in 1766, and Haydn inherited all of his responsibilities also. So this mass is his first complete Missa longa, and his first for the Esterházy family.
Completed and first performed in 1768, the mass is scored for the following performers; 4 solo voices (S—A—T—B), Chorus, 2 English Horns, 2 Horns, 2 Trumpets, Timpani, 2 Violins, Continuo & Organ obbligato. Pretty much standard layout with the exception of the English Horns, which were used at that time in Vienna and virtually no where else. They impart a beautiful tenor oboe sound to the ensemble that is incomparable. They are also responsible for my choice of the second major work that was part of the ceremony; the symphony of 1764, also in Eb, and often called 'The Philosopher'. In addition to the shared tonic, the symphony also is the only published 18th century symphony (or from any time at all, as far as I know) in which the 2 oboes are replaced by 2 English Horns. The pairing of these two works thus became a no-brainer. As you will hear, they fit together perfectly.
The other two pieces used here, the solo organ concerto by Johann Hasse and the Trumpet & Timpani concerto by Altenburg are chosen for their propriety. Johann Adolf Hasse (b. near Hamburg, 1699— d. Venice—1783), long-lived and highly praised throughout his life, was best known by far as a composer of operas (where he had teamed up with Metastasio, the leading librettist of the era) and vocal works, including cantatas, oratorios and dozens of motets and other vocal works in the Italian style. He worked in Vienna, Dresden, Berlin/Potsdam and various Italian The concerto heard here was first published as one of a set of six in London, in 1743.
Johann Ernst Altenburg (b Weissenfels, 15 June 1734; d Bitterfeld, 14 May 1801). German trumpeter, organist and teacher. He is best known for his valuable treatise "On the Heroic and Musical Trumpeters' & Kettledrummers' Art", which, though finished in manuscript and offered on a subscription basis by J.A. Hiller as early as 1770, was not published until 1795. It contains important information on the declining position of court and field trumpeters, seen at first hand, and of their tightly knit organization ('Cameradschaft') founded on a privilege granted by the Holy Roman Emperors since 1623. It is not absolutely known whether the work played here under his was entirely of his own composition, or whether it was copied out as a lesson for his teaching duties. In any case, it is a wonderful example of trumpet and timpani usage.
Secular Music in the Liturgy
As I have no desire to repeat the entire essay here, I wish to only make a couple of points in relation to this performance. First, the blueprint isn't written in stone. It is a general guideline for Viennese style masses, but each day varied in the music used and the exact emphasis placed on certain sections. A lot of that is determined by who is in attendance. Second is the fact that in a weekday mass there would be motets that were specific to the saint whose day is being celebrated. And on Sundays, the Church Calendar specified particular observances also. Christmas and Easter are obvious choices for special masses. However, this particular attempt is aimed at a more generic Sunday mass, with the Prince and family in attendance. Thus the 7 trumpets....
8)
Quote from: Leo K on June 12, 2012, 10:29:26 AM
I suggest a couple of Johann Naumann masses to listen to alongside the more familiar works of Mozart and Haydn. Although these masses are from Dresden, I offer them as a study of Haydn's influence on the wider musical world. Also, Johann Hasse is responsible for furthering Naumann's career. It is interesting to note that although Naumann was a protestant, he worked at a Catholic court. The years we are considering here are 1786-1806. Mozart criticized Naumann's work as dull stuff, but I humbly disagree!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/517EzQLFCDL._SL500_AA280_.jpg)
Johann Gottlieb Naumann: Mass No. 18, in D minor (1794), Mass No.21 in C Minor (1786-1806)
Collegium Instrumentale, Dir. Peter Kopp
These works are modest masses with great beauty. The period instruments, and the clarinets in particular, give the flavor of autumn to the orchestration. I really love this recording, and this is a very valuable addition to my 18th Century Mass collection, of which I turn to all the time for peace and reflection. Naumann's liturgical music is not flashy, but solid and very devotional.
Leo,
Well, I'm game; it took me a while (Ars Musici doesn't just pop right up) but I found it and it's on the way. I have also already a tiny amount of music by his contemporaries so I should be able to put something together here. Thanks for the tip on this. There is a whole different brand of grandeur in Dresden! :)
8)
I've been dipping into the three volume Heartz books and found a fascinating description of a episode when Haydn went to London with Salomon. On the way they stopped off in Bonn where Salomon was born. This is a short excerpt from an account told in 1805 by Haydn:
Salomon took Haydn on Sunday to the court chapel to hear Mass. Hardly had they found themselves a good place, when the High Mass began. The first sounds announced a work of Haydn's. (p. 323)
Heartz surmises that the mass that was performed was Haydn's second Missa Cellensis - he discounts the first mass with this title because of its length and also because it is not as masterfully written, plus, the second one was composed within a few years of the visit. He then devotes about five pages to describing the mass with musical examples.
This sparked my interest and I plan on pulling that mass up and listening as I read that section.
:)
Quote from: Arnold on June 19, 2012, 05:28:58 PM
I've been dipping into the three volume Heartz books and found a fascinating description of a episode when Haydn went to London with Salomon. On the way they stopped off in Bonn where Salomon was born. This is a short excerpt from an account told in 1805 by Haydn:
Salomon took Haydn on Sunday to the court chapel to hear Mass. Hardly had they found themselves a good place, when the High Mass began. The first sounds announced a work of Haydn's. (p. 323)
Heartz surmises that the mass that was performed was Haydn's second Missa Cellensis - he discounts the first mass with this title because of its length and also because it is not as masterfully written, plus, the second one was composed within a few years of the visit. He then devotes about five pages to describing the mass with musical examples.
This sparked my interest and I plan on pulling that mass up and listening as I read that section.
:)
Yes, I remember that part. The
Missa Cellensis was one of Haydn's most beautiful masses, IMO. It was the last one he wrote before the Josephinian Reforms stopped him writing masses altogether. He didn't start again until 15 years later when Joseph was dead. Thanks for the page number; I'm going back to reread it myself. :)
8)
I was wondering when your next book would be out! ;D Masses? Cool! Will there be secret societies, church conspiracies, cloak and dagger murder, and all out mayhem throughout?
(http://www.runemasterstudios.com/graemlins/images/popcorn.gif)
Bill munches popcorn in anticipation of Dan Brown moments in this thread.
Quote from: Bogey on June 19, 2012, 05:55:40 PM
I was wondering when your next book would be out! ;D Masses? Cool! Will there be secret societies, church conspiracies, cloak and dagger murder, and all out mayhem throughout?
(http://www.runemasterstudios.com/graemlins/images/popcorn.gif)
Bill munches popcorn in anticipation of Dan Brown moments in this thread.
But of course! In fact, we were waiting for you to contribute your share. :)
I like to keep you off-balance, Bill. Never know what to expect. ;)
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 19, 2012, 05:16:56 PM
Leo,
Well, I'm game; it took me a while (Ars Musici doesn't just pop right up) but I found it and it's on the way. I have also already a tiny amount of music by his contemporaries so I should be able to put something together here. Thanks for the tip on this. There is a whole different brand of grandeur in Dresden! :)
8)
If it's not too late, compare with deep discount. It was $11.61 there. If there is anything else you'd like from the label (or Carus), some are at this price, some a hair higher, but others more (with free shipping in the US) and you have until June 24.
Quote from: mc ukrneal on June 20, 2012, 12:13:26 AM
If it's not too late, compare with deep discount. It was $11.61 there. If there is anything else you'd like from the label (or Carus), some are at this price, some a hair higher, but others more (with free shipping in the US) and you have until June 24.
I ended up getting it at Classical Music Superstore for $9.15!! Trouble was, typing "Naumann" into Amazon's search engine didn't produce any results. I had a similar issue last week with a disk called "Jubilate Deo", which is also, coincidentally (?) on Ars musici. CMS had them both for a song though, just took a while getting there! Carus, eh? Interesting label. :)
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 20, 2012, 04:20:22 AM
I ended up getting it at Classical Music Superstore for $9.15!! Trouble was, typing "Naumann" into Amazon's search engine didn't produce any results. I had a similar issue last week with a disk called "Jubilate Deo", which is also, coincidentally (?) on Ars musici. CMS had them both for a song though, just took a while getting there! Carus, eh? Interesting label. :)
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Ah, but add the 2.99 shipping and it comes out more. Still, not a big difference (and I guess I shouldn't mention it's down to 9.09). Strange that you didn't get it the first time you typed it. I had problems only because I couldn't spell it right the first few times, but eventually got it. This Jubilate Deo disc is $10.58 at Deep Discount and in stock (not sure how that compares). Anyway, may be worth a gander.
Title for future piece: Stolen Dan Brown Moments
Quote from: mc ukrneal on June 20, 2012, 04:31:29 AM
Ah, but add the 2.99 shipping and it comes out more. Still, not a big difference (and I guess I shouldn't mention it's down to 9.09). Strange that you didn't get it the first time you typed it. I had problems only because I couldn't spell it right the first few times, but eventually got it. This Jubilate Deo disc is $10.58 at Deep Discount and in stock (not sure how that compares). Anyway, may be worth a gander.
Yes, funny to me how prices changes almost hourly. For amusement, I put things in my cart at Amazon and every time I go check I get a note that says "Since you put X in your cart, the price has changed from Y to Z. You save .03!". ::)
Well, I am expecting that disk of motets to arrive today. I do use Deep Discount often, they are always a good reliable vendor. But CMS have found it profitable to build a teleporter right to my music room.... :D (a trick I learned from Harry). ;)
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Quote from: karlhenning on June 20, 2012, 04:39:24 AM
Title for future piece: Stolen Dan Brown Moments
That's some sort of clever code, isn't it Karl? $:)
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Dolphy and da Vinci . . . .
Fascinating topic, Gurn!
Joining the debate from the point of view of an Eastern Orthodox Christian, I tend to side with those who viewed which suspicion the practice of intermingling secular and liturgical music in the specific context of a mass offered in church or chapel. The whole Orthodox philosophy of mass (liturgy) is completely alien and outright hostile not only to such innovations but even to instrumental music being used during the office. The Orthodox mass is solely and completely vocal and its setting and actions have been prescribed and codified at least since St. John Chrysostomos. If you go to a mass in Bucharest, Belgrade, Moscow or Athens you'll see and hear exactly the same melodies, words (in vernacular of course), gestures and ritual acts as you could have seen and heard 1,000 years ago in the Agia Sophia cathedral in Constantinople. Very little, if anything, has been changed, removed or added ever since. I recommend anyone to go to an Orthodox mass - it really is something very different from what Catholics and Protestants are accustomed with. Rachmaninoff's Liturgy of St. John Chrysostomos and All Night Vigil give a very good idea of what is all about but when the music is performed in a church, surrounded by icons and strong incense smell it can turn into something mystical even for non-religious people (I had two Spanish guests, not quite religious, at my wedding and they were completely overwhelmed and spellbound by the office).
That being said, let's not forget that the Austrian Empire has been the champion and pillar of Counter-Reformation - and it is exactly the CR that introduced "pomp and circumstance" into the mass and not only the mass. The church architecture after the Council of Trent was very different from its predecessor and anyone who has seen the Baroque churches and monasteries of Bavaria and Austria can attest to that. Just google "Ettal" for an extreme example of Baroque sophistication. I would say (just a personal opinion, feel free to criticize or demolish it :) ) that already prior to the advent of "Classicism" the purity and austerity of mass had been corrupted by the (admittedly well-intentioned) decision of the highest ecclesiastical authorities to overwhelm the common people with a lavishing display of paintings, statues, gold, silver and pompous music. One has only to compare Palestrina's masses with those of Biber or Caldara to hear soundworlds which are galaxies apart.
So the "Classical" practice of introducing symphonic and concertante intermezzos during the mass was just the latest (and logical) development in a trend that started 200 years ago. Now IMHO, from a purely aesthetical point of view it might have been quite an experience to hear such a mass in a lavishly decorated church or chapel. But when it comes to the spiritual part which is, after all, the essential part and significance of mass - I have very strong doubts that they achieved their intended purpose. But then again as I said in the introducing paragraph I come from a very different religious background regarding mass and church office. My take on the musical settings of the Catholic Mass by famous or not so famous composers is that they are splendid statements of personal faith and/or craftsmanship (the two are not always overlapped) but their spiritual and religious value is limited to "a happy few". I listen to them with pleasure and even delight in some cases but I cannot say that I have the same religious experience as if hearing a true mass in a church.
Finally I would like to say just this (with apologies to any Roman Catholic I might inadvertently offend): I would take anytime of day and night a "Classical" Mass over a Conciliar Mass (post Vatican II Council) which is not only devoid of any spiritual experience but also aesthetically and theologically offensive.
These are my very sincere and honest two cents on the topic, given from the point of view of both an active listener and an Eastern Orthodox Christian. It is not my intention to derail the thread or to offend anyone.
Quote from: Florestan on June 21, 2012, 06:07:30 AM
Finally I would like to say just this (with apologies to any Roman Catholic I might inadvertently offend): I would take anytime of day and night a "Classical" Mass over a Conciliar Mass (post Vatican II Council) which is not only devoid of any spiritual experience but also aesthetically and theologically offensive.
Even over the Bernstein? (Just kidding.)
(I've not yet brought myself to listen to the Bernstein Mass. This week doesn't look like Lenny's week, either . . . .)
Quote from: karlhenning on June 21, 2012, 07:31:55 AM
Even over the Bernstein? (Just kidding.)
(I've not yet brought myself to listen to the Bernstein Mass. This week doesn't look like Lenny's week, either . . . .)
I heard the Bernstein Mass when it first came out - a fantastic time, the early '70s - and thought it was a lot of fun with some moving passages. I have not gone back to it since then. It never struck me as a "serious" work, but part of that period's flirtation with popularizing religion, (
Godspell and
Jesus Christ Superstar also appeared in 1971). It also seemed to be Bernstein trying to establish his street cred with the "younger generation".
Might be a good time to listen to it again and see how it strikes me.
:)
Florestan, delighted you decided to join us.
I like many of the points you made here, although especially the fact that the full flowering of the 'decorated mass' (as I think of it) did not occur out of thin air, but rather it was the culmination of decades of growth in that direction.
I have never been to an Orthodox Mass, it sounds interesting. I think that the Roman Mass was very hesitant to move towards using instruments also, but they eventually overcame that. But even today, there is only one 'approved' sacred instrument, which is the organ. Everything else is a special case. In Austrian culture, the range of instruments used is a little as 2 violins & continuo all the way to a pretty substantial orchestra, but they all have the organ in common.
I was a Catholic well before Vatican II, when the liturgy was still all Latin, and there was a lot of music played (although nowhere near what you heard in Vienna!). After that, I agree, the service was sterile and joyless for me. Since that was the only reason I was hanging around anyway, I could see it was time for me to go. :-\
I will say that my entire intent in this thread is to bring out the delight and aesthetic satisfaction that derives from enjoying the full course of mass music from that time. The only way that I have been able to approach this music is as music, not as recreating a spiritual journey. To each his own, of course, I just didn't want to let only believers have all the enjoyment of this cream of the music from the era of Church dominance of European culture. I did that for far too long, to my disadvantage. :)
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Great post, Gurn ! :D
Kloster Ettal was one of the high points of my bavarian trip a few years ago. The whole compound is very impressively laid out in the beautiful setting of the bavarian piedmont. Gorgeous as the church is from the outside, my jaw dropped as I entered the building. It is stupendously decorated in rococo style with gold and cream ornaments. Although it was a rainy weekday the place was filled with the usual carloads of enthusiastic tourists. It took a good deal of mental effort to discard the distraction and imagine what the place must have looked like in Mozart's day. A high mass there must have been simply awesome.
Apart from Mozart and Haydn masses, my introductions to the austrian mass were both via the good Offices of GMG poster Gabriel (is he still around?). He sent me copies of the Naumann disc every one is referring to, as well as prompting me to go for a disc of Hummel masses. I wholeheartedly agree that the Naumann is very good. No forgotten masterpieces, but very well-crafted works of some stature. I derived less pleasure from another Naumann disc from the same interpreters (2 Psalm settings). I wonder what would be the occasion for these particular works? At 17 and 26 minutes, they are surely too substantial to be interpolated in a Mass Ordinary ?
Re: Haydn's Cellensis masses. I firmly prefer the glorious 75 minutes earlier setting, one of Haydn's happiest creations. I have 4 versions of it and the ones I prefer are those that give the music room to breathe. Thanks to this thread I now understand why: I am absolutely convinced this must have been the only acceptable way to perform such grandly demonstrative music in its intended liturgical setting. I can certainly imagine the Wilhelm or Jochum readings in the Ettal Klosterkirche, but not the zippy Preston or Wislocki !
Quote from: André on June 29, 2012, 02:09:19 PM
Great post, Gurn ! :D
Kloster Ettal was one of the high points of my bavarian trip a few years ago. The whole compound is very impressively laid out in the beautiful setting of the bavarian piedmont. Gorgeous as the church is from the outside, my jaw dropped as I entered the building. It is stupendously decorated in rococo style with gold and cream ornaments. Although it was a rainy weekday the place was filled with the usual carloads of enthusiastic tourists. It took a good deal of mental effort to discard the distraction and imagine what the place must have looked like in Mozart's day. A high mass there must have been simply awesome.
Apart from Mozart and Haydn masses, my introductions to the austrian mass were both via the good Offices of GMG poster Gabriel (is he still around?). He sent me copies of the Naumann disc every one is referring to, as well as prompting me to go for a disc of Hummel masses. I wholeheartedly agree that the Naumann is very good. No forgotten masterpieces, but very well-crafted works of some stature. I derived less pleasure from another Naumann disc from the same interpreters (2 Psalm settings). I wonder what would be the occasion for these particular works? At 17 and 26 minutes, they are surely too substantial to be interpolated in a Mass Ordinary ?
Re: Haydn's Cellensis masses. I firmly prefer the glorious 75 minutes earlier setting, one of Haydn's happiest creations. I have 4 versions of it and the ones I prefer are those that give the music room to breathe. Thanks to this thread I now understand why: I am absolutely convinced this must have been the only acceptable way to perform such grandly demonstrative music in its intended liturgical setting. I can certainly imagine the Wilhelm or Jochum readings in the Ettal Klosterkirche, but not the zippy Preston or Wislocki !
Thank you very kindly, André. I actually thought of you and your enthusiasm for sacred music while writing these essays. You are among the few who know the struggle I had to bring myself to this music, but I must say, I am very pleased that I did!
I think that Psalm settings were sung after mass. It was customary that most (if not all) of the congregation would stay in church and sing vespers and Psalms. And of course, the Lutherans had their own entire liturgy, which matched the Roman in many ways but not all. Since Naumann was in Dresden, he could have been composing for Protestants, while in Austria he probably wasn't, while in Salzburg he certainly wasn't (since they were all deported in <>1730!).
The more I read about the big monasteries the more I realize their importance to music in general and sacred music in particular. Kloster Ettal must have been a fabulous journey!
No, it is hard to enjoy 'zippy' in a mass like that one! Maestoso is what springs to mind. It may well be that the second one was a superior musical piece, but the first one is a tremendously lovely work of art.
Gabriel is an infrequent visitor these days, but still pops up from time to time. As with anyone whose taste and aesthetic sense is virtually congruent with my own, I hold him still in the highest esteem. 0:) :)
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Thanks again
Haha! Yes, I recall that religious music was not your strong suit, so the care and insight you put in these essays really surprised me :D. And I must say I learned a thing or two about the genre that I had never bothered to explore. I just love the genre, and the music of that era is very dear to me, so when you combine the two it's a natural !
I think that despite the fact that writing masses was expected from every important or budding composer of the era, the Mass setting is a musical structure that posed a great challenge to composers, one that the best of them actually relished. Mozart for example hated to do it on command, and most of his masses offer only fleeting glimpses into his greatness as a composer. But when he worked on his c minor Mass he put all his heart and genius into it. Too bad he never finished it - I wonder why?
Jumping half a century forward after Schubert's death, only Bruckner was able to recapture the essence and spirit of the classical austrian High Mass. Some of Schubert's masses are quite fine, and his great E flat mass is a true masterpiece. Do you consider that as classical or romantic ? It's from 1828. End of an era, beginning of another sort of thing.
Quote from: André on June 29, 2012, 04:47:08 PM
Haha! Yes, I recall that religious music was not your strong suit, so the care and insight you put in these essays really surprised me :D. And I must say I learned a thing or two about the genre that I had never bothered to explore. I just love the genre, and the music of that era is very dear to me, so when you combine the two it's a natural !
I think that despite the fact that writing masses was expected from every important or budding composer of the era, the Mass setting is a musical structure that posed a great challenge to composers, one that the best of them actually relished. Mozart for example hated to do it on command, and most of his masses offer only fleeting glimpses into his greatness as a composer. But when he worked on his c minor Mass he put all his heart and genius into it. Too bad he never finished it - I wonder why?
Jumping half a century forward after Schubert's death, only Bruckner was able to recapture the essence and spirit of the classical austrian High Mass. Some of Schubert's masses are quite fine, and his great E flat mass is a true masterpiece. Do you consider that as classical or romantic ? It's from 1828. End of an era, beginning of another sort of thing.
I was quite surprised at how much work was needed to get a grip on the era. Little bit here, little bit there; nowhere a straightforward presentation that answered my questions. The same thing that got me started on Haydn, actually. :)
Many great composers actually didn't get beyond writing masses, which is why their names are only known to a select few. Secular music was the key to making through the 19th century. Not necessarily any secular music either, as the fate of Haydn and most of Mozart in that time will attest.
I think that in order to judge Mozart's masses fairly, one must consider the constraints that were put on him by the Archbishop Colloredo. He anticipated Emperor Joseph by several years in shearing away any hint of either Rococo OR grandeur in the mass. Since he was Mozart's employer, the choices were limited. If he had been in Vienna 10 years earlier, I think an entirely different body of work would have resulted. But in certain masses he allows his genius to shine through. As an example, I offer you K 317 in C, often called 'The Coronation Mass', but actually it was probably the Easter Mass of 1779 in Salzburg Cathedral. It is brilliant in all ways and possibly the finest Missa longa to emerge from Salzburg in that era. I commend it to you. :)
I consider Schubert to be the last real Classical composer, but that's just my opinion. I agree about the Eb mass, but I'm also partial to the Ab. But hey, that's just me.
I also tend to not go beyond into the Romantic. At that point, things simply got too big for my tiny brain to comprehend. :)
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"Finally I would like to say just this (with apologies to any Roman Catholic I might inadvertently offend): I would take anytime of day and night a "Classical" Mass over a Conciliar Mass (post Vatican II Council) which is not only devoid of any spiritual experience but also aesthetically and theologically offensive."
Even some Roman Catholics might give this a +1, but just a personal opinion. One day may figure out how to do a fancy quote- or not.
Quote from: Johnll on June 29, 2012, 08:26:04 PM
One day may figure out how to do a fancy quote- or not.
If you look at your post: on the left side of the screen is the user name of the person who posted. If you look/scroll to the right (at the same level), you will see the word 'Quote' - just click this to quote someone else's post. Alternatively, in the preview screen you will see 'Posted by: USERNAME' on the left side of the screen and 'Insert Quote on the right'. Again, you could just click that. Hope that helps.
What a wonderful discussion here. Wish I'd had the time to write more!
Michael Haydn's masses/requiems are new to me. Gurn mentioned this recording to me recently, which I have but haven't heard yet:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41eTuMag2wL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
I also want to recommend this fine recording:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61nV8vh1obL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
Zurich Boys' Choir, Munich Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: Christoph Poppen. Soloists: Gabriela Bone, Gisela Schubert, Ioannis Ikonomou, Gerhard Späth, Friedemann Winklhofer, Ingrid Kasper.
I wish I could find out more about this mass ( in C major), also called the 'Missa Admontis'.
Edit: I found a few words!
QuoteThe names of Michael Haydn's masses are associated either with a specific commission or with the composition's dedicatee. Thus, Haydn composed the "Missa in honorem Sti. Gotthardi," also known as the "Admont Mass," for the Admont Abbey located in the region of Styria, Austria, where Gotthard Kuglmayr was the Abbot. The mass combines formal concentration with liturgical function. The songlike melody, the unity of the motivic material, and the balanced harmony of solemn and lyrical passages show how intensively Haydn concerned himself with the genre. Due to its length and its orchestration the mass can be considered a type of missa solemnis. Fugues and fugal movements are completely missing from the Missa Admontis as is any kind of contrapuntal (including imitative) composition. In so doing, Haydn assured that the required understanding of the liturgical text would be achieved.
Quote from: Leo K on June 30, 2012, 07:12:09 AM
What a wonderful discussion here. Wish I'd had the time to write more!
Michael Haydn's masses/requiems are new to me. Gurn mentioned this recording to me recently, which I have but haven't heard yet:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41eTuMag2wL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
I also want to recommend this fine recording:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61nV8vh1obL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
Zurich Boys' Choir, Munich Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: Christoph Poppen. Soloists: Gabriela Bone, Gisela Schubert, Ioannis Ikonomou, Gerhard Späth, Friedemann Winklhofer, Ingrid Kasper.
I wish I could find out more about this mass ( in C major), also called the 'Missa Admontis'.
Edit: I found a few words!
Leo,
That's amusing in view of the PM I just sent you recommending those two. Shows how short my memory can be sometimes. :D Anyway, the third disk I recommend is this one here, on Linn Records;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/MichaelHaydnFeastofInnocentsMasscover.jpg)
One of the interesting features of this disk is that the producers have incorporated the associated vespers for the same feast, as well as a pair of Mozart Epistle Sonatas which fit in nicely. Of course, the sound of a boys' choir mustn't offend you, else go no further. :D
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on June 30, 2012, 07:32:59 AM
Leo,
That's amusing in view of the PM I just sent you recommending those two. Shows how short my memory can be sometimes. :D Anyway, the third disk I recommend is this one here, on Linn Records;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/MichaelHaydnFeastofInnocentsMasscover.jpg)
One of the interesting features of this disk is that the producers have incorporated the associated vespers for the same feast, as well as a pair of Mozart Epistle Sonatas which fit in nicely. Of course, the sound of a boys' choir mustn't offend you, else go no further. :D
8)
LOL, I saw your PM after I posted! 8)
Your recommendation of this one:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CkEanHKuL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
(which I'm listening to now) is amazing. It is almost an hour long, and oh, so beautiful. I can't help but think of Mozart's late style, it sure does sound like he was influenced by Michael Haydn's missa!
QuoteMichael Haydn's Missa Hispanica or Missa a due cori, Kletzler I:17, MH 422, was presumably written for Spain, but there is no evidence of its ever having been performed there during Haydn's lifetime. The mass is scored for 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 horns in low C, F and G, 2 trumpets in C, timpani, strings, basso continuo, SATB soloists, and two mixed choirs.
The Austrian premiere was in Kremsmünster on June 24, 1792, a performance in Salzburg followed in 1796. When Empress Marie Therese visited Salzburg in 1805, she liked the music so much she wanted to have her own copy of the score.
Quote from: Leo K on June 30, 2012, 08:11:48 AM
LOL, I saw your PM after I posted! 8)
Your recommendation of this one:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CkEanHKuL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
(which I'm listening to now) is amazing. It is almost an hour long, and oh, so beautiful. I can't help but think of Mozart's late style, it sure does sound like he was influenced by Michael Haydn's missa!
Yes, I am very much taken with that one. Amazingly few recordings of it, given the quality of the content. Sad commentary on where the music biz is gone these days, but I digress...
Yes, Mozart held Michael Haydn in very high esteem, and it would have been impossible for him to not be influenced by. Actually, I think this probably went in both directions, rather like with Wolfgang and that
other Haydn later in Vienna.
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Much to my discomfiture I looked in vain for a Michael Haydn disc in my collection. I know I have something more than the puny andantino für trombone I unearthed. Maybe I'll manage to put my hands on it some day :-\. In any event, thanks guys for the suggestions of some of his sacred works. I shall keep an eye out on those. BTW the Hungaroton is a treasure trove of things haydnian and associated music of the era.
Time I got on board the train.
First - Gurn, sorry to be slow, I honestly didn't think of much to add to your excellent presentations so far.
But now we've hit "my man," Mike Haydn, and I'm so very pleased to see so many of the truly great recordings of his vocal music already being bandied about. Sadly, the Missa hispanica thing seems to be out of print, and there has never been another, but maybe mp3 downloads will work for you? You're missing a gem otherwise - but to be fair, the recording, good as it is, doesn't really do the thing complete justice because of the intent to have two orchestras and two choirs intertwining and echoing from opposite sides of a great cathedral space, which can only be hinted at in one's home setting (well, unless you happen to live in a castle or somesuch).
Now here's my contribution to the Michael Haydn discography for today, and it has to be a download, sorry all you CD-fondlers (like me) but it doesn't come any other way:
[asin]B002RHTAIC[/asin]
It contains the St.Hieronymus Mass MH 254 from 1777, about which even Leopold Mozart (who in general had a less-than-warm opinion of Michael Haydn, perhaps in part because Haydn got the jobs Leopold thought he should have had) veritably gushed in a letter to Wolfgang. It's unusual in that it has no stringed instruments in the score: Oboes, bassoons, trombones and organ, that's it. The work is sometimes called the Oboe Mass because the first oboe part dominates almost throughout. The Pierre Cao recording here, a 'period' performance, is an absolute joy; of the four recordings made so far of this mass, it's enough superior to the Graden version on BIS that I'd choose Cao if I could have just one. An older CD led by Raimund Hug is good but less impressive than the other two. (A fourth recording on LPs only from the University of Missouri at Columbia is far in the distance and in any case unobtainable.)
(The other work on the disc, by one Jiri Druzhetsky, is interesting but not compelling.)
ANDRE: Perhaps you have a set of the Mozart symphonies that has what used to be considered his No. 37 in G, K.444. If so, it's by Michael Haydn (MH 334, with a short introduction tacked on by Wolfie). Another thought is that he does show up now and then in compilation discs such as the trombone thing you mentioned; another possible source is one of several Christmas-in-Austria-type albums that contain one of his Christmas shepherds' cantatas. If none of the above, then I guess you'll just have to go through your entire collection, disc by disc, track by track. Ready? Set?
More to follow. I'm entertaining company this weekend so must be brief. Imagine what that means if the present post is considered 'brief'!!
And what have I been doing this now-ending weekend, you ask? (My best guess is that few if any of you have asked that.)
Well, other than enjoying the fact that we're not sweltering or burning like 97% of the rest of the United States, I've been extending my boundaries forward a bit with these Masses. Mostly, that means I've been playing CDs that I haven't heard in a while.
This listening begins with some works written in the first two decades of the 19th C., meaning the immediate extension of the brothers Haydn. Specifically, I've been playing the Beethoven C Major Mass, plus five Masses by J.N. Hummel, six of Franz Schubert, and two by Carl Maria von Weber. (The latter pair are from Weber's days in Dresden, so not Austrian; but he did study with Michael Haydn, so the thread however tenuous is there.)
The overwhelming impression that derives from all this listening is a point Gurn made in his very first post in this thread: Church music in that time and place was very, very, VERY conservative. The Hummels, for instance, while beautifully written throughout, could just as readily have derived from Joseph Haydn at the time of his second Missa Cellensis (1782). Schubert's first four Masses are admittedly immature works, and have much more of a lyrical bent than we are used to from the later Haydn works; but the connections and derivations are still obvious. (With his two later Masses, Schubert is moving in other directions, but those come from the 1820s.) Weber, whose two mature Masses come from 1814 and 1818, has clearly moved into the opera theatre, but on a far more limited basis than he was doing in his other realms of composing - and on that basis, frankly, the two Weber works don't quite, er, 'work,' because he can't seem to make up his mind which world he wants to inhabit, so jerks back and forth between theatre and church often awkwardly. (The second of the two, the so-called Jubel-mass, is much better than the first because it begins to resolve this dichotomy. But it still doesn't fully succeed.) And even Beethoven the Fiery Radical, with his C major Mass from either 1801 or 1803 depending on which source you use (1803 seems standard), takes a lyrical path that Schubert would soon follow far more than Beethoven himself, but never really tries very hard to break from the traditions then in force. He does go far enough that the work was a failure in its time. But it should be recalled when listening that it dates from the time of the Eroica, and putting them head to head would suggest two very different eras of thought at work - maybe even two completely different composers?
And that in turn leads to the understanding that the real break with the past in Austrian church music - 'break' in the sense that finally composers could look forward (toward Bruckner, say) instead of backward (toward the Haydns and Mozart) - really did not come until Beethoven's Missa Solemnis and the A-Flat and E-Flat Masses of Schubert. And those were from the 1820s. Whereas of course the symphony, the string quartet, the piano sonata and the opera were all long since dancing along newer and more futuristic paths.
And with that, my final musical blather for the moment, I return to our house guests who will be evicted tomorrow morning (whew!), and from there I'll think of yet more exciting things with which to mesmerize you.
Quote from: André on June 29, 2012, 02:09:19 PM
Great post, Gurn ! :D
Kloster Ettal was one of the high points of my bavarian trip a few years
You were at Kloser Ettal, you were inside this jewel of Rococo architecture, you thought of Haydn and Mozart and others, but my dear André, did you know another great composer not only worked there, but the Abbott gave the permission to have this genius buried inside the church? I am talking about
Carl Orff!
Quote from: kaergaard on July 01, 2012, 07:46:01 PM
You were at Kloser Ettal, you were inside this jewel of Rococo architecture, you thought of Haydn and Mozart and others, but my dear André, did you know another great composer not only worked there, but the Abbott gave the permission to have this genius buried inside the church? I am talking about Carl Orff!
Sadly, my own recent Bavarian drive-through did not get me to Kloster Ettal or very much of anything else worth reporting. I did visit an ATM and a yummy bakery in Munich, and I did proceed to get lost and nearly miss the tour bus. I did stop and look into a grand old Munich church that was doing a Haydn Mass on Sunday, but I was there on Tuesday. Later, I got to look out across Lake Chiem and see in the distance the monastery, on a small isle, for which Michael Haydn wrote his St. Ursula Mass. And I did get to ask the tour director if by any chance we would be going close enough to see Dachau, and he seemed very uncomfortable that I'd even brought the topic up. I guess tour guides want everything to be happy.... (We did not get close enough. A huge stand of trees blocks the view from the motorway. In any case, just seeing it would be meaningless; visiting the interpretive center, on the other hand....)
Just a note; following all this with interest, and as soon as the hectic pace dies down a bit, will post some comments. Nice to be retired... :D
8)
Wow! What a thread! Thanks Uncle Connie for your thoughts and observations, it's time to revisit Schubert and Beethoven's masses :)
(wishing I was retired too!)
Quote from: Leo K on July 02, 2012, 10:41:51 AM
Wow! What a thread! Thanks Uncle Connie for your thoughts and observations, it's time to revisit Schubert and Beethoven's masses :)
(wishing I was retired too!)
You're welcome of course, half the fun is sharing things, the other half is learning. See, I just stroked everybody's egos....
Warning about being retired: One of the prerequisites generally is that you get old. Do not rush that process! Wait your turn!
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 02, 2012, 11:51:51 AM
You're welcome of course, half the fun is sharing things, the other half is learning. See, I just stroked everybody's egos....
Warning about being retired: One of the prerequisites generally is that you get old. Do not rush that process! Wait your turn!
:D I'm already one day older than dirt.... :-\
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 02, 2012, 12:17:56 PM
:D I'm already one day older than dirt.... :-\
8)
Yeah, well, I guess that makes me older than dirt's parents, doesn't it?
But I've got a secret for you. Keep it strictly to yourself....
SSHHH - it happens.
Well, here am I again, moving further into what I said yesterday about the extended influence of Gurn's boys of the 18th Century, and just how far that influence seeped into the works of successor composers for a very long time after the Haydns were dust.
Consider this:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/71X06Q63-JL.jpg) (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00004VG0S/?tag=goodmusicguideco)
Anton Bruckner, he of the monster symphonies and massive brass chorales, wrote six Masses - seven if you count a Requiem. Including the latter, the present work is the fourth and dates from 1854 (but may have been partly sketched earlier). That is fifty-two years after Joseph Haydn wrote his last Mass, and takes in the entire careers of Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, almost all of Schumann and a fair amount of Berlioz, Liszt and Wagner. And yet, from a 30-year old Bruckner, we get music that inspires the following review comment (copied from ArkivMusic.com, which got it from Gramophone): "What {this Mass} tells us is that Bruckner was already adventurous, for his time, in his use of harmony and his comprehensive knowledge and understanding of the sacred music of Haydn and Mozart. It is Haydn especially who is brought to mind by the joyful, bounding orchestral commentary which accompanies the choir's excited cries of 'Kyrie eleison'. The Credo and Agnus Dei are the most conventional movements; they might have been written by any of several competent church composers of the day. But there is no mistaking the Brucknerian imprimatur in the trumpets in the Gloria...."
So we have a point, half a century removed from the classic Viennese masters, at which Bruckner is in effect looking in both directions at once, and creating a synthesis - a minor one, to be sure, as his great days were another decade and a half to come, but still a solid piece of work by a direct successor of the people we're supposed to be dealing with here. And the line is indeed directly back to Our Boys: Bruckner studied with Simon Sechter, who studied with Albrechtsberger, and we all know where that puts us, right? (But - small confession; the above is true except that Bruckner didn't start his studies with Sechter until the year after he wrote this Mass.)
Anyway - this is where I leave off in the extensions and in my quest to double-underscore Gurn's point about enduring and long-lasting influence. Now, musicologists can of course take music written long after this point and demonstrate clearly that the Haydn-Mozart era still has influence all the way up to today. But to find that influence so specific, in such bold and sharply-chiseled chunks, becomes in my experience quite a bit more difficult after about the time of this Bruckner. Even Bruckner's three "great" masses from just ten years later, while still grounded in the obvious progression of tonal musical development, somehow no longer smell all that much of Haydn.
So this is where Gurn is leading us, and personally I think we'd all be wise to follow his lead, as it's immensely rewarding. (And as a final afternote, the present Bruckner has only been recorded this one time; the performance can be had as shown here, or in a two-disc reissue coupled with a pretty good reading of Bruckner's even earlier Requiem, 1849 - the work that Bruckner freaks sometimes refer to as Bruckner's first work that actually sounds like him. Worth having for those who like to explore.)
Very interesting post, Conrad! I tell you honestly here that I didn't really know where I was leading this discussion, because I haven't been down this road yet. I do have the Hummel masses, and of course, Schubert and Beethoven, but that's as far as I've gone post-Haydn. Which is the point, I think, since we are on a voyage of discovery.
I do want to give Bruckner his due, though. His symphonies are far too large for me to get my head wrapped around them, but his sacred music has a lot of appeal. It should be an interesting road traveled by the time we reach that point. :)
8)
Quote from: Uncle Connie on June 30, 2012, 08:13:20 PM
Time I got on board the train.
It contains the St.Hieronymus Mass MH 254 from 1777, about which even Leopold Mozart (who in general had a less-than-warm opinion of Michael Haydn, perhaps in part because Haydn got the jobs Leopold thought he should have had) veritably gushed in a letter to Wolfgang. It's unusual in that it has no stringed instruments in the score: Oboes, bassoons, trombones and organ, that's it. The work is sometimes called the Oboe Mass because the first oboe part dominates almost throughout. The Pierre Cao recording here, a 'period' performance, is an absolute joy; of the four recordings made so far of this mass, it's enough superior to the Graden version on BIS that I'd choose Cao if I could have just one. An older CD led by Raimund Hug is good but less impressive than the other two. (A fourth recording on LPs only from the University of Missouri at Columbia is far in the distance and in any case unobtainable.)
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/HaydnMAlbrechtsberger2Massescover.jpg)
Just listening to this mass for the first time. The St. Hieronymus (St. Jerome, that is) Oboe Mass. I must say, it is brilliant! The Quoniam of the Gloria, which starts out with the oboe(s) playing a little exotic, 'Turkish' sounding tune is absolutely kicking! Quite unlike any mass music I have heard before. No wonder Leopold gushed. :)
8)
BIG, BIG ERROR HERE!! A couple hours ago I posted some discussion about the Bruckner Missa solemnis in B-Flat, and as a pendant to my comments I included the following: "(And as a final afternote, the present Bruckner has only been recorded this one time; the performance can be had as shown here, or in a two-disc reissue coupled with a pretty good reading of Bruckner's even earlier Requiem, 1849 - the work that Bruckner freaks sometimes refer to as Bruckner's first work that actually sounds like him. Worth having for those who like to explore.)"
This is not true at all. The pressing I own is the single disc as mentioned (and pictured). I noted the double-disc in the Amazon listings and, in haste, wrote the above without paying proper attention. The two-disc set does include the Missa solemnis, but the Requiem involved isn't Bruckner's, it's Mozart's. In a performance I've never heard, so my "pretty good" statement is gibberish. I assumed it was the Requiem recording I do have, but that's on Hyperion, not Virgin....
Anyway. We all step in it sometimes. Today was my day. I'm sorry.
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 02, 2012, 05:35:01 PM
BIG, BIG ERROR HERE!! A couple hours ago I posted some discussion about the Bruckner Missa solemnis in B-Flat, and as a pendant to my comments I included the following: "(And as a final afternote, the present Bruckner has only been recorded this one time; the performance can be had as shown here, or in a two-disc reissue coupled with a pretty good reading of Bruckner's even earlier Requiem, 1849 - the work that Bruckner freaks sometimes refer to as Bruckner's first work that actually sounds like him. Worth having for those who like to explore.)"
This is not true at all. The pressing I own is the single disc as mentioned (and pictured). I noted the double-disc in the Amazon listings and, in haste, wrote the above without paying proper attention. The two-disc set does include the Missa solemnis, but the Requiem involved isn't Bruckner's, it's Mozart's. In a performance I've never heard, so my "pretty good" statement is gibberish. I assumed it was the Requiem recording I do have, but that's on Hyperion, not Virgin....
Anyway. We all step in it sometimes. Today was my day. I'm sorry.
:D No to worry; if that's the worst thing you've done today you're way ahead of me. I bet when André comes around again he will give that some thought anyway. He knows the most obscure recordings sometimes! :)
8)
Mike, this is just what I was feebly hinting at, and Conrad beautifully put it across: believe it or not, but Bruckner manages to pick up the thread that somehow seems to have broken with the Solemnis and Schubert's late masses: forget about the 40 year hiatus that in 19th century chronology would suggest the passing of at least a couple of aesthetic eras or movements, and listen to Bruckner's last three Masses. They are of the same stock, roots and climate as Schubert's, Beethoven's and Hummel's.
Well, hi Lis ;D ! No I had no clue about Orffs' burial place in Ettal. When I travel to Germany it's always with wife and mom-in-law in tow. My wife will let me visit anything as long as I'm back in an hour ::), but Mutti has a way of organizing a tour or an excursion as if it were a military campaign. :( Therefore any type of visit has to be informative, expedient and efficient. I must encapsulate, digest and summarize every bit of valuable info I can get my hands on so she can relay it to her friends whe we're back in Malmedy. In these small towns every trip
abroad is fodder for street encounters or market day chatting (buying meat or fruits is but a pretext) where any valuable bit of information is dutifully shared with the full expectation that within a week the whole town will know about it. I tell you: information and efficiency is everything ;D This year we were in Aachen (again) and Trier, and thanks to my nonpareil capacity for information gathering, I managed to unearth valuable data she could share with her friends - even though she had beent there a few times before. I love her dearly. She always makes me ant to surpass her expectations! ;D
Quote from: André on July 02, 2012, 06:58:39 PM
Mike, this is just what I was feebly hinting at, and Conrad beautifully put it across: believe it or not, but Bruckner manages to pick up the thread that somehow seems to have broken with the Solemnis and Schubert's late masses: forget about the 40 year hiatus that in 19th century chronology would suggest the passing of at least a couple of aesthetic eras or movements, and listen to Bruckner's last three Masses. They are of the same stock, roots and climate as Schubert's, Beethoven's and Hummel's.
Well, hi Lis ;D ! No I had no clue about Orffs' burial place in Ettal. When I travel to Germany it's always with wife and mom-in-law in tow. My wife will let me visit anything as long as I'm back in an hour ::), but Mutti has a way of organizing a tour or an excursion as if it were a military campaign. :( Therefore any type of visit has to be informative, expedient and efficient. I must encapsulate, digest and summarize every bit of valuable info I can get my hands on so she can relay it to her friends whe we're back in Malmedy. In these small towns every trip
abroad is fodder for street encounters or market day chatting (buying meat or fruits is but a pretext) where any valuable bit of information is dutifully shared with the full expectation that within a week the whole town will know about it. I tell you: information and efficiency is everything ;D This year we were in Aachen (again) and Trier, and thanks to my nonpareil capacity for information gathering, I managed to unearth valuable data she could share with her friends - even though she had beent there a few times before. I love her dearly. She always makes me ant to surpass her expectations! ;D
André,
Yes, I could see without doubt that this was the direction that ll these things were going. I just haven't spent any time in the modern era yet. But bringing Beethoven into it for a minute; I think that at least 2 lines of descent formed from him. And the second one, based on the Missa Solemnis, is what we would now call 'concert masses'. That is, not really intended (or suitable) to play in church for an actual mass ceremony. That tradition continues even today, I think, with many 20th century masses (Bernstein's leaps to mind) being actually concert masses. Maybe not, I haven't made any sort of study of the phenomenon, but I think so anyway. Whereas Bruckner's masses were actually intended to be masses, unless I am mistaken about him. I'll have to ponder this for a bit.
Mutti sounds like my kind of woman, at least in the short term. I can see that training around Central Europe with her would be a blast!
8)
Quote from: André on July 02, 2012, 06:58:39 PM
When I travel to Germany it's always with wife and mom-in-law in tow. My wife will let me visit anything as long as I'm back in an hour ::), but Mutti has a way of organizing a tour or an excursion as if it were a military campaign. :( Therefore any type of visit has to be informative, expedient and efficient. I must encapsulate, digest and summarize every bit of valuable info I can get my hands on so she can relay it to her friends whe we're back in Malmedy. In these small towns every trip
abroad is fodder for street encounters or market day chatting (buying meat or fruits is but a pretext) where any valuable bit of information is dutifully shared with the full expectation that within a week the whole town will know about it. I tell you: information and efficiency is everything ;D This year we were in Aachen (again) and Trier, and thanks to my nonpareil capacity for information gathering, I managed to unearth valuable data she could share with her friends - even though she had been there a few times before. I love her dearly. She always makes me ant to surpass her expectations! ;D
I think I'd be miserable following along with Mutti - because I want to roam, sometimes in an organized way, sometimes just randomly. Which is why we got badly lost in Munich and slightly lost twice in Vienna. My next trip, no tour guide, little of a formal agenda, just me and wife prancing through the city wherever we happen to have gotten off the bus. Of course we may never find our hotel again, but that's minor.
The only Hummel Mass I have heard is this one:
[asin]B000001SEW[/asin]
But there is at least one other in D Major that I haven't heard.
:)
Quote from: Arnold on July 03, 2012, 06:52:26 AM
The only Hummel Mass I have heard is this one:
[asin]B000001SEW[/asin]
But there is at least one other in D Major that I haven't heard.
:)
So far as I am aware there are five in print. One disc, the cheapest and easiest to acquire as an introduction, would be this:
[asin]B000273AOY[/asin]
(And don't be put off by the guy who gave it just one star on Amazon; the review is hogwash.)
The other four readily available - I won't bother with pictures - are all on Chandos conducted by Hickox. Catalogue numbers 0681, 0712 and 0724. Over the course of his three discs Hickox also included some filler items, a couple of Graduals, a Salve, and the same Te Deum as on Grodd's Naxos disc - the only duplication. (Grodd takes it slightly slower; I think Hickox's brighter and more martial approach is probably better suited to the intent of this militaristic thing, but I kind of like Grodd's more introspective darkness.) Arnold: The D Major you mention knowing about would be the Op.111 on one of the Hickox discs; on another of then is a d minor one, an earlier work and unpublished (WoO).
Hummel wrote this stuff for Esterhaza, as Haydn's successor there, between 1804 and -08, thereby extending the Haydn tradition of one Mass per year for the name-day of the Princess Esterhazy. (A few other composers contributed works to this run of annual Masses also: Somebody named Fuchs of whom I know nothing, and Albrechtsberger, and a minor insignificant upstart named Beethoven....) Clearly the basis for Hummel's music is Haydn and Mozart; this continued structurally throughout Hummel's life. He never wrote another Mass after the Op. 111 in 1808; and once he left Esterhaza he turned into a grand flamboyant piano virtuoso and became somewhat shallower the composer, which has tarnished his reputation badly until the last generation or so has resuscitated it.
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 03, 2012, 07:46:16 AM
So far as I am aware there are five in print. One disc, the cheapest and easiest to acquire as an introduction, would be this:
[asin]B000273AOY[/asin]
(And don't be put off by the guy who gave it just one star on Amazon; the review is hogwash.)
I wouldn't exactly call these responses "reviews"; they're more like customer comments. But, yes, one star is quite extreme for a good recording of some fine music. Another customer gave it 5 stars; when comparing it to Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, this customer stated that Beethoven's work was "not worth remembering". Overall, I find all these comments useless.
Quote from: Sammy on July 03, 2012, 08:27:23 AM
I wouldn't exactly call these responses "reviews"; they're more like customer comments. But, yes, one star is quite extreme for a good recording of some fine music. Another customer gave it 5 stars; when comparing it to Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, this customer stated that Beethoven's work was "not worth remembering". Overall, I find all these comments useless.
Yes, you have a point; a fair number of these "reviews" (I do agree, mostly "comments" is closer) are a waste of their time to type and my time to read. But if you read enough of them anyway, you will find a few repeat reviewers who do indeed know what they're talking about and have things of real value to say. My personal favorite is J. Scott Morrison, a retired M.D. in Vermont, who has written an immense quantity of incisive and useful material, and has guided me to quite a few fine things that I might otherwise have skipped. Unfortunately, in order to find the Dr. Morrisons of the Amazon world, you have to wade through a whole lot of tripe.
Not really off-topic, but perhaps a bit down a side passageway and back into a dark corner behind the servants' staircase:
As a consequence of this thread I have been reviewing my holdings. And I note that in the matter of the six masses of Schubert there is a bit of an issue. Namely, much of what I've got is politely described as OLD, and not so politely described as REALLY OLD, and in desperate need of upgrade I'd think. But I have no idea what to get because I haven't heard anything modern at all. So I'd appreciate some ideas.
Here's what I have:
1 in F: George Barati, Vienna Symphony, on a Tuxedo reissue from LPs in the early 60s. I actually plan to keep this no matter what, because of a big soft spot for Barati's contribution to both Haydn and Schubert - he gave us very fine readings of both Schubert's 1 and 4, and Haydn's Nicolai and Harmonie. All were first-ever recordings except the last one, and that might as well have been too since its only predecessor was awful. Also, there's the sympathy due owing to the ghastly end of his life, when at age 83 he went for an evening walk near his home in San Jose, California, and was mugged and murdered. So very not fair!! So in his memory I'll keep all four of those old discs, along with a couple of discs of his own music which I find, er, well, difficult but not godawful like so much modernistic stuff....
2 in G: Romano Gandolfi, Prague Chamber Choir & Orch., on a 1993 Discover CD (real cheapie Belgian label, gone now) which actually is pretty good but could doubtless be improved upon.
3 in B-Flat: Jack Händler, Prague Chamber Choir & Orch., another Discover disc I picked up for $2 in a sell-off when the Tower chain closed down. Same comment as preceding. And that is the second of two Discover conductors that I've never heard of, before or since.
4 in C: Well actually, here I seem to have two versions. One's the Barati, cf. No. 1 above. The other is David Atherton's on London (or Decca for Brits). I won't be giving up either disc; Barati's for reasons stated, Atherton's because it's autographed (he lives here, and used to conduct our orchestra (two bankruptcies ago)). But as a listening experience they're both rather dated, so....
5 in A-Flat: George Guest, St.Martin-in-the-Fields, London/Decca - same disc as Atherton's No. 4. Recorded 1977. Good in its day, but that was then.
6 in E-Flat. George Guest, as preceding; rec. 1975.
So - which of you has what that you'd like to suggest as a better choice for any of this? With all due respect to my buddy Gurn, I couldn't care less about "period performance" as long as the result is good. (But I don't avoid such performances either. The operative word is "good.")
Thanks for any ideas. Oh - money is no object. (It actually is, from my end of things, but don't consider it in your ideas; you provide suggestions, I'll sort out the exchecquer as I can.)
And wasn't it nice of Schubert to write six masses and never repeat a key signature, so you don't have to memorize the catalogue numbers?
:D PI not important. What a joker you are, Conrad! >:D
Anyway, seriously, this is the only actual set of Schubert masses that I have;
[asin]B00009PBXF[/asin]
and I am very partial to it. And money IS no object, since it is a virtual giveaway. Weil has always been a brilliant conductor of masses, and no exception here, beyond not working with Tafelmusik, a minor surprise. The OAE and Vienna Boys' Choir are fine musicians though. :)
8)
I'd emphatically recommend Sawallisch's 7-disc EMI boxset of Schubert's sacred music, but a quick search showed it has sadly gone out of print. >:(
Don't hesitate if you happen to come by it somewhere.
Off the top of my head, I'd also recommend Harnoncourt, as well as this (http://www.amazon.com/Schubert-Masses-Nos-2-6/dp/B000003CVY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341430454&sr=8-1&keywords=schubert+masses).
Quote from: Wanderer on July 04, 2012, 11:45:09 AM
I'd emphatically recommend Sawallisch's 7-disc EMI boxset of Schubert's sacred music, but a quick search showed it has sadly gone out of print. >:(
Don't hesitate if you happen to come by it somewhere.
Berkshire have a double disc of 5 and 6.
EDIT: Actually, I see it close to the same price on Amazon but with a third mass.
There's a nice A Flat from Carl Bamberger. It's offered as a free dowload on Random Classics blogspot. Typical regional german music making from the late fifties, warts and all. Maybe not 1820 authentic, but certified ur-fifties stuff.
For the E Flat, easily Schubert's best work in the genre, no period or non-period version I've heard comes close to the glorious mid sixties EMI under Leinsdorf. Berlin Phil, St-Hedwig choir, soloists (Pilar Lorengar, Josef Traxel among others), recorded in Jesus-Christus Kirche in beautiful stereo. Had it on a Seraphim Lp for many years. As far as I can ascertain, it's never been available on cd. But with majors ditching their catalogue like there's no tomorrow, one can only hope. Leinsdorf was capable of the best (!), and this is a great Schubert recording.
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 04, 2012, 09:45:55 AM
:D PI not important. What a joker you are, Conrad! >:D
Anyway, seriously, this is the only actual set of Schubert masses that I have;
[asin]B00009PBXF[/asin]
and I am very partial to it. And money IS no object, since it is a virtual giveaway. Weil has always been a brilliant conductor of masses, and no exception here, beyond not working with Tafelmusik, a minor surprise. The OAE and Vienna Boys' Choir are fine musicians though. :)
8)
I have that one, and have never been tempted to look for another one.
I do believe, however, that it's now been reissued as one of those Vivarte budget boxes, in the same group as the Tafelmusik Hadyn set.
Quote from: Wanderer on July 04, 2012, 11:45:09 AM
I'd emphatically recommend Sawallisch's 7-disc EMI boxset of Schubert's sacred music, but a quick search showed it has sadly gone out of print. >:(
Nah, it was re-released last year with a different cover and with four more CDs. :)
[asin]B0052R8J22[/asin]
Re: Schubert Masses
I checked what was available on Spotify and found quite a bit. Right now listening to Harnoncourt doing #5 in A-flat.
[asin]B0050R275Y[/asin]
:)
Well, I have finally gotten around to listening to the Naxos disc of Schubert's Mass No. 5 (which I posted on the listening thread). This one:
[asin]B003Y3O1T6[/asin]
I love the sound and precision of this. The singing is excellent . It is tender when it should be, but also rousing as well. It has a lightness and deftness that I enjoyed. I don't know how this compares to any other version, but I imagine it holds its own.
Apparently Schubert revised this mass to gain a post of Court Vice-Kapellmeister. It has so many different ideas crammed into one piece. Apparently it was never actually played to gain the position as he was told that that "It was not in the style favoured by the Emperor, whose tastes in this respect were conservative." I am not really sure what this means in the context of the mass. Can anyone help decode this? (It was taken from the Naxos site).
Quote from: mc ukrneal on July 06, 2012, 01:18:09 AM
Well, I have finally gotten around to listening to the Naxos disc of Schubert's Mass No. 5 (which I posted on the listening thread). This one:
[asin]B003Y3O1T6[/asin]
I love the sound and precision of this. The singing is excellent . It is tender when it should be, but also rousing as well. It has a lightness and deftness that I enjoyed. I don't know how this compares to any other version, but I imagine it holds its own.
Apparently Schubert revised this mass to gain a post of Court Vice-Kapellmeister. It has so many different ideas crammed into one piece. Apparently it was never actually played to gain the position as he was told that that "It was not in the style favoured by the Emperor, whose tastes in this respect were conservative." I am not really sure what this means in the context of the mass. Can anyone help decode this? (It was taken from the Naxos site).
My only actual Schubert reference to hand is Deutsch's catalogue, which isn't terribly helpful. He tells us that there are variant versions of some sections, and that Schubert intended to dedicate the Mass to the Emperor and Empress (which was what people did in those days when they wanted royal favor - and a job!). The fact that the revised version doesn't get its own catalogue number, and thus a separate listing, suggests that the variants are rather minor. The booklet to the George Guest recording is even less useful: It says, in total, and I quote: "He probably began work on [the Mass] in 1819; he definitely completed it in 1822, although he later made revisions." Wow. That's useful!
Anybody got one of the standard critical bios of Schubert? I need to get one - Maurice Brown, Brian Newbould (or, if you read German, Deutsch's). Lots of cheap used copies of Brown's on ABE, 'scuse me while I spend a small bit. If nobody else can help with this, I'll report back in a couple of weeks when I get my book.
Herewith the pertinent paragraph from the liner notes from the Weil/OAE set, by someone named Julian Haycock of whom I've never heard.
Quote
The Mass in A flat, D.678, took Schubert an uncharacteristically long period of time to complete--far longer, in fact, than any of his other works, including those for the stage. Intended as a setting on a grand scale for no less a figure than the Emperor himself, Schubert appears to have been inhibited by the audacity of his own vision. In true Beethovian style, he made countless sketches in an attempt to help develop and refine his ideas into a coherent and convincing form, but it was not until September 1822 that the work was finally ready. However, even this was not an end of the matter. In January 1826 Schubert returned to the score, giving it a thorough overhaul as well as composing a new Cum Sancto Spiritu section. After years of unstinting effort, Schubert submitted the work for the Emperor's approval only to be told that whatever its artistic merits, it was in a style that was felt to be inappropriate. This was actually a veiled reference to the fact that Schubert's lyrical instincts were to the fore in D.678, with the normal fugal sections (a texture Schubert never really mastered) reduced to just the Cum Sancto Spiritu at the end of the Gloria [perhaps there's a link here to the fact that this was the section he totally recomposed?--JS]. By breaking the traditional rules of Mass settings, Schubert may have moved forward artistically, but in so doing ironically blew any chance of ingratiating himself with power at the highest political level.
In the general comments about the masses as a group, he notes that
Quote
The hierarchical structure of Catholicism was anathema to him, which explains why in each of his masses he omits the words Et in unam Sanctum catholican ecclesiam. [which no doubt did not help endear him to the Imperial Court when he sent in this mass--JS] Although an expression of sincerely held views, Schubert's Masses belong to the Beethoven-Bruckner tradition of religious works that are intended for worship on a grand scale rather than normal day-to-day liturgical use.
Thanks, Jeffery - of course, I notice you waited until I'd already ordered a used copy of Newbould before posting. ;D (Not really, of course; given that I'm inclined to read just about anything I can on a topic of interest, I should have bought this book aeons ago.)
And apropos of revisions or alternate sections, note that the Benedictus of the Mass in C D.452 exists in two distinct versions, and in this case they do have distinct numbers. The publisher Diabelli had printed this Mass in 1825 but apparently later thought the difficulty of the soprano part in the Benedictus inhibited sales (and performances), so he asked Schubert for a simpler version to offer; Schubert supplied one a couple of weeks before his death, October 1828, now listed as D.961. [Note that the catalogue, and Schubert, end at D.965; the numbers after that are supplementary.]
And while I'm here, thanks to all of you who have ensured my bankruptcy by suggesting so many Schubert editions, all of which I simply must have. (But a little at a time, as I'm not rolling in the moolah.) If ever anyone hears of a way to obtain a copy of the Leinsdorf E-Flat that Andre notes, please let us all know, but especially greedy ol' me.
Julian Haycock - no idea what his formal qualifications are, but he writes for the International Record Review site, and has done a book on Rachmaninoff which you can buy on Amazon if you wish. I've seen the name in CD booklet notes but couldn't tell you specifically where.
Andre: In addition to the Bamberger A-Flat you mention, which I will go track down, there's a professional-quality CDR reissue of another wonderful old version, from DGG, Bavarian Radio and Regensburg Boys, soloists including Maria Stader and Ernst Häfliger, cond. Georg Ratzinger. Wonderful, very south-German traditional from the 50s. $12 from HaydnHouse.com (+ $2 postage), no booklet but wonderfully engineered if their other work is any indication. The conductor, as a point of trivia, was the brother of the current Pope.
Most of today was spent mentally juggling Schubert and Weber masses (and spending money on things), and as it turned out most of the spending went the other way from the Haydn era: Instead of the successors, I decided to poke into one of the great predecessors of the era we're talking about:
[asin]B0060QO5NQ[/asin]
[asin]B000001S31[/asin]
The first is orchestral and has been ordered. The second is vocal and will be ordered in due course. Well worth including in this thread owing to his influence on Haydn and on Viennese music of all types for quite some while after his death (1741). Also wrote one of the half-dozen most influential music theory treatises in history, Gradus ad Parnassum.
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 06, 2012, 07:24:11 PM
Also wrote one of the half-dozen most influential music theory treatises in history, Gradus ad Parnassum.
Which is one of the densest and thorniest books I have ever read outside of mathematics. What I have is a Dover reprint of a mid 20th century British translation of the part of GaP which deals specifically with counterpoint (and in fact, the the title is given as "The Study of Counterpoint from Johann Joseph Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum"). It's the sort of book which, if you don't pay strict attention to every sentence, will quickly leave you hopelessly confused.
Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on July 06, 2012, 07:38:49 PM
Which is one of the densest and thorniest books I have ever read outside of mathematics. What I have is a Dover reprint of a mid 20th century British translation of the part of GaP which deals specifically with counterpoint (and in fact, the the title is given as "The Study of Counterpoint from Johann Joseph Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum"). It's the sort of book which, if you don't pay strict attention to every sentence, will quickly leave you hopelessly confused.
Rough guess - I'd get hopelessly confused regardless of attention paid. I once checked a copy (of some translation or other) out of the library and gave it a go for the allotted three weeks. As a practical matter all I learned was that his name was Johann Joseph, not Joseph Johann. There is just something about teaching a topic that is inherently dry, by a method that makes it drier still. Perhaps I was too coddled in school.
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 07, 2012, 06:24:27 AM
Rough guess - I'd get hopelessly confused regardless of attention paid. I once checked a copy (of some translation or other) out of the library and gave it a go for the allotted three weeks. As a practical matter all I learned was that his name was Johann Joseph, not Joseph Johann. There is just something about teaching a topic that is inherently dry, by a method that makes it drier still. Perhaps I was too coddled in school.
Joseph Haydn considered it to be one of the Great Books of the Western World though. In his effects after his death was a copy that is believed to be the same one that he talks about having as one of his few possessions back in the early 1750's. It is covered in marginal notes, some of which actually correct some of Fux's solutions. He also made every student he had (many, including Pleyel, Reicha and Beethoven) study out of their own copy.
I think it is all in how the brain works. Like Conrad, I would have been happy that it helped me get his name straight... :D
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Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on July 06, 2012, 05:42:21 PM
Herewith the pertinent paragraph from the liner notes from the Weil/OAE set, by someone named Julian Haycock of whom I've never heard.In the general comments about the masses as a group, he notes that
Very interesting. Thanks for that!
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 02, 2012, 04:15:14 PM
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/HaydnMAlbrechtsberger2Massescover.jpg)
Just listening to this mass for the first time. The St. Hieronymus (St. Jerome, that is) Oboe Mass. I must say, it is brilliant! The Quoniam of the Gloria, which starts out with the oboe(s) playing a little exotic, 'Turkish' sounding tune is absolutely kicking! Quite unlike any mass music I have heard before. No wonder Leopold gushed. :)
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I too am listening to the St. Hieronymus mass for the first time. It is very unique! And brilliant! I am so glad I know of it now!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61y75753cQL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
Quote from: Leo K on July 07, 2012, 08:01:04 AM
I too am listening to the St. Hieronymus mass for the first time. It is very unique! And brilliant! I am so glad I know of it now!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61y75753cQL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
This is indeed a gem of a mass and I am having a great deal of trouble understanding why we haven't had maybe 500 versions of it by now, as with the Missa Solemnis and Berlioz' Requiem and Faure's Requiem and so forth. But, well, you know how these things go, the world sometimes rotates in a slightly different orbit than mine....
There's a third version, download only - I have no idea whether it was ever a CD, I can find no reference to one - and IMNTHO* it's the best of the three. But honestly, not by much; they're all superb. I have a theory about how music of this excellence inspires quality performances only, no other is possible. Probably rubbish, but I like believing it, so don't you dare disabuse me. (Hell, even the fourth version - the first ever done, back in the 1960s, and by a University group at that - was truly, sincerely top level work. Too bad you can't hear that any more, it would give real feet to my theory....)
This downloaded Pierre Cao version also has another mass for wind-accompaniment only, by a minor composer to be sure, but still distinct and worth repeated hearings. But then, I very much want the 'filler' material on the other two CDs as well. So you know, there's really only one solution.... 8)
[asin]B002RHTAIC[/asin]
\ ( * IMNTHO - In My Not Terribly Humble Opinion. Ten points if you figured that out on your own.)
Indeed, I have that BIS disk too, and was spurred on by Leo's post to give it a listen yesterday. The choral work is superb; the Graduals are a capella and very nicely worked out. But the instrumentalists are one of my favorite PI wind groups, Ensemble Philidor. By way of dropping names, their Mozart Gran Partitta is top of the heap material. In any case, despite that BIS have their own unique way of listing 'movements', it is still the Gloria: Quoniam which is the most unique thing I have heard in a mass. M. Haydn is undoubtedly an unsung sort of guy, moreso even than his brother. Pity, really... :-\
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The Mass in Salzburg – Early 1770's
Salzburg! What a wealth of riches for the music lover. Known as a center for the arts for centuries before the time that we are interested in, by the 1770's it was its own little inland empire.
In fact, the wealth is so diverse that one can scarcely know where to start. In the period when Prince-Archbishop Sigismundo von Schrattenbach was still alive, there was not yet any sign on the horizon of the liturgical reforms which would stifle creativity from the late 1770's until the early 1790's. True, it can (and should) be said that the restrictions called on the ingenuity of the composers to make the most from the least auspicious potential. But the all-out wonderment that greeted even the most humble churchgoer was now a thing of the past.
Michael Haydn, younger brother of Joseph and true specialist in sacred music, was installed in Salzburg by Schrattenbach by August, 1763. His music was already well known throughout the region and widely distributed through the churches and abbeys from Bavaria to Romania. He succeeded J.E. Eberlin, yet another well known specialist in sacred music.
Also, just returned from their Grand Tour of Western Europe and England were the Mozart Family, Vice-Kapellmeister Leopold and child sensation Wolfgang. Within a few short years, Wolfgang was to be a star, but for now, he lent a bit of genius to a musical establishment that, at the top, at least, was way more than competent.
One thing that persisted in the church music tradition was the fact that the Ruling House owned all the music that was produced for it by its minions. For this reason, even in the 1770's, the music of previous generations was still played. So the organ and trumpet music of Heinrich Biber, Kapellmeister in the late 17th century, and Eberlin from the early 18th century, was still heard and appreciated. Other names with a strong Salzburg tradition were Georg Muffat and his son Gottlieb, who went on to become the Imperial Organist in Vienna after a long apprenticeship in Salzburg. On the down side, a lot of the music played during masses by these organists was extemporized, and as a result, very little of it survives due to not being written down. However, there is some; Eberlin wrote and published a set of 9 Toccatas & Fugues which exist in a couple of nice recorded versions. And Muffat the Younger also left a few surviving toccatas.
The Viennese practice of working a concerto into a mass was less prevalent in Salzburg (if it was used at all). And the use of symphonies didn't seem to bloom until after the Reform, where there are at least three in succession by Michael Haydn with fugal finales which are believed to be church symphonies. It is also suggested that some of Mozart's symphonies, especially 27-30 of 1774, were written as church symphonies, but found life beyond that in later years. What Salzburg DID have were Epistle Sonatas. There are 17 surviving examples by Mozart, 15 of them written for the church combination of instruments which includes 2 violins, basso continuo (cello or double bass and organ) and, in the later ones, organ obbligato. It was these works, about which Mozart wrote to Padre Martini in Italy 1776 that 'the entire mass with the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Epistle Sonata, Offertory or Motet, Sanctus and Agnus Dei must last no longer than ¾ hour'. So despite the fact that there are few surviving examples, it can be seen that this form was considered to be a standard, integral part of the mass.
One should also keep in mind a couple of other things; by 1776, Schrattenbach was long dead and his successor, Colleredo, was no slouch when it came to reforming ala Joseph. He beat Joseph to the punch in the case of liturgical reform, instituting his around 1775. The other thing that I find interesting is that in reality, Colleredo didn't really intend his reforms for Salzburg Cathedral as much as he did for the various parish churches, where the weaker-minded poor folk would be distracted by too much grandeur. So, at least on feast days, the celebrations in Salzburg would have been considered to be pretty elegant by today's standards!
The next installment will have my first attempt at a recreation of a Salzburg festive mass. Lots of choices to make, and especially a lot of details to get right. In looking at the possibilities, I think there must have been a person whose job it was to keep straight the proper Proper's, and not to allow confusing even the ordinary Ordinary's..... :D
Suggestions/corrections/comments are very welcome.
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A very pleasing essay Gurn, a wonderful text to read while on break at work, helping me to forget work (if only for a moment!)
Thanks :)
Looking forward to your reconstruction. I am soaking in your essays, so I can respond in more detail :)
Quote from: Leo K on July 11, 2012, 06:22:28 AM
A very pleasing essay Gurn, a wonderful text to read while on break at work, helping me to forget work (if only for a moment!)
Thanks :)
Looking forward to your reconstruction. I am soaking in your essays, so I can respond in more detail :)
Thanks, Leo. I've been looking forward to Salzburg for quite a while now, trying to find just the right works for this. Hopefully I will have learned from earlier efforts and this one will be super! :)
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And while I await the traipse through the churches of Salzburg (when I toured the place I was told there are fifty!! - Wikipedia puts it more in the 30s, but either way....), I wonder if I might be permitted to go back to something that has been nagging at me for some while. Gurn has broached it a couple of times, and from that point forward I've been trying to figure things out, so far to only a little avail.
The question is really in two parts: (1) Were the central European masses we've been dealing with intended for use during a church service, or were they 'concert masses'? (2) How can we tell which is which?
Gurn started the thoughts rolling when he mentioned, more or less in passing, that he believed the masses of Anton Bruckner were specifically intended for church services. No sooner had I started delving into that question, than I ran across - in two different places - the information that the masses of Schubert could explicitly not be used in church, because of Schubert's refusal to set the phrase from the Credo "one holy and apostolic Church." Ergo, the work was liturgically impure, ergo it couldn't be used for a formal church service.
And then I ran across - again, two separate sources - the statement that, for a very long time and extending all the way up to Bruckner (if not beyond), the Church requirements for a performance of a mass during an actual service included the stipulation that the first line of the Gloria, and again the first like of the Credo, be intoned chant-style and unaccompanied, only after which the music could take over.
"Aha!" methought. "Maybe that's the answer! If the composer set the first lines of the Gloria and Credo, then it's concert. If not, then it's church!" Simple, hey? Well, in theory maybe, but the problem is that it isn't really working out too well, and now I have no idea where I've wandered and how to get back out again.
According to my listening, to every single Joseph Haydn mass recording I have, only two - the two so-called "Organ" masses - have the first lines of those sections chanted. (And in the case of the "Little Organ Mass," it's actually just the Gloria; not the Credo.) All my versions of these two works, every one, have the chanted opening; every version I have of every other J.Haydn mass has none. (And in fact I have the distinct recollection that the first time I ever heard the chanted openings at all, in any mass whatsoever, was on a Philips recording of both of these Organ Masses by the Vienna Choir Boys et al. conducted by Uwe Christian Harrer, issued in 1986. Prior to that, the performances were all "through-composed." And that included at least one LP recording of the Little Organ Mass (Hans Gillesberger, Vienna Academy Choir, 1952).
Michael Haydn: As but one example, the St.Hieronymus Mass has three current recordings, and all of them use the chant phrases. But a fourth recording, the earliest, on LP (Andrew Minor, Chorus & Orch. of the University of Missouri at Columbia, sometime in the 1960s) does not use them.
Bruckner: Apparently all current (recent) (modern) recordings use the chanted phrases for three of the four full-sized masses (the last of all, the f minor, was specifically not written that way). But earlier recordings, e.g. F.Charles Adler doing the d minor in the early 1950s, and I THINK the Jochum set from the 60s, don't use the chants.
Beethoven, Hummel, Weber and of course Schubert: I have never in my life heard a chanted phrase used for these four composers.
I'm not at all certain what I've just "discovered." Mostly I've discovered more questions than I had when I started. And paramount among them is, "HUH?" (And probably least among them, but still of interest to me, is: "If a performance didn't use the chant-openings in a work that has provision for them, what then happens to those words?")
I have no idea what this contributes to the direction of this thread, except maybe more confusion; but it's something I want to try and pin down, if I can. Ideas/comments/thoughts/laughter most welcome indeed.
Hi, Conrad,
I'm certainly going to come back and address this issue when I have some good documentation on it. However, to the best of my knowledge, the very first 'Concert Mass' was Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. And at that, I'm not sure that it was always his intention that it be so (he wrote it for the elevation of Archduke Rudolph to Archbishop or Cardinal, finishing it too late for that), but everything I've read indicates that it is simply way too grand in all ways to perform as a church service. Is it possible that there is some liturgical 'rule of thumb' that allows one to distinguish between the two? I really don't know that there is. As I understand the Schubert situation, his mass without 'one holy and apostolic church' was rejected because he didn't write fugues in places that traditionally had fugues. But that isn't a liturgical consideration, it is merely a custom that happened to be congruent with the taste of the person making the decision. I need to go back and review Haydn's masses, but one (at least) of the late masses also has changes or elisions in the text. So too does one of Mozart's. But there was never any question that Haydn (and Mozart) intended their works as working masses.
So you raise some interesting points. I will never be the arbiter of these, but I will do some research and present what I find for y'all's consideration. Cool. :)
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Haydn's Seven Last Words is not a mass but was from the beginning intended to be presented in a church setting. When we listen to it nowadays - in orchestral or so-called oratorio form (meaning, with voices and orchestra), we must keep in mind that the work was certainly not intended to be played straight through as we do when playing a cd. Haydn himself would no doubt be rather surprised.
Composers of the era were also businessmen, so they probably saw to it that some form of performing use could be maintained after a work's 'trial run' (most masses composed in that period were either commands or hoped-for commands, therefore strictly speaking 'one-off' occasions). Haydn capitalized on SLW's fame by allowing trancription on pianoforte and himself working on the string quartet version that is by now the most frequently played of any of the work's versions. I have a transcription of Mozart's Requiem on string quartet (by Mozart disciple and champion Peter Lichtenthal, 1780-1853). Access to a full-fledged concert or church performance was probably comsidered improbable at the time, hence a need for usable domestic arrangements. The first known trancription of the Requiem was done barely a year after Mozart's death, in a string quintet arrangement. Composers knew that and sometimes, as in Haydn's case, actively participated in the deal. Fame and income was all that counted !
My hunch is that composers probably through-composed what we now hear but fully expected the first musical lines to be dropped and replaced by the usual chant. In the light of the practices of the time this was probably seen as not only acceptable but even desirable in that it granted their works access to a performing forum of great popular accessibility and financial-social influence.
Today in my free time, of which there wasn't much, I did some perusing of the comments on the masses of Schubert in Brian Newbould's biography - I ordered a copy but in the end didn't want to wait, so I checked one out of the library.
Newbould doesn't discuss the bit about the opening lines, per Andre in the post just up there above me, but one real possibility it seems to me - at least with Schubert - is to compose the whole thing and then, if somebody wants to chant the first few words, either let the chorus go ahead and repeat them, or simply use that short bit of music as an instrumental intro., and have the chorus come in on the next phrase. Works in many many cases that I can think of, though not all.
But what Newbould DOES discuss is the famous bit about Schubert omitting a certain phrase from the Credo. Yes he did, in all six of his masses; but what I did not know is that he also left out a rather wide range of other words in all six masses also; it's just that the "one holy and apostolic church" bit is the only phrase omitted repeatedly. Newbould cites half a dozen specific examples and tells us that there are several more scattered about; and he also points out that other composers did the same sort of thing, including among the great ones, Mozart. (He cites no specifics for Wolfie, though.) And his summary opinion is that, even if that one repeated phrase does represent something of a protest by Schubert - but it might be something else too, says the good Ph.D., such as Schubert's effort to shorten the most academic portion of the wordiness - mostly it's just haste, forgetfulness, inattention, and perhaps unfamiliarity (in the sense of word-for-word memorization) with Latin, inasmuch as Schubert never held a church job. It's also pointed out that Schubert not infrequently did the same thing with the poems he was setting as songs; either a word was left out, or added, or changed to a different word entirely; happened all the time. (Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau discussed this in his book on Schubert's songs.) In summary, Prof. Newbould suggests that what Schubert was really doing with his masses (and most other religious works) was writing a piece of music to which he would then fit the words; rather than taking the text as it stood and fitting the music to it. And in his haste, sometimes he screwed up.
And Newbould also makes mention of a number of church performances of the various masses and some of the smaller sacred works; so Schubert wasn't banned from use during actual services at all. He may not have broken into the big-time, in the sense of having his works done at St. Stephen's or one of the other big churches; but in parish churches and the chapels on the estates of certain nobility (the latter as was also true of many of the Haydn masses), he got his chances. Newbould makes particular mention of the little G Major mass, Schubert's smallest, which originally was set for voices, strings and organ only. He wrote it for a small neighborhood church. But later he gained a performance in a bigger venue and added trumpets and drums to the original; and later still, after his death, his brother Ferdinand added some woodwind parts presumably for yet another and bigger venue.
Also worth noting in passing is the provision in churches in the Habsburg dominions at this time (which excluded Salzburg, by the way, until after Napoleon) for telescoped texts in the longer sections of the mass; the classic example is Joseph Haydn's Little Organ Mass, where the entire Gloria, with text compressed like mad, takes less than a minute. Although Schubert didn't use this method of composing, he clearly knew of the tradition, and may well have thought, what the hell, what's a word here and there?, you can't understand half of 'em anyway. [This particular thought is mine; it is not to be connected to Dr. Brian Newbould, it should be made clear.]
And so that's where my thoughts have been going today; tomorrow, they'll probably wander through yet another wormhole in intellectual space, and land in an entirely different galaxy!
Conrad,
Now, what you have written there gives eloquent voice to my own way of thinking. Of course, it also adds fuel to the fire of the dispute between the Church and the churches, so to speak, because when one reads what Rome have to say about "no words shall be omitted or rearranged &c &c" and the simple fact that one can scarcely listen to a mass written between, say, 1730 and 1830 and not find at least a small crop of variances, then de facto and de jure are a long way apart.
'Telescoping, as a principal, is pretty cool. Where I referred above to Mozart's complaints to Martini, his telescoping in the little string of Missa brevis' that he composed in the mid 1770's was his way of getting around the time constraints. However, that practice goes back decades. It is interesting to listen to, especially since, as you mention, it is hard to understand what they're saying except with practiced ear. In fact, that's another of the Roman tenets for sacred music; words must be clearly intelligible. Oops, guess the guys missed that one, too. :D
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 13, 2012, 04:22:57 AM
Conrad,
Now, what you have written there gives eloquent voice to my own way of thinking. Of course, it also adds fuel to the fire of the dispute between the Church and the churches, so to speak, because when one reads what Rome have to say about "no words shall be omitted or rearranged &c &c" and the simple fact that one can scarcely listen to a mass written between, say, 1730 and 1830 and not find at least a small crop of variances, then de facto and de jure are a long way apart.
And we have just uncovered another in life's endless examples of practice not always adhering to the letter of the law. Obviously the Austrian churches did not go out of their way to create a blazing rift with Rome, but neither did they concern themselves about a little local variation here and there. Ultimately, if my memory is even close to the facts, in c.1905 the Pope issued a strong edict severely restricting all aspects of acceptable music in the churches: Piety and solemnity were the watchwords, and virtually all else was taboo. But the edict, by virtue of pressure from the appropriate cardinals and bishops, included a specific dispensation for the celebration of mass in Austria and related lands (including I think south Germany). And so from that point until the edict was overturned some generations later by a more liberal Pope, Austrian churches were the only ones allowed to do such things as play Schubert or Haydn masses during services. Elsewhere, it was the organ and maybe a choir and, please, nothing fun or the least bit happy....
Quote'Telescoping, as a principal, is pretty cool. Where I referred above to Mozart's complaints to Martini, his telescoping in the little string of Missa brevis' that he composed in the mid 1770's was his way of getting around the time constraints. However, that practice goes back decades. It is interesting to listen to, especially since, as you mention, it is hard to understand what they're saying except with practiced ear. In fact, that's another of the Roman tenets for sacred music; words must be clearly intelligible. Oops, guess the guys missed that one, too. :D
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As the old cliche goes, "laws are meant to be broken," which if you believe it means anarchy when taken to extremes, but in moderation maybe it works rather well at times.
Oh, and if you can understand the words of the Gloria in the "Little Organ," well, more power to you. Even though I know the words by this time, in this case (and some others as well) it all sounds like musical oatmeal to me. I have trouble far too often understanding singers at all, even without competing words sung by others. I seem to be unusually sensitive to good diction, far more so than many of my friends; there are times when I hear a mumble-singer do a song the words of which I not only know, but have sung myself; and I
still can't understand! (Which in the latter case means that, while I know what the word actually is, that's not what I hear. Some sort of clogged sonic discriminator in my eardrum, I guess.)
Great posts guys, very informative stuff indeed. The hilariously compressed Gloria in Haydn's Little Organ Mass has been duly noted by scholars. Imo it's particularly ironic considering Haydn's extraordinarily extended setting of the Gloria in his first Missa Cellensis (sometimes referred to as the St-Cecilia Mass), where it lasts over 30 minutes - almost double the length of the Credo in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Every single section is given the full treatment - florid arias, fugues etc.
I note in particular that my very favourite line of any Haydn mass happens to be the words Schubert omitted in ALL his masses: the tenor solo at 'Unam sanctam catholicam, apostolical ecclesiam' in the Missa Cellensis :D. There is so much spring, bounce, airiness here that it makes me smile every time - esp. in the Gerhard Wilhelm version, where the conductor allows Kurt Equiluz time to enounce and relish the words. Could it be that Schubert knew the work and couldn't think of matching it? Just joking of course, but I find the coincidence amusing.
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 13, 2012, 05:40:44 PM
And we have just uncovered another in life's endless examples of practice not always adhering to the letter of the law. Obviously the Austrian churches did not go out of their way to create a blazing rift with Rome, but neither did they concern themselves about a little local variation here and there. Ultimately, if my memory is even close to the facts, in c.1905 the Pope issued a strong edict severely restricting all aspects of acceptable music in the churches: Piety and solemnity were the watchwords, and virtually all else was taboo. But the edict, by virtue of pressure from the appropriate cardinals and bishops, included a specific dispensation for the celebration of mass in Austria and related lands (including I think south Germany). And so from that point until the edict was overturned some generations later by a more liberal Pope, Austrian churches were the only ones allowed to do such things as play Schubert or Haydn masses during services. Elsewhere, it was the organ and maybe a choir and, please, nothing fun or the least bit happy....
Ah yes, the famous
"Motu Proprio" of Pius X. The edict and special dispensation that you mention for Austria et al dates back further, to the early 19th century. I ran across it in my research and am still kicking my own butt for not writing down where I saw it, because I can't find it again. However, in the course of things, I decided to ask someone who was there, so to speak. I have a very dear friend who was born and raised in a suburb of Augsburg, within easy distance of Salzburg. This was in the 1920's that we are talking about here. She had been telling me how her mother used to 'shop' for which church to go to every Sunday, and I wanted to know more about the process. The answer was revealing, not only about her mother but also about the importance attached to the music and related aspects of the mass for these people of southern Bavaria, who were continuing a tradition of centuries;
"Back to your question and Augsburg: The local newspaper published every Friday the events in all of the churches, down to names of the presiding clergyman of the Masses. That gave Mama the chance to avoid the Fire and Brimstone, but also to hear some very good Bach, Haydn, and all the others who ever wrote church choir stuff. I don't know about the papal actions you mentioned; evidently not too many churches obeyed, no lack of great music and singing that I noticed. In fact I remember the great musical offerings in Fürth, Nürnberg, and especially in Salzburg."
QuoteAs the old cliche goes, "laws are meant to be broken," which if you believe it means anarchy when taken to extremes, but in moderation maybe it works rather well at times.
Oh, and if you can understand the words of the Gloria in the "Little Organ," well, more power to you. Even though I know the words by this time, in this case (and some others as well) it all sounds like musical oatmeal to me. I have trouble far too often understanding singers at all, even without competing words sung by others. I seem to be unusually sensitive to good diction, far more so than many of my friends; there are times when I hear a mumble-singer do a song the words of which I not only know, but have sung myself; and I still can't understand! (Which in the latter case means that, while I know what the word actually is, that's not what I hear. Some sort of clogged sonic discriminator in my eardrum, I guess.)
Sad to say, I have all I can do to follow an opera even with a libretto in my hand! Same with church music, even though for 8 years I played an integral part in celebrating it (back in the pre-Vatican II days, altar boys had a great list of Latin responses to learn). My solution to all this is to treat them like I used to do Bob Dylan; just sit back and concentrate on the rhythm and tone and let the words just slide on by. 0:)
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Quote from: André on July 13, 2012, 07:08:30 PM
Great posts guys, very informative stuff indeed. The hilariously compressed Gloria in Haydn's Little Organ Mass has been duly noted by scholars. Imo it's particularly ironic considering Haydn's extraordinarily extended setting of the Gloria in his first Missa Cellensis (sometimes referred to as the St-Cecilia Mass), where it lasts over 30 minutes - almost double the length of the Credo in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Every single section is given the full treatment - florid arias, fugues etc.
I note in particular that my very favourite line of any Haydn mass happens to be the words Schubert omitted in ALL his masses: the tenor solo at 'Unam sanctam catholicam, apostolical ecclesiam' in the Missa Cellensis :D. There is so much spring, bounce, airiness here that it makes me smile every time - esp. in the Gerhard Wilhelm version, where the conductor allows Kurt Equiluz time to enounce and relish the words. Could it be that Schubert knew the work and couldn't think of matching it? Just joking of course, but I find the coincidence amusing.
Really good point, Andre - of course one of those masses was a Solemnis and the other a Brevis which makes some difference right there (in a Solemnis, for instance, one never telescoped text anywhere), but still - a time differential of 30 to 1 is absurd! If I'm not mistaken the only longer Gloria in a mass setting than Haydn's is in Bach's b minor, and I am unaware of any shorter ones than Haydn's little one.
Point of (minor) interest: I've mentioned before that in 1795 Haydn's brother Michael wanted to use the Little Organ in Salzburg, but couldn't as it stood because Salzburg didn't allow telescoping. So he rewrote the Gloria, expanding it ("a little bit extended," as he put it) to make all the words clear. But even at that it only got him to three and a half minutes.
On the versions of the Cellensis: Overall, of the older (non-"period") performances I tend to prefer Jochum to Wilhelm, but not in the tenor section you refer to: In fact, not in the tenor parts anywhere in the mass. Equiluz has it all over Richard Holm - I strongly suspect that the latter was just a bit over the hill by this time; at least it sounds like he's having some trouble reaching notes that once he would have sailed to. On the other hand, if there is a better soprano soloist than Maria Stader, and even more so a bass one than Josef Greindl (both from the Jochum disc), I don't know of them. [Needless to say, I collect Cellenses - I wonder if that actually
is the plural of Cellensis?, or if there even is one at all? - and to my knowledge I have every one ever made except the very first, by the Haydn Society in 1950, which I have never been able to find even 50 years ago when I really did mount a search through rare record dealers. No luck. Too bad, acrid sound or no, because with Walter Berry singing bass I suspect I'd be in heaven.]
Quote from: André on July 13, 2012, 07:08:30 PM
Great posts guys, very informative stuff indeed. The hilariously compressed Gloria in Haydn's Little Organ Mass has been duly noted by scholars. Imo it's particularly ironic considering Haydn's extraordinarily extended setting of the Gloria in his first Missa Cellensis (sometimes referred to as the St-Cecilia Mass), where it lasts over 30 minutes - almost double the length of the Credo in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Every single section is given the full treatment - florid arias, fugues etc.
I note in particular that my very favourite line of any Haydn mass happens to be the words Schubert omitted in ALL his masses: the tenor solo at 'Unam sanctam catholicam, apostolical ecclesiam' in the Missa Cellensis :D. There is so much spring, bounce, airiness here that it makes me smile every time - esp. in the Gerhard Wilhelm version, where the conductor allows Kurt Equiluz time to enounce and relish the words. Could it be that Schubert knew the work and couldn't think of matching it? Just joking of course, but I find the coincidence amusing.
I have noticed that every mass is unique and individual in what is chosen for emphasis and what is allowed to pass by this time. Oddly enough, Motu Proprio covered this aspect too;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/MotuProprio1.jpg)
What this is saying to me is that the different parts have to be so uniquely interwoven that they will only work with each other. I thought this was interesting. Mozart's 'Credo Mass' (K 257) is another example of this, with its unique repetition of the word 'credo' until it takes on a life off its own. :)
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Like Gurn, I just sit back and let the words be as they will, without concern of what they mean. As a Catholic, I know the jist of what is going on, and the basic structure of a mass, enough to enjoy what is going on, kind of like knowing what to expect with sonata form.
This is a great discussion! I’m racking my brain to add illumination, but alas, I have the darndest time trying to elucidate my thoughts.
I’m listening to J. Haydn’s “Theresienmesse” (Bruno Weil) and enjoying it as if hearing it for the first time. I dearly love the 18th century mass. I wonder why?
Quote from: Leo K on July 14, 2012, 08:39:39 AM
Like Gurn, I just sit back and let the words be as they will, without concern of what they mean. As a Catholic, I know the jist of what is going on, and the basic structure of a mass, enough to enjoy what is going on, kind of like knowing what to expect with sonata form.
This is a great discussion! I'm racking my brain to add illumination, but alas, I have the darndest time trying to elucidate my thoughts.
I'm listening to J. Haydn's "Theresienmesse" (Bruno Weil) and enjoying it as if hearing it for the first time. I dearly love the 18th century mass. I wonder why?
Leo,
It IS difficult to add, my idea is that it is because it is such a large topic (we are talking about the entire heart of Classical Music here, I think) that one has a challenge coming to grips with any particular starting point. Way back before I started the thread, I realized that the only way I could do it was by delimiting a particular chunk and trying to ignore the rest for now, although clearly that is its own challenge.
IMO, you love it, as do I, because the underlying philosophy of that period was to create beauty (to praise God, for their part), and the beauty remains despite any other philosophical considerations today.
I am listening (once again) to The King's Consort playing Michael Haydn's
Requiem in c for Sigismundo. What a wonderful (and sadly unknown) piece of work! :)
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 14, 2012, 07:16:11 AM
Ah yes, the famous "Motu Proprio" of Pius X. The edict and special dispensation that you mention for Austria et al dates back further, to the early 19th century. I ran across it in my research and am still kicking my own butt for not writing down where I saw it, because I can't find it again. However, in the course of things, I decided to ask someone who was there, so to speak. I have a very dear friend who was born and raised in a suburb of Augsburg, within easy distance of Salzburg. This was in the 1920's that we are talking about here. She had been telling me how her mother used to 'shop' for which church to go to every Sunday, and I wanted to know more about the process. The answer was revealing, not only about her mother but also about the importance attached to the music and related aspects of the mass for these people of southern Bavaria, who were continuing a tradition of centuries;
"Back to your question and Augsburg: The local newspaper published every Friday the events in all of the churches, down to names of the presiding clergyman of the Masses. That gave Mama the chance to avoid the Fire and Brimstone, but also to hear some very good Bach, Haydn, and all the others who ever wrote church choir stuff. I don't know about the papal actions you mentioned; evidently not too many churches obeyed, no lack of great music and singing that I noticed. In fact I remember the great musical offerings in Fürth, Nürnberg, and especially in Salzburg."
I wouldn't be in the least surprised to learn that they still do this today in one form or another. I was a tourist there in May - spending a bit of time in Salzburg, Innsbruck and Vienna - and although I saw no newspaper notices, I did see posters tacked up all over the place announcing church services and music for the coming Sunday. In Innsbruck it
was Sunday, and if I'd been paying more attention to music and less to touristy things, I could have tiptoed away from the tour group and gone to hear the Mass Number Nine in D Major by the obscurity Wenzel Horak, 1800-1871, for whom I find no listings in any recording database anywhere, so I seem to have missed out on a real
coup. In Salzburg the notices were of course mostly for Mozart, except at St.Peter's where they were doing some Michael Haydn smaller things, and the cathedral itself was doing a Requiem by one Luigi Gatti (1740-1817), but as I was there on Tuesday and Wednesday, oh well.... well, I'm off the track. My point is that in all the public parks, train stations, etc., there are notice boards for all manner of musical performances (and drama, dance, art shows, etc.) including listings of what music is being done at what church on what date/time. Same with south Germany (Munich and Karlsruhe were where I saw them) and even in the big bus/train station and park in Luzern, Switzerland - although their offerings were seemingly sparse, perhaps they are less cultured? (I seriously doubt that.) [However, no mention anywhere of the name of any priest for sermon-brimstone purposes. Not on these public boards, at least.]
Quote from: Leo K on July 14, 2012, 08:39:39 AM
Like Gurn, I just sit back and let the words be as they will, without concern of what they mean.
It occurs to me that I probably have a different perspective than many others on the matter of intelligible words, because I was in fact a singer in another life (meaning, when I wasn't yet too old) and clear diction and emphasis on word meanings were part of the training. And more than just my teachers hammering it in, once I got good enough to think about such things as a Lieder recital, I got hooked on Schubert and naturally adopted Fischer-Dieskau's book as my personal 'bible,' and boy!, does
he pound the diction-and-word-sense mantras home with a nail-studded hammer! And so now, even though I don't do it myself any longer, I still sit back and criticize others who mumble or slur or garble, and think how much better it would be if I knew what they were singing, and even more if I had the sense that
they knew what they were singing. Ask any of my friends just how big a pompous ass I can be on this topic....
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 14, 2012, 09:24:08 AM
It occurs to me that I probably have a different perspective than many others on the matter of intelligible words, because I was in fact a singer in another life (meaning, when I wasn't yet too old) and clear diction and emphasis on word meanings were part of the training. And more than just my teachers hammering it in, once I got good enough to think about such things as a Lieder recital, I got hooked on Schubert and naturally adopted Fischer-Dieskau's book as my personal 'bible,' and boy!, does he pound the diction-and-word-sense mantras home with a nail-studded hammer! And so now, even though I don't do it myself any longer, I still sit back and criticize others who mumble or slur or garble, and think how much better it would be if I knew what they were singing, and even more if I had the sense that they knew what they were singing. Ask any of my friends just how big a pompous ass I can be on this topic....
I see your point completely, Conrad. But OTOH, I already know all the words and what they mean (as I know you do too), plus I have pathological hearing defects, so I am forced to content myself with that. :-\ I'm not happy about it, just pragmatic. Many times I have found out that what I thought was fuzzy singing was really fuzzy hearing on my part! :o So I edge around that topic. Glad you don't though, since someone has to be the watchdog. :)
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Quote from: Leo K on July 14, 2012, 08:39:39 AM
Like Gurn, I just sit back and let the words be as they will, without concern of what they mean. As a Catholic, I know the jist of what is going on, and the basic structure of a mass, enough to enjoy what is going on, kind of like knowing what to expect with sonata form.
My thoughts, almost exactly. Knowing "what to expect" is part of the pleasure a known structure or text gives me. As if I'm instantly at an upper level of knowledge and appreciation, where I can savour nuances, fineness of musicality from both composer and interpreters.
Gurn, there's one aspect of performing masses of that place and era that you haven't covered. I'm referring to the vexatious question of the proper latin pronunciation:alla tedesca or all'italiana ? The logical way would seem to be the german way (Aggnus Dei, kvi tollis peccata mundi). I have reservations about equating austrian and german in that regard. Austrians are Germany's southerners and share a border with Italy, on top of the obvious political interconnections within the Habsburg Empire. Could your 'dear friend' ;) tell us a thing or two on the subject? I'm really curious. Even though she hails from Augsburg, not Salzburg, I'll take her advice on the matter very seriously :D
Quote from: André on July 14, 2012, 03:41:48 PM
Gurn, there's one aspect of performing masses of that place and era that you haven't covered. I'm referring to the vexatious question of the proper latin pronunciation:alla tedesca or all'italiana ? The logical way would seem to be the german way (Aggnus Dei, kvi tollis peccata mundi). I have reservations about equating austrian and german in that regard. Austrians are Germany's southerners and share a border with Italy, on top of the obvious political interconnections within the Habsburg Empire. Could your 'dear friend' ;) tell us a thing or two on the subject? I'm really curious. Even though she hails from Augsburg, not Salzburg, I'll take her advice on the matter very seriously :D
'dré,
Hoy, I had quite forgotten that debate, long ago and at a time when my interest was not as high. But yes, it is interesting to know. I will ask my friend, although I suspect she will say that she doesn't hear it as different. It is, after all, Latin the way she learned it in school. Sort of like the valedictorian at the local Texas high school, whose speech I heard when I went to a friend's son's graduation. As a 3 years German scholar, he couldn't help but close with "Owf wiedersehen, y'all"... :)
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Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 14, 2012, 08:47:30 AM
IMO, you love it, as do I, because the underlying philosophy of that period was to create beauty (to praise God, for their part), and the beauty remains despite any other philosophical considerations today.
Yes, I would have to say your are right! 8)
QuoteI am listening (once again) to The King's Consort playing Michael Haydn's Requiem in c for Sigismundo. What a wonderful (and sadly unknown) piece of work! :)
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Me too, and I prefer the King's Consort recording over Helmuth Rilling's account. What a stunning requiem! Fans of Mozart's Requiem should hear this!
Quote from: Leo K on July 15, 2012, 07:25:10 AM
Yes, I would have to say your are right! 8)
Me too, and I prefer the King's Consort recording over Helmuth Rilling's account. What a stunning requiem! Fans of Mozart's Requiem should hear this!
Ah, we are both aesthetes then. :)
I don't have the Rilling (well, I wouldn't, would I?) but I have no urge at all to 'upgrade' the King version. And yes, it isn't hard to see where Mozart found a role model 20 years down the line. :)
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Quote from: André on July 14, 2012, 03:41:48 PM
Gurn, there's one aspect of performing masses of that place and era that you haven't covered. I'm referring to the vexatious question of the proper latin pronunciation:alla tedesca or all'italiana ? The logical way would seem to be the german way (Aggnus Dei, kvi tollis peccata mundi). I have reservations about equating austrian and german in that regard. Austrians are Germany's southerners and share a border with Italy, on top of the obvious political interconnections within the Habsburg Empire. Could your 'dear friend' ;) tell us a thing or two on the subject? I'm really curious. Even though she hails from Augsburg, not Salzburg, I'll take her advice on the matter very seriously :D
In the absence of anything formally authoritative, I did a certain brief survey of my recordings, paying attention to where the musicians are based and which version of Latin they choose, "tedesca" (Osanna in ex-TSEL-sis) or "italiana" (-- ex-CHEL-sis). Viz.:
The 'tedesca' include: Everything I have from anywhere in Austria or Germany - and in the latter case I have examples from a wide range of regions, north (Berlin), east (Dresden and Halle), south (Munich and Ingolstadt), west (Freiburg/Breisgau, Neuss am Rhein, Köln, Saarbrücken); Zürich (German Switzerland); Prague; and Bratislava.
The 'italiana' would include everywhere else, but specifically (so far) the USA and UK; Stockholm; Amsterdam; Bruxelles and Liege; France; Lausanne (French Switzerland); and obviously Italy. Oh, and Japan. Unless I am mistaken those are the only places from which I have recordings in Latin - oh wait, I've got one from Romania, just a moment - yep, 'italiana,' but given that Romanian is a Romance language, that figures.
The one place where there is a "split decision" is Budapest. I have recordings using 'tedesca' involving one German and three or four Hungarian conductors; but I have also two Hungarian conductors who use 'italiana' in the masses of Franz Liszt.
So this is hardly definitive but I suspect it gives a hint of the way things go.
UPDATE: Remembered one more CD. To 'italiana' add Mexico City.
I have a recording of (I think) the Missa Solemnis where the soloists are split on the matter. I'm pretty sure it was from a german recording, but the soloists were of mixed origins. I was always surprised the conductor or recording producer didn't insist on uniformity in the matter. It could also be the Verdi Requiem, of which I have many versions.
Quote from: André on July 17, 2012, 06:07:37 PM
I have a recording of (I think) the Missa Solemnis where the soloists are split on the matter. I'm pretty sure it was from a german recording, but the soloists were of mixed origins. I was always surprised the conductor or recording producer didn't insist on uniformity in the matter. It could also be the Verdi Requiem, of which I have many versions.
That should have been taken care of by the conductor - either the general conductor, or the choral director if there was one (and in a big work such as you're mentioning, there often is). I do think it's a bit strange that such a mixed-bag version was allowed to slip through. Perhaps they thought nobody would notice. They apparently weren't aware that you existed! ;D (I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of listeners really did not notice - not that I can prove this statement, but I really believe it. And frankly, until we got involved in all these Haydn-era mass discussions and I started focusing on every little thing, I'm not sure I'd have noticed either.)
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 17, 2012, 07:31:21 PM
That should have been taken care of by the conductor - either the general conductor, or the choral director if there was one (and in a big work such as you're mentioning, there often is). I do think it's a bit strange that such a mixed-bag version was allowed to slip through. Perhaps they thought nobody would notice. They apparently weren't aware that you existed! ;D (I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of listeners really did not notice - not that I can prove this statement, but I really believe it. And frankly, until we got involved in all these Haydn-era mass discussions and I started focusing on every little thing, I'm not sure I'd have noticed either.)
It may have been too late, or not possible. I know that I learned "Italian" pronounciation when I joined choir in college, and have always sung/read/spoken Latin that way ever since. It would take a great deal of work for me to learn any text using "German" pronounciation instead--especially if it was a text like that of the Mass, one with which I'm already familiar. So perhaps the particular soloists were, in essence, stuck in a groove and couldn't unlearn it in time. Moreover, as a possible audience member, if I did notice such a thing, I'd put it down to the individual singer, just like I do the bad pronunciation of various singers working in a language they're not familiar with. (For hilarious results, try Dietrich Fischer Dieskau trying to sing Haydn's Scottish songs with what he intended to be a Gaelic brogue.)
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 17, 2012, 07:31:21 PM
That should have been taken care of by the conductor - either the general conductor, or the choral director if there was one (and in a big work such as you're mentioning, there often is). I do think it's a bit strange that such a mixed-bag version was allowed to slip through. Perhaps they thought nobody would notice. They apparently weren't aware that you existed! ;D (I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of listeners really did not notice - not that I can prove this statement, but I really believe it. And frankly, until we got involved in all these Haydn-era mass discussions and I started focusing on every little thing, I'm not sure I'd have noticed either.)
Keep in mind that sometimes, even with recordings, there are last minute changes and there is no way to merge everything together ideally. Sometimes, we can even find recordings/performances where the singers sing in different languages. Personally, I don't find this bothersome, since I usually have a hard time understanding what they are saying anyway.
Quote from: André on June 30, 2012, 04:20:12 PM
Much to my discomfiture I looked in vain for a Michael Haydn disc in my collection. I know I have something more than the puny andantino für trombone I unearthed. Maybe I'll manage to put my hands on it some day :-\. I
I FOUND IT ! Unaccountedly wedged between two Beethoven piano sonata records :P. What I have is the Requiem performed by The King's Consort and Robert King. I'm listening to it as I write. The interpretation is sooooo HIP that I find it hard to find points of comparison with other works of the era I know. The orchestral playing, replete with glassy violin tone, swells on individual notes, explosive timpani and braying brass is hard to take. The sung parts seem very italianate: the shape of the melodies, the florid ornamentation, it all seems very different from both Joseph Haydn or Mozart. What I hear is music that seems to have much stature, very dedicated in feeling and quite bold in construction, but interpreted with insufferable prissiness.
What else is there that is not interpreted by the assembled Curators of Ye Olde Instruments Museum ?
Actually, I couldn't agree with you less. I have listened to this interpretation a few dozen times to date, and liked it better each time. Perhaps it doesn't sound like a performance one would hear today, especially if one was brought up hearing more modern interpretations, but for music from 1773, I feel as though this is probably far closer to what it sounded like in Salzburg Cathedral at the actual funeral mass of Archbishop Schrattenbach. And very appealing to MY taste. :)
Conrad has every version of this (I have a couple more too, but this is my favorite) so perhaps he can recommend one that you might enjoy more. :)
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Haha! I knew you would react strongly :). One of those cases where I can't get past an interpretation that blocks me from getting into the musical experience. While listening to it yesterday I was reading articles and reviews on the requiem. One reviewer commented on the superb performance of the alto Hilary Summers. Well, to me she sounded absolutely terrible, with a hooty tone of uncommon ugliness. This recording seems to have many friends. Reviews are universally laudatory. So maybe it's just me after all :D.
Quote from: André on July 24, 2012, 03:56:25 AM
Haha! I knew you would react strongly :). One of those cases where I can't get past an interpretation that blocks me from getting into the musical experience. While listening to it yesterday I was reading articles and reviews on the requiem. One reviewer commented on the superb performance of the alto Hilary Summers. Well, to me she sounded absolutely terrible, with a hooty tone of uncommon ugliness. This recording seems to have many friends. Reviews are universally laudatory. So maybe it's just me after all :D.
:D Well, I'm not one of those foam at the mouth people when it comes to PI performance. It is clearly my preference because the instruments simply sound better to me, but some things I simply can't hear the same way someone else might do. Clearly we diverge here, despite that our tastes have been congruent for 10 years now. :) Hooty? Well, yes, I can hear the wisdom coming out. ;)
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Some PI performances are/have been for decades my benchmark for anything that came subsequently. But generally speaking they are more instrumental than choral/vocal works. When it comes to the latter, too many factors intrude ;) that are rarely understood properly by the conductor (a function that did not exist per se before the early 19th century).
Harnoncourt in his 1970s recordings of Bach's Christmas Oratorio, or Mozart Great Mass, K 427 is an example of how it should be done. It's all in the balance. I hear no such concern for balance in Robert King's Michael Haydn. Just like a traffic cop who'll let anyone who honks loudest pass first >:D.
Not a reflection of my feelings for the music, au contraire. I just wish I could enjoy it at my level :D. Maybe the Rillling or Zacharias versions supply that? Although I note with some alarm that Zacharias swifts through the Requiem in a zippy 34 minutes :o
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 24, 2012, 04:19:46 AM
:D Well, I'm not one of those foam at the mouth people when it comes to PI performance. It is clearly my preference because the instruments simply sound better to me, but some things I simply can't hear the same way someone else might do. Clearly we diverge here, despite that our tastes have been congruent for 10 years now. :) Hooty? Well, yes, I can hear the wisdom coming out. ;)
As long as we are on the subject of Michael Haydn, what should be the first Michael Haydn recording a person purchases? I saw that cpo set of symphonies and thought I'd play Berkshire Roulet by searching for "Warchal" but came up empty. I like honking, but not screaming, Italianate or otherwise.
Quote from: Fafner on July 24, 2012, 08:15:15 PM
As long as we are on the subject of Michael Haydn, what should be the first Michael Haydn recording a person purchases? I saw that cpo set of symphonies and thought I'd play Berkshire Roulet by searching for "Warchal" but came up empty. I like honking, but not screaming, Italianate or otherwise.
No, BRO don't have it, it's on Amazon Marketplace though. I had that set at one time and wasn't really enthusiastic about the playing or conducting. But the other series on CPO, these here;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/71SmW-oLauL.jpg)
[asin]B000001S0Z[/asin]
by Goritzki are reputed to be much more nicely done. I don't know for sure, since I have only recently ordered them, but not received them yet.
Don't know if you have an interest in masses, but this one here;
[asin]B0000060H1[/asin]
the Mass for St Jerome, also called The Oboe Mass for reasons that are obvious when you hear it, is one of the most interesting that I've ever run across. Like all Michael Haydn disks, it is hard to find, but there are 3 or 4 different recordings of this one because it is so cool, so probably one of them will be available somewhere. And of course, MP3's are generally available if you want to go that route. :)
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Quote from: André on July 24, 2012, 08:06:41 PM
Some PI performances are/have been for decades my benchmark for anything that came subsequently. But generally speaking they are more instrumental than choral/vocal works. When it comes to the latter, too many factors intrude ;) that are rarely understood properly by the conductor (a function that did not exist per se before the early 19th century).
Harnoncourt in his 1970s recordings of Bach's Christmas Oratorio, or Mozart Great Mass, K 427 is an example of how it should be done. It's all in the balance. I hear no such concern for balance in Robert King's Michael Haydn. Just like a traffic cop who'll let anyone who honks loudest pass first >:D.
Not a reflection of my feelings for the music, au contraire. I just wish I could enjoy it at my level :D. Maybe the Rillling or Zacharias versions supply that? Although I note with some alarm that Zacharias swifts through the Requiem in a zippy 34 minutes :o
Well, I agree, Harnoncourt's K 427 is a lovely recording. Don't know the Bach, but I happily take your word for it. But I also know (as do you) that a recording is merely a single-faceted representation of one view of a performance, so I don't necessarily base the quality of the performance on the POV of the recording. I also try to get past the limitations of the medium and get into the entire thing, even if the performance is NOT all I would like it to be. Frankly I found that to be a very easy task with this recording compared to some others I've heard, where it required superhuman effort to put myself into the event. :)
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I agree totally. It just so happens that this particular interpretation sounded so terrible in all its components that I found it actually prevented me from hearing the music behind. It must be a rare case of my usual openness of mind subjectively sidetracked by subliminal animosities I didn't even know existed :D. No joke, I normally like - often love PI performances, especially of instrumental or chamber music. I don't like massed violins playing without vibrato. That's why I normally don't listen to HIP Mozart symphonies for example. With Haydn the PI playing simply sounds better. I don't know why but I'll venture to postulate that it's because Haydn's musical phrases are shorter, more varied, less melody-driven and less reliant on unison string playing - totally going out on a limb here :-X
Quote from: André on July 25, 2012, 05:01:23 PM
I agree totally. It just so happens that this particular interpretation sounded so terrible in all its components that I found it actually prevented me from hearing the music behind. It must be a rare case of my usual openness of mind subjectively sidetracked by subliminal animosities I didn't even know existed :D. No joke, I normally like - often love PI performances, especially of instrumental or chamber music. I don't like massed violins playing without vibrato. That's why I normally don't listen to HIP Mozart symphonies for example. With Haydn the PI playing simply sounds better. I don't know why but I'll venture to postulate that it's because Haydn's musical phrases are shorter, more varied, less melody-driven and less reliant on unison string playing - totally going out on a limb here :-X
Pretty sure I agree with you insofar as your analysis of Mozart v Haydn goes. As much as I dislike to generalize, I think it is certainly fair to say that Haydn's phrasing differs from Mozart's to the point of being nearly a different language. Which is a wonderful thing, certainly, since the differences are what highlight the individual composers' voices.
OTOH, I don't believe that massed violins playing without vibrato actually exist other than as a concept. Nor do I believe that any modern (last 15 years?) PI group would try to do that anyway. The reduced vibrato people, as people will do, took that concept too far. The anti-reduced vibrato people simply went over the top with their anti-ness. Despite the fact there there never was an actual 'vibratoless' playing style, since it can't be done by anyone who doesn't have perfect intonation anyway, I believe that reality has claimed the no-vibrato people, and it will eventually claim those who still believe that there is such a thing used as an essential element of period style.
That's my opinion, I could be wrong. :)
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 25, 2012, 05:17:46 PM
Pretty sure I agree with you insofar as your analysis of Mozart v Haydn goes. As much as I dislike to generalize, I think it is certainly fair to say that Haydn's phrasing differs from Mozart's to the point of being nearly a different language. Which is a wonderful thing, certainly, since the differences are what highlight the individual composers' voices.
OTOH, I don't believe that massed violins playing without vibrato actually exist other than as a concept. Nor do I believe that any modern (last 15 years?) PI group would try to do that anyway. The reduced vibrato people, as people will do, took that concept too far. The anti-reduced vibrato people simply went over the top with their anti-ness. Despite the fact there there never was an actual 'vibratoless' playing style, since it can't be done by anyone who doesn't have perfect intonation anyway, I believe that reality has claimed the no-vibrato people, and it will eventually claim those who still believe that there is such a thing used as an essential element of period style.
That's my opinion, I could be wrong. :)
8)
I think the actual point of the "no vibrato" was that (intentional) vibrato was used only as an effect, a departure from the norm meant to produce a specific result, rather than a general method in which vibrato-lessness was the departure from the norm.
There is of course the matter of gut strings vs. metal strings. I would assume vibrato and non-vibrato don't produce the same identical results for gut as they do for metal (although I've never compared them, not having thought of this aspect until just now as I type this post :) )
Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on July 25, 2012, 05:40:52 PM
I think the actual point of the "no vibrato" was that (intentional) vibrato was used only as an effect, a departure from the norm meant to produce a specific result, rather than a general method in which vibrato-lessness was the departure from the norm.
There is of course the matter of gut strings vs. metal strings. I would assume vibrato and non-vibrato don't produce the same identical results for gut as they do for metal (although I've never compared them, not having thought of this aspect until just now as I type this post :) )
In most respects you are correct. But the original aim was to reduce vibrato to a far lower level, not to eliminate it completely. Strings cannot play in unison without some vibrato to 'blend' them together. And 18th century soloists, for example, never played without vibrato, so who would they be emulating to try and do it today? But like all movements in all areas, the people involved in early 'HIP', once they became certain that they were the keepers of the Holy Grail, decided to go too far and just say that anyone who used vibrato on a stringed instrument was condemned to the Eternal Flames. Which is bullshit of course, complete and utter. They are only semi-Eternal Flames really.... :) No, but what I am saying is that no one believes this anymore, and while you will certainly hear vibrato used judiciously as opposed to end-to-end in a work, vibrato-free playing isn't really even attempted any more.
I realize that André wasn't really saying that this is done here, except maybe a little bit. :)
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 25, 2012, 05:17:46 PM
. . . The anti-reduced vibrato people . . . .
My dear chap: you've found a diplomatic way of expressing wubba-wubba ; )
Quote from: karlhenning on July 26, 2012, 04:04:25 AM
My dear chap: you've found a diplomatic way of expressing wubba-wubba ; )
Hilary is my idol.... 0:)
8)
Quote from: Fafner on July 24, 2012, 08:15:15 PM
As long as we are on the subject of Michael Haydn, what should be the first Michael Haydn recording a person purchases? I saw that cpo set of symphonies and thought I'd play Berkshire Roulet by searching for "Warchal" but came up empty. I like honking, but not screaming, Italianate or otherwise.
Hi, everybody, it's Mr. Michael Haydn Fanatic here, weighing in on the symphonies, which is admittedly out of place but so what, we're here now, let's do it.
To comment on CPO's choice of Bohdan Warchal to start their complete Michael Haydn series many years ago would cause my blood pressure to soar. CPO does a fine job most of the time, but this was one major screw-up indeed. Warchal was a perfectly decent conductor for many, many years in repertory that he was sympathetic to. Give him, say, Janacek, or many of the Czech and Slovak modernists that came after, and he did nice things. With Michael Haydn he was a bomb. Ultimately CPO seems to have realized this (rotten reviews all over the place) so they suspended their series for a time, then resumed it with Johannes Goritzki and had much better luck. Near the end though, something happened with Goritzki and he wasn't able to complete things, so there was another big lapse and then at long last the final 2-disc volume featuring Frank Beermann came out and wrapped it all up. In sum CPO recorded 44 of the 46 symphonies or symphony-like things; one sinfonia concertante was skipped (MH 132) and the remaining work is lost.
I have spent quite a few years now, and a fair amount of money, collecting Michael Haydn interpretations, for many reasons, but one was to collect as many symphonies as possible NOT conducted by Bohdan Warchal. As of now, of the 44, I have just 5 in Warchal versions alone. For these five works (all early and none really all that momentous except to fanatics, ahem) there is no competition. Some day, maybe....
Goritzki is good and in quite a bit of his work he's as good as is really needed, but he can get perfunctory at times in his rush to (apparently) get as much done as possible and get the discs out the door. An especially egregious example of this pops up on the disc Gurn showed us above, Symphonies 34-39 (a set of six little Italian-model things of about 10 minutes each, composed as a set - the only time MH ever did such a thing), with the Symphony 36 in B-Flat MH 475. It's one of the very few fire and brimstone 'explosions' that Michael ever gave us, trumpets and drums blazing away all over the place, and Goritzki has to subdue them and rush it along? I think not.... But, that said, in most of what he did Goritzki is fine. The final conductor in CPO's set, Frank Beermann, only did four symphonies to finish it off (one of which was a repeat of one that Warchal had done!) but I consider them the best of all the CPO offerings.
Moving away from CPO, the Hungaroton company at one time had three volumes of symphonies done by conductor Pal Nemeth, using period instruments and style. They appear to be discontinued now. This kind of treatment of MH fans seeking top-level performances should be condemned, preferably with a firing squad at Hungaroton marketing HQ. If you can find them for a rational price, BUY THEM. I have no idea where to steer you. (BRO doesn't have them.)
But for my money, for the best place of all to start, try this:
[asin]B00000E9JB[/asin]
Eight excellent performances by Harold Farberman and the Bournemouth Sinfonietta, DDD but originally on LPs at the very end of the LP era. Not PI. Just lovingly, energetically essayed. Originally there was apparently a plan to do the complete symphonies at this time, but funding dried up and in the end they only managed to do 20, of which 18 can be had on this twofer and three other single discs also listed on Amazon. (You'll see one shown with just one copy at an astronomical price, but the immediate following listing is the same disc for cheap. The so-called "Graz" unnumbered symphony is MH 26, very early, very fine.)
And apropos of MH 475 above, this is one place where Farberman really shines. Admittedly he embellishes the trumpet and drum parts - what the hell, they did it in the 1700s too, after all! - but no more energy and intensity has ever been put into a symphony performance than here. Wow!
Final note: The 'flaw' of this Vox set is that they stupidly published it as just one single track per symphony; the movements aren't separated. Annoying. Also note two different covers exist, the Amazon thumbnails show both. And last but not least the Amazon listing of contents has a couple of flubs: In the first column the G Major shown as MH 26 is actually MH 334, and in the second column the one "formerly attributed to Mozart" is wrong, that one is the same G Major MH 334 that was once considered Mozart's No. 37 K.444. Whew. I'm done. Go buy something. Sorry to drift away from Masses, I'll be good from here on.
No, no, interesting reading, and apropos in the sense that the 5 symphonies that MH wrote in the early 1780's, now called Perger 19, 26, 31, 33 & 43, which all have fugato finales (a rarity at that time), are believed to have been composed as legitimate church symphonies. I was steering in that direction earlier and then a more general discussion of symphonies arose. But my whole point was to get some recommendations for those 5 works. Goritzki and Beermann have most of them, I have the one by Warchal that I ripped before offing the box (P 19 Sym. 28). As it happens, one must purchase all the Goritzki's AND the Beermann to get the 5, but what the hell, I was likely to buy them all anyway... :)
Thanks for all that info.
BTW, you can use Audacity to break a recorded track into movements. I do it to remove applause, for example. Piece of cake. :)
8)
Having posted the preceding I really feel I ought to give you the other three Farberman discs:
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51AqiLUQD0L._SL500_.jpg) (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00008FZXK/?tag=goodmusicguideco)
This contains one repeat from the 2-disc, 8-symphony set noted in my last post. But the compensation is the stunning P.20, or MH 393 in d minor, MH's only minor-key work. Farberman gives this work all there is to give. Yes he includes timpani; they are authentic, just rarely found (only one other conductor known to me ever used them). Yes he embellishes the brass and drums - he was a percussionist, after all - but they are tasteful, reasonable and mesmerizing. (In this case he also gives the concertmaster some solo lines and they are embellished as well.) The big argument however has to be with the slow movement, which Farberman plays adagio and takes 12 minutes to do it. The movement is marked andantino and so it is a legitimate question to ask if maybe Farberman is making a more lightweight piece into Grand Tragedy or something like that. It's a matter of taste really; I will not be without Farberman but it's also very good that I have several other versions, all of which stay with andantino, to use for comparison. Beermann's on CPO is my favorite of the 'normal' ones.
[asin]B000BYW792[/asin]
Contains as noted before the very early MH 26 (unnumbered according to this disc) which is a real small gem. Other works excellent also.
[asin]B0009A0HZE[/asin]
When I tried looking this one up on Amazon for this post, I couldn't find it at first. I had typed "haydn farberman" as my search term, and it did not bring this to light. Later I went hunting in other ways and found it; the problem is that Amazon has input the conductor's name as "Faberman," without the first 'r'. Among other gems this contains the Symphony MH 302, with a posthorn in the trio of the minuet. This is another symphony where Farberman allows embellishment, and of all those he treats that way I think it's easily the best in that particular respect.
Thanks for those links. I ordered this one first, hope it comes in that neatly rustic cover;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/61q8hfvm4ML.jpg)
I would quite like to hear that d minor symphony. :)
8)
Thanks for these extremely informative posts, Uncle Connie! Have to say, I almost believed it was an April Fools' prank though. Farberman in MH :o. Goodness gracious. HB is known to me as one of my favourite Mahler imterpreters, the conductor who stretches a 75 minute work into a 90 minute behemoth of colossal proportions, all cushioned in the most comfy Simmons Beautyrest sound world. I shall certainly seek those out !
Gurn, you have been warned ! >:D
Quote from: André on July 26, 2012, 06:27:03 PM
Thanks for these extremely informative posts, Uncle Connie! Have to say, I almost believed it was an April Fools' prank though. Farberman in MH :o. Goodness gracious. HB is known to me as one of my favourite Mahler imterpreters, the conductor who stretches a 75 minute work into a 90 minute behemoth of colossal proportions, all cushioned in the most comfy Simmons Beautyrest sound world. I shall certainly seek those out !
Gurn, you have been warned ! >:D
Andre - actually I have most of Farberman's Mahler, and adore them. So we are clearly in sync on that composer. Too bad Farberman never managed to do them all, I wonder how long the Third would have taken him.
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 26, 2012, 06:09:59 PM
Thanks for those links. I ordered this one first, hope it comes in that neatly rustic cover;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/61q8hfvm4ML.jpg)
I would quite like to hear that d minor symphony. :)
8)
Never seen that particular version of a cover in my life. Please advise which symphonies are on it. (Assuming you know, as the picture doesn't give it away.)
Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 26, 2012, 06:53:41 PM
Never seen that particular version of a cover in my life. Please advise which symphonies are on it. (Assuming you know, as the picture doesn't give it away.)
It is an alternate cover to this disk:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/d844431378a02cbea6bf6110.jpg)
with these works on it;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/1f78431378a01cbea6bf6110.jpg)
That's just a typical Vox cover, the other is way cooler!
8)
Gurn, what do you consider Mozart's Requiem to belong to? A Mass in classical era Austria ? Or is it pointing to something else, freer in structure, more emotional in expression? It is certainly the best known, most performed and most recorded of all MCEA. And the one most subject to wild variations in interpretative stance.
Right now listening to a live Salzburg bicentenary year performance under Bruno Walter with the WP, Wiener Staatsopern Chor, soloists Lisa della Casa, Ira Malaniuk, Anton Dermota and Cesare Siepi. Talk about luxury casting: 3 of these soloists were in the famed bicentenary year Decca Krips Don Giovanni. Two (soprano and bass) in the same company's even more famous Kleiber Nozze di Figaro. Recordings that obviously aimed to pay their respect and live up to their famous native son's fame. I have another such bicentenary year effort on my shelves (Jochum on DG).
Remember Hansel and Gretel ? I have no idea what the salzburgers or austrians would have made of the Requiem in 1792, but it seems that by 1956 their descendants had somehow lost their way from home and by 1956 had developed their own idea how the piece should go.
But I digress. Well, maybe not. From Vienna 1792 to Vienna 1956 things seem to have changed considerably. And from that bicentenary (the year of my birth 0:)) to today too ! Next on the listening schedule is a recent version by a revolutionary siberian group and their iconoclastic greek conductor that promises to be anything but tradition-bound. I read a blog entry about the Thielemann Munich version, in which the reviewer duly notes the oleaginous string textures, ritardando-ridden phrase ends, and other artefacts from a bygone era.
So, what are we to make of current day MCEA ? Is the Mozart Requeim a problem child?
André,
This is a piece that is hard to put into a box and declare the truth about. Musicologists are still divided about what's what there. But as you probably recall, I am in the camp that says that Classical & Romantic have little division, rather they are a continuum of the same style, ranging from a stricter form early times to a more wide-ranging one later on, but all of a piece when it comes down to it.
It seems to me that you have hit the nail on the head though when you say that it is the performance that makes the work vary from one end of the spectrum to the other. I believe that stylistically, it is very much in the mold of Michael Haydn's c minor Requiem of 1773. And if you hear it performed by the same group, one after the other, you would agree. Then, if you heard both performed by a modern instrument/modern (post-Romantic) style group, you would also see them as being of a piece. Only if you heard one performed in one style and the other in the opposite would you say they were essentially different, and that really is the crux of it, isn't it?
I don't know what MCEA means, so I can't comment. But big, lush performances of any High Classical piece are just not my cup of tea. I know that's not the popular view, but I can't stick with any other. :-\
8)
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on July 31, 2012, 05:23:50 PM
I don't know what MCEA means, so I can't comment.
8)
??? You're the one who came up with the name for this thread! :P
As for the Requiem--wasn't it initially performed in a sort of domestic chapel or domestic concert? Or at least intended for such by Baron Whoever who commissioned it? Which suggests the smallest possible forces in a relatively intimate setting.
Solti's recording includes some of the Latin texts used in a Requiem chanted by cathedral clergy, since it's a live performance of the Requiem being sung in the context of a Requiem for Mozart on the anniversary of his death--but it's definitely not a small scale, intimate performance.
MCEA = Masses in Classical Era Austria. Just trading the quote-unfriendly title for a trendy acronym, generation Y style :D
Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on July 31, 2012, 05:51:58 PM
??? You're the one who came up with the name for this thread! :P
As for the Requiem--wasn't it initially performed in a sort of domestic chapel or domestic concert? Or at least intended for such by Baron Whoever who commissioned it? Which suggests the smallest possible forces in a relatively intimate setting.
Solti's recording includes some of the Latin texts used in a Requiem chanted by cathedral clergy, since it's a live performance of the Requiem being sung in the context of a Requiem for Mozart on the anniversary of his death--but it's definitely not a small scale, intimate performance.
Yes, Walsegg-Stupach. And it was, just as you say. It isn't only for authenticity purposes that it pleases me more aesthetically, it just overall sounds better to me. Potential authenticity is just a bonus. 0:)
Quote from: André on July 31, 2012, 06:11:44 PM
MCEA = Masses in Classical Era Austria. Just trading the quote-unfriendly title for a trendy acronym, generation Y style :D
OK, so I took my dumbass pill this morning. Sue me. :D :D
8)
I got a hold of this recently (I love the cover, because I love the 18th century portrait)!
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/5146ud3U-EL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
Georg Grün and the Kammerphilharmonie Mannheim present Michael Haydn's
Missa pro defunctis, for soloists, chorus & orchestra in B flat major, MH 838.
A late unfinished work, and a new work to my ears, I'll see how it sounds soon 8)
A review on the web:
Quote
Of Johann Michael Haydn's two requiem settings, his incomplete late work, the Requiem in B flat major, has remained in the shadow of his so-called "Schrattenbach Requiem" in C minor, composed in 1771. Haydn, almost 70 at the time, who wrote his second "solemn requiem" on commission from the Empress Maria Theresa, could only complete the setting through the beginning of the "Dies irae." Quite similar to Mozart's requiem fragment, Haydn's torso was completed by a musician of a "kindred spirit," since an incomplete Mass for the dead had scarcely a liturgical use. In 1839 Father Gunther Kronecker, choirmaster of the Benedictine monastery, Kremsmünster, took on this weighty task, and thus he was the "Süßmayr to Michael Haydn." Stylistically, his completion of the work - borne on lyrical-cantabile melody displaying at times a folk song character - creates a bridge to the music of Franz Schubert and the Viennese Biedermeier. World premiere recording of this work, as completed by P. Kronecker.
I very recently acquired this disk;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/Massof1750Tumaetalcover.jpg)
which is actually quite brilliant. I've been sure all along that the idea of playing out an entire mass with the correct adjunct music could not possibly have been entirely my own (despite that it was original TO me :) ), and this disk proves it out.
It is a Viennese mass from the Ordinary part of the Church year. It purports to be from circa 1750, although the Mass itself claims 1758. Nonetheless it is a beautiful e minor mass that proves once again that there were plenty of composers out there of great skill who were unheard of, basically because they wrote little besides church music. Here is the lineup:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/Massof1750Tumaetalback.jpg)
Tuma's Sonata da Chiesa is particularly nice, as is the Offertorium aria by Zechner.
Like a lot of Ars musici disks, this one is very hard to get in the USA. AMP have one for $50! But AMP/UK have several, for as little as £2.99. Strongly recommended. If you already have the disk, I would love to chat about it with you. For example, as an inveterate nit-picker, I can say that things like the organ concerto would not have been played all at once like that, but the movements would have been broken up and spread out across the mass. But if you are a ripper and know what you are doing with tags, fixing this is child's play. Actually having the music to fix is the main thing. Check it out! :)
8)
Thanks for the rec., Gurn. What can one expect in the form of notes?
Quote from: Opus106 on September 15, 2012, 12:58:25 PM
Thanks for the rec., Gurn. What can one expect in the form of notes?
If you must have it in notes; £2.99 = £3.
;D
Quote from: Opus106 on September 15, 2012, 12:58:25 PM
Thanks for the rec., Gurn. What can one expect in the form of notes?
You're welcome, Navneeth.
Well, it's mainly in e minor, so you can expect 1 sharp, I guess, and the organ concerto is in F so 1 flat too.
:D :D 0:)
No, but seriously, the notes are good. I learned a lot from them, or at least they consolidated a lot of info that I learned over a long period in widely disparate places, so that was handy. It's definitely a Viennese mass, so the lines of progression are drawn out from that POV, which is the main place to be. All'round, if you can get it for only a little, you will have got a lot. :)
8)
Quote from: The new erato on September 15, 2012, 01:22:46 PM
If you must have it in notes; £2.99 = £3.
;D
Quote from: Gurn Blanston on September 15, 2012, 01:25:00 PM
You're welcome, Navneeth.
Well, it's mainly in e minor, so you can expect 1 sharp, I guess, and the organ concerto is in F so 1 flat too.
:D :D 0:)
Ugh... ::) That teaches me not to fight the idea of including the words 'sleeve' or 'liner' ever again. ;D
Quote
No, but seriously, the notes are good. I learned a lot from them, or at least they consolidated a lot of info that I learned over a long period in widely disparate places, so that was handy. It's definitely a Viennese mass, so the lines of progression are drawn out from that POV, which is the main place to be. All'round, if you can get it for only a little, you will have got a lot. :)
8)
That's great to hear! Thanks, again. :)
Quote from: Opus106 on September 15, 2012, 01:30:56 PM
Ugh... ::) That teaches me not to fight the idea of including the words 'sleeve' or 'liner' ever again. ;D
That's great to hear! Thanks, again. :)
You are most welcome. If you decide to get it, I would enjoy chatting about it. :)
8)
Ohhh, oooohh, eternal shame on me for passing this thread by before! :o
Only now, when I accidentaly stumbled upon
Johann Michael Haydn's Requiem in C minor (not the unfinished one in B flat) I arrived at this sacred place... :)
I've only sampled online, but I think what anyone would strike immediately is the fact that this work must have been a major inspiration for Mozart when writing his Requiem.
Anyway, I'm looking for a good recording! :) And I could use some help...
Robert King's recording has been mentioned before here and it
does sound like a primary recommendation: beautifully performed and recorded in the best HIP tradition, excellent singing too. But, not surprisingly from those quarters, I feel the overall sound is - probably partly due to the English choral singing - pretty smooth and lacks some grit and I would have a bit more drive.
Other options are: Zacharias (MDG), which got some positive comments but is non-HIP and to my ears rather old-fashioned and off the mark, despite some superb singing. Next is Guy Jannssen and the Laudantes consort (Cypres): I like his approach, some wonderful things going on in the orchestra but the singing is not so great, plus he is too slow - as is the same in the oddly coupled Campra Requiem, which also suffers from mediocre/bad singing... And then there is the wild horse: Ivor Bolton in a live recording with the Mozarteum Orchester (Oehms Classics - samples at jpc and
HERE (http://www.allmusic.com/album/salzburger-festspiele-2004-mw0001839565), which to my knowledge does not play on period instruments, but I must say it does not sound bad at al...quite good, actually.
Any comments and - hopefully - additional recommendations are most welcome! :) If I had to choose now, I might take my chances on Ivor Bolton, and/or for the time being go for the safe & "nice" King's Consort, which has an good coupling too, and wait for a German or mid-European ensemble to come along some day - because this music deserves much more exposure!
| [asin]B0007PHARY[/asin] | [asin]B0001Y1JSW[/asin] |
| [asin]B000Y1BRK2[/asin] | [asin]B000A32AWI[/asin] |
Q
Quote from: Que on February 15, 2013, 11:51:37 PM
Ohhh, oooohh, eternal shame on me for passing this thread by before! :o
Knowing your preferences, I was always surprised too. You are probably a busy man... 0:)
QuoteOnly now, when I accidentaly stumbled upon Johann Michael Haydn's Requiem in C minor (not the unfinished one in B flat) I arrived at this sacred place... :)
I've only sampled online, but I think what anyone would strike immediately is the fact that this work must have been a major inspiration for Mozart when writing his Requiem.
Anyway, I'm looking for a good recording! :) And I could use some help...
Robert King's recording has been mentioned before here and it does sound like a primary recommendation: beautifully performed and recorded in the best HIP tradition, excellent singing too. But, not surprisingly from those quarters, I feel the overall sound is - probably partly due to the English choral singing - pretty smooth and lacks some grit and I would have a bit more drive.
Other options are: Zacharias (MDG), which got some positive comments but is non-HIP and to my ears rather old-fashioned and off the mark, despite some superb singing. Next is Guy Jannssen and the Laudantes consort (Cypres): I like his approach, some wonderful things going on in the orchestra but the singing is not so great, plus he is too slow - as is the same in the oddly coupled Campra Requiem, which also suffers from mediocre/bad singing... And then there is the wild horse: Ivor Bolton in a live recording with the Mozarteum Orchester (Oehms Classics - samples at jpc and HERE (http://www.allmusic.com/album/salzburger-festspiele-2004-mw0001839565), which to my knowledge does not play on period instruments, but I must say it does not sound bad at al...quite good, actually.
Any comments and - hopefully - additional recommendations are most welcome! :) If I had to choose now, I might take my chances on Ivor Bolton, and/or for the time being go for the safe & "nice" King's Consort, which has an good coupling too, and wait for a German or mid-European ensemble to come along some day - because this music deserves much more exposure!
| [asin]B0007PHARY[/asin] | [asin]B0001Y1JSW[/asin] |
| [asin]B000Y1BRK2[/asin] | [asin]B000A32AWI[/asin] |
Q
As it happens, the King was the first one I got and was then struck with the realization that my hunt was over after the first arrow. It is a splendid realization. I don't know from where I sit now, but the very first thing I would check out, especially with your tastes, would be to see if Pal Nemeth /Capella Savaria have done a version on Hungaroton. They are as PI as it gets, beautiful performers, and have done a great bunch of Michael Haydn. Without doubt it will be out of print (if it exists), but that can always be overcome. I can't imagine a version I would rather have, M. Haydn's music is
their music.
Other than that possibility, I don't have a solid idea. I can't see me trading King for any of those you have listed. You might try King anyway; it isn't like you would be flushing a million euros if it
didn't suit you. The St Ursula's Mass on Disk 2 is very fine too. :)
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The original post (thank you, Gurn!) includes a description of 18th-century Mass music that might almost equally apply to Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Are we sure that one is a "concert Mass"? Might it have in fact been written for and first performed at some special church occasion?
Quote from: jochanaan on March 14, 2013, 07:26:58 PM
The original post (thank you, Gurn!) includes a description of 18th-century Mass music that might almost equally apply to Beethoven's Missa Solemnis. Are we sure that one is a "concert Mass"? Might it have in fact been written for and first performed at some special church occasion?
Thanks for moving it TTT with such an interesting question!
AFAIK, the Missa Solemnis was composed for the installation of Beethoven's student, the Archduke Rudolph, as a Cardinal. In typical Beethoven fashion, he missed the deadline by a year or two, but in fact he did send it to Rudolph, and IIRC it was played at a Mass. In Vienna, meanwhile, when Beethoven wanted to play parts of it as his famous Academy of May 7, 1824, which also included the World Premiere of The Ninth, he couldn't do so because due to laws, Sacred Music was prohibited from being played in a secular concert stage. So he got a special dispensation to premiere the selections by calling them "Three Hymns" (rather than 3 parts of the Mass Ordinary) and in fact it was quite a popular presentation. The reaction seemed to be that these works were more appropriate for the concert venue.
It should be borne in mind that in the intervening years between Haydn's late masses and the Missa Solemnis, there had been a Papal decree banning that kind of music from the Mass. Not that the Austrians gave a damn, of course.... :)
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Quote from: Uncle Connie on July 26, 2012, 06:53:41 PM
Never seen that particular version of a cover in my life. Please advise which symphonies are on it. (Assuming you know, as the picture doesn't give it away.)
I have that Vox "wallet". Luckily, Vox abandoned that format early on. On the other had, I've never had one break on me.
And the music is very good. Up there with Vanhal and the other "second tier" Classical-era symphonists. Actually, I like Michael a little more than Vanhal.
Some of these Farberman recordings have been issued by Regis. They even issued some recordings that were never on CD before.
An Easter Mass in Salzburg Cathedral?
I was sitting in the music room this morning, listening to Beethoven's hymn to the cosmos and gazing out my window at the rabbits laying their brightly colored eggs in the various corners of the yard when the thought naturally occurred to recreate an Easter Mass from Salzburg, circa 1779. If my library, which is well-represented with Salzburgians, would cooperate, this could be a nice Easter Sunday morning listening project.
The choice of a mass ordinary was fairly straightforward, since despite the variety out there, Mozart's Mass in C, K317 was actually (most likely) composed for Easter in Salzburg Cathedral, it would function nicely even in 2013 for that same purpose. Somewhere, somehow, this mass got the name "Coronation Mass", but in fact there is absolutely no record of it being used for any coronation of anyone at anytime, while its completion in March, 1779, and in festive C major with full orchestration makes it almost a certainty that it was used for this purpose. It is also accompanied by the lovely Epistle Sonata K329(317a), which, with its identical (and unusual) instrumentation is clearly meant as a companion piece.
So, with only one piece out of time, the Eybler Motet for Easter "Terra Tremuit" (The Earth Trembles), which comes 10 years too late but fits too nicely to overlook, and some organ works by Muffat, trumpet fanfares by Caldara and the perfect setting for a Te Deum by Michael Haydn, we are ready to go.
The mass opens with a toccata by Muffat in the somber key of d minor (since the News hasn't got out yet!). As the Archbishop enters, we have the opening flourish of the sonata in C for 2 Clarini (high trumpets) and the violins, with timpani. Then the lovely opening strains of Mozart's Kyrie. This is undoubtedly the finest church work to ever come out of Salzburg, and the occasional bursts of symphonic writing tend to make one think of Haydn's late masses, except there isn't the fugal writing that Haydn used.
After the Gloria, Mozart's finest Epistle Sonata is played while the priest continues in silent prayer leading up to the epistle for the day. This is followed by the Credo, and then the beautiful Eybler motet "The Earth Trembles". After the gospel, the short second movement of the Caldara trumpet sonata leads into the Sanctus, the Benedictus and the Agnus Dei. During the communion, the organist plays a Toccata & Fugue by Eberlin, yet another native son, and the mass proper closes with a "Go forth" injunction from the celebrant. At this point, since this is a festive celebratory mass, a new feature is displayed, a Te Deum. This is a classic setting of a poem of praise, believed to be by either Saint Augustine or Saint Ambrose as early as 387AD and still in use today.
Afterwards, we hear the final movement of the Caldara sonata for trumpets and then another toccata by Muffat as people file out of church, this one in a festive C major.
This sort of listening project gives one a great opportunity to hear this music in its natural progression. I personally get a good deal of satisfaction from it, because I have let it pass by for many years due to the religious implications. I have come to the decision, as you might if you are in similar philosophical circumstances, that this is too large and lovely a body of work to divorce oneself from. Historical recreations are a great way to generate the intellectual satisfaction that should go with musical enjoyment. try it and see. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on March 31, 2013, 06:58:59 AM
An Easter Mass in Salzburg Cathedral?
[...]
Excellent idea, splendid realization. 8)
Quote from: Florestan on March 31, 2013, 10:48:11 AM
Excellent idea, splendid realization. 8)
Thanks, Florestan. In the event, it was highly enjoyable. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on March 31, 2013, 10:56:16 AM
Thanks, Florestan. In the event, it was highly enjoyable. :)
Imagine how magnificent an experience would be to really see and hear that Mass in the Salzburg cathedral. The mere thought of it gives me goosebumps. (It goes without saying that the liturgical Mass should be Tridentine, not Concillar).
Quote from: Florestan on March 31, 2013, 10:59:24 AM
Imagine how magnificent an experience would be to really see and hear that Mass in the Salzburg cathedral. The mere thought of it gives me goosebumps.
I know that until WWII at least, they still did masses in the old style there. I wonder if they still do today, since Vatican II. I would guess not. Still the historical aspect; this is where Mozart and Michael Haydn played the organ on Sundays etc. would be enough of a point of interest to make the trip well worthwhile. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on March 31, 2013, 11:02:52 AM
I know that until WWII at least, they still did masses in the old style there. I wonder if they still do today, since Vatican II. I would guess not. Still the historical aspect; this is where Mozart and Michael Haydn played the organ on Sundays etc. would be enough of a point of interest to make the trip well worthwhile. :)
I visited Salzburg 20 years ago but I was there only one day. I hope next time I'll stay longer and maybe catch a historical Mass being enacted. :)
From the liner notes to the Philips set of Mozart's masses (meaning from the Complete Mozart Edition, Volume 10 of its 2000 incarnation), by Kenneth Chalmers:
after explaining that K.317 and K.337 were written for Easter, and the probable link to K.329
Quote
The "Coronation" nickname of the Mass seems to derive from its performance under the Viennese court composer of the day, Salieri, possibly during the coronation of Leopold II in Frankfurt in 1790 or (as King of Bohemia) in Prague in 1791, the event for which Mozart wrote La Clemenza di Tito.
I have heard, in contrast to this, that the mass's name stems from its use in Marian context, for a ritual coronation of the Virgin's statue in a church whose location I've forgotten--may not have been Salzburg.
Meanwhile, you've given me a good idea of what to listen to later on, after the current batch of Russian symphonies has been digested.
Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on March 31, 2013, 11:56:37 AM
From the liner notes to the Philips set of Mozart's masses (meaning from the Complete Mozart Edition, Volume 10 of its 2000 incarnation), by Kenneth Chalmers:
after explaining that K.317 and K.337 were written for Easter, and the probable link to K.329
I have heard, in contrast to this, that the mass's name stems from its use in Marian context, for a ritual coronation of the Virgin's statue in a church whose location I've forgotten--may not have been Salzburg.
Meanwhile, you've given me a good idea of what to listen to later on, after the current batch of Russian symphonies has been digested.
Interesting, thanks for that. Zaslaw doesn't mention the Leopold II connection, and although I remember Salieri leading a pair of Mozart masses there, I couldn't remember which they were. The Marian connection has to do with an anniversary of the coronation of a miracle working statue of Mary at the church of Maria Plain, a pilgrimage destination near Salzburg. There was never any documentation of this connection, however. The completion date on the autograph of "March 23, 1779" lends a lot of credence to the Easter idea, given that Mozart habitually didn't complete anything until it as needed. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on March 31, 2013, 12:03:21 PM
given that Mozart habitually didn't complete anything until it as needed. :)
And in some cases, only after it was needed! :P
Chamlers is definite that the Masses were written for Eastertide Salzburg; the Salieri performances are given as less definite and would have been revivals of the music, not first performances.
Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on March 31, 2013, 12:18:22 PM
And in some cases, only after it was needed! :P
Chamlers is definite that the Masses were written for Eastertide Salzburg; the Salieri performances are given as less definite and would have been revivals of the music, not first performances.
:D Many examples of that, for sure! :)
Yes, I was going to make that point myself; the mass was already 11 or 12 years old by then. Another reason I hate hanging names on musical works... ;)
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Looks like there will be a bit of catch-up reading for me on this thread. Other than a few Haydn Masses, I am really not familiar with other works in this classical sub-genre. As I went through the pretty large liner-note of the following set of SMP by Karajan a few days ago, it appears the work was not even familiar to the Austrian themselves (back in the early 1950's), who share the same language with the Germans ...
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/419FFS3G0SL._SX300_.jpg)
Hi, Coop. Enjoy your stay here. I suspect that you will discover an entirely different sort of music between Austria and Germany. And also will have to arrive at different terms with what you consider to be 'sacred music', because the Austrians certainly did! In the period between 1730 and 1830, the likelihood of hearing anything resembling your Bach, for example, is right out. Of course, this was the period when stile Antico, which Bach represented so well, was in high disfavor in Austria (and other places too, I might add). Which is not to say that sacred music was any less respected, it just was done differently.
You might like to try some of Mozart's masses, not the few he did after moving to Vienna, but the Salzburg masses from the 1770's. And of course, Michael Haydn, the premiere composer of masses at the time. The further away you go from the Vienna / Salzburg axis, the less the music you find will represent this style. That's why I've tried to keep the focus here, because if you just say 'mass music' the range is phenomenal!! Which is and of itself is another great topic for a thread (hint hint, in case anyone wants to do that!!). :)
Enjoy!
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New disk finally shipped today, although I have been trying for nearly a year to snap up a copy;
[asin]B0000060H1[/asin]
Michael Haydn's famous Oboe Mass, which was praised to the heavens by Leopold Mozart in a letter to Wolfgang. Stunning as that is, I think in retrospect that this is the only positive thing that Leopold ever wrote!!
I have the mass itself by others, but this is the disk to have, not least because it is the only one containing the original through-composed offertory "Timete Dominum". I have begun an essay on this fascinating mass which will proceed apace when once I get this disk. If you can't find a copy of this one, I would point out that there is one by Raymond Hug that is very nice too, one which I already have. This is a mass that I would really enjoy discussing with anyone interested. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on May 24, 2013, 07:54:25 AM
New disk finally shipped today, although I have been trying for nearly a year to snap up a copy;
[asin]B0000060H1[/asin]
... which was praised to the heavens by Leopold Mozart in a letter to Wolfgang. Stunning as that is, I think in retrospect that this is the only positive thing that Leopold ever wrote!!
I think you're being unfair, he also wrote another "positive things": ;)
Exempli gratia:
(http://www.jpc.de/image/w600/front/0/4260034868601.jpg) (http://www.jpc.de/image/w600/rear/0/4260034868601.jpg)
Quote from: Gordon Shumway on May 24, 2013, 08:14:10 AM
I think you're being unfair, he also wrote another "positive things": ;)
Exempli gratia:
(http://www.jpc.de/image/w600/front/0/4260034868601.jpg) (http://www.jpc.de/image/w600/rear/0/4260034868601.jpg)
:D Well, I wasn't thinking about 'composing', rather, discussing someone else's music. He was a bundle of negativity. :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on May 24, 2013, 08:20:36 AM
:D Well, I wasn't thinking about 'composing', rather, discussing someone else's music. He was a bundle of negativity. :)
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I know, I know. Your post was very clear. :)
I simply took the chance to promote that excellent set. :)
Quote from: sanantonio on May 24, 2013, 08:24:08 AM
Both of these recordings are on NML, and I am listening to the one you pictured as I type - it will be my first time to hear it. My exposure to Michael Haydn has been rather limited; so far it sounds good.
What about this Mass, in particular, interests you?
Writing from my phone....
Listen to the Gloria in particular. The second part of it is extraordinary for a Mass in any era! Also, it is all winds, no strings. Highly unusual thing, at least at that time. More later.
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Quote from: Gordon Shumway on May 24, 2013, 08:31:59 AM
I know, I know. Your post was very clear. :)
I simply took the chance to promote that excellent set. :)
Well, you know what a humorless bastard I am... :)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on May 24, 2013, 09:53:15 AM
Well, you know what a humorless bastard I am... :)
It's very clear to me. I haven't bought not even for a second your mask of tolerant guy. :laugh: ;D :laugh:
BTW, have you considered that Leopold Mozart? (I swear this off-topic will end here).
Quote from: Gordon Shumway on May 24, 2013, 10:15:55 AM
It's very clear to me. I haven't bought not even for a second your mask of tolerant guy. :laugh: ;D :laugh:
BTW, have you considered that Leopold Mozart? (I swear this off-topic will end here).
I just saw it there when you posted the other day and thought it might be quite interesting. I haven't heard other than orchestral from Leopold.
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I've heard samples of that M. Haydn mass earlier today. I'll see if I work it into next month's already tightly packed ordering schedule, the samples are great.
Quote from: Geo Dude on May 24, 2013, 01:48:37 PM
I've heard samples of that M. Haydn mass earlier today. I'll see if I work it into next month's already tightly packed ordering schedule, the samples are great.
I got it at Arkiv, it wasn't available at AMP for a long time. Arkiv told me it was their last copy, but they might get more soon. In general, if you want something by Michael Haydn other than certain of his symphonies, and you see a disk for sale, you would be well-advised to snap it up ASAP, since it won't be around for long. That's a hard learned lesson. :) Hope you
do get it though!
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(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51gZAM9h-SL._SY300_.jpg)
This disc/series was mentioned earlier in the thread; I ordered it as a result and must say that it is a great disc.
I always hate to see a good thread die an untimely death. :) My latest Haydn blog post concerns this topic, so I thought I would revive this thread while letting you know about that post. If you are interested in Viennese Classical era masses, this is a nice start.
For this, the 50th essay in this series, I would like to diverge from the tyranny of linear chronology for an hour or two and explore an interesting idea that has paid handsome dividends to me, and might do so for you, also.
1764, which we have now got to, produced one of Haydn's more interesting symphonies, No. 22, 'The Philosopher'. It is a Sinfonia da Chiesa, which, as we discussed previously, is a form, not a required venue. That said, there is no reason that a Sinfonia da Chiesa cannot be used in church, and in fact many of them were.... (http://www.fjhaydn.com/my-blog/2013/11/haydns-sacred-music-a-unique-listening-opportunity.html)
This was the first post I made about this topic, way back when I was talking about 1750!
In order to understand Haydn's roots, one must have at least a rudimentary idea of what church music was like in mid-18th century Austria, and what a huge part it played in the daily lives of the citizens. Unlike its large Protestant (i.e. – Lutheran) neighbor to the north, Austria was very Roman Catholic. The Emperor of Austria was the also Holy Roman Emperor, so Vienna, as the seat of the Holy Roman Empire at that time, was second in importance to Catholicism only to Rome itself. (http://www.fjhaydn.com/my-blog/2013/07/haydns-sacred-music-in-context.html)
You might find either or both of them interesting.
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All the while I have been working on other project, most notably my Haydn chronology, I've been working at collecting some more 18th century church music. While masses are the low-hanging fruit on the sacred music tree, so to speak, sometimes or another one likes to pluck off something a bit more rare, and yet which still fits with the general purpose.
On those lines, I recently acquired these two little gems:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Gerbert12Offertories_zps3d1100ef.jpg)(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/WernerProAdventucover_zps5612b845.jpg)
Grove's says of Gerbert:
Gerbert, Martin, Freiherr von Hornau
(b Horb am Neckar, 11 or 12 Aug 1720; d St Blasien, 13 May 1793).
German music historian, theologian, abbot and composer. He received training with the Jesuits and entered the Benedictine monastery at St Blasien. After ordination in 1744 he served as instructor in theology and philosophy and as librarian of the chapter. From 1754 to 1764 he published a series of didactic theological works and traveled extensively in France, Italy, Switzerland and Germany. On these journeys he met leading scholars and surveyed the contents of libraries for medieval sources of theology, liturgy and music history. In 1762 he issued a prospectus for a history of sacred music, soliciting information from archivists about the contents and location of medieval music manuscripts.
--snip--
Gerbert's compositions include an offertory published in Remigius Klesatl's XXIV offertoria solennia (Augsburg, 1747), and an eight-part Missa in coena Domini published at the end of the second volume of De cantu et musica sacra.
which is not entirely correct, as it actually consists of 12 offertories, not 1. They are the works presented here. As we know, offertories are motets of a sort, keyed to specific days on the liturgical calendar. These 12 belong to different times throughout the year. The are essentially Fuxian Baroque in style, as you would expect in that time and place. Wonderfully performed on this disk too, I can easily seeing fitting one or another of them into various masses.
And about Werner:
Werner, Gregor Joseph
(b Ybbs an der Donau, 28 Jan 1693; d Eisenstadt, Burgenland, 3 March 1766). Austrian composer. From 1715 to 1716 (or possibly 1721) he was organist at Melk Abbey. He married in Vienna (where he may have been a pupil of J.J. Fux) on 27 January 1727, and moved from Vienna to Eisenstadt to take up an appointment as Kapellmeister at the Esterházy court on 10 May 1728. As successor to the post of Wenzel Zivilhofer he received a salary of 400 gulden in addition to 28 gulden lodging money per year, increased in 1738 and, on his son's joining the establishment as alto singer, in 1740. Werner also taught some musicians in Eisenstadt, including Johann Novotný and S.T. Kolbel.
--snip--
In his old age Haydn left a memorial to his former Oberhofkapellmeister with his edition (1804) of six introductions and fugues for string quartet, taken from Werner's oratorios.
Werner's music reflects several different tendencies. In church music, which occupied him until his last years, he composed a cappella masses in a strict contrapuntal style but also works with string and wind accompaniments markedly influenced by the Neapolitan tradition. He was, however, a capable contrapuntist and a composer who thought naturally in contrapuntal terms. Although his melodic style was sometimes angular, in a manner reminiscent of Zelenka's, he could also produce, as in his secular cantatas and his Christmas pieces (which include pastorals for organ with strings and oboes), themes of a simple, folksong-like character.
I had heard only barely of Ars Antiqua Austria, and was fortunate enough to be filled in on them in a different thread here. This disk is superbly played and sung, most of the works from Werner are cantilenas (a little cantata with a recitative followed by an aria) and a Pastorella for 2 violins and organ (continuo) all intended for the Advent season (Pro Adventu). In addition, the 6 little arrangement by Haydn are included, a real gem both musically and historically.
I must say, I am delighted with both of these purchases, they will fit well with my 18h century Austrian Church Music project, and also, fortuitously enough, provide some fine listening pleasure. :)
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Along the same lines as the previous two disks, I received this one today, a scarce enough disk I had to order from Germany to find it! It contains a large variety of small pieces, motets, arias, hymns and the like, from composers ranging from Pál Esterházy (the Prince's grandfather) to the Haydn brothers, Caldara, Werner, Fux, an early Hoffmann (Johann Heinrich) and Matthias Georg Monn. Concilium Musicum Wien / Angerer is a stellar ensemble, and they play these works in a nice simulation of period style. Yet another source of (sadly scarce) 18th century Austrian sacred music, suitable for augmenting any number of masses, or for standalone concertizing. I even got a Haydn work I hadn't ever had before, an Advent aria, Mutter Gottes mir erlaube (Hob 23d:2), so that was a treat!
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/AustrianChurchMusicAngerer_zpsfa115061.jpg)
I am always interested in acquiring more music of this type (18th century Austrian, specifically) if you have any rec's. :)
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A new disk today, by a name I have known for years, but whose music I have never heard. Georg Reutter the Younger was a Big Deal in 1735-65 Vienna, he was the head of everything to do with the Imperial Music. In 1739 he was on a recruiting drive through the countryside when he discovered a seven year old boy who could sing like an angel. He brought him back to Vienna and instituted him in the predecessor of the Vienna Boys' Choir, and two years later went back and got his brother too. Even though he turned them loose ~1750 when their voices changed, the Haydn brothers did OK for themselves thanks in large part to their tutelage at St. Stephan's!
One of the lesser known aspects of Reutter's talents is that he possessed them in great measure. This disk of motets and arias just arrived today, so not thoroughly listened to yet, but I like what I've heard. A great source for offertory and gradual motets, beautifully played, I might add.
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/ReutterPortusFelicitatis_zpsaee5378c.jpg)
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Been a while since I posted in this thread; didn't stop acquiring material for it though!
Today I got this very interesting disk by composer Franz Joseph Aumann (1727 - 1797). He was a Augustinian monk at the monastery of St. Florian, and a great influence on the young Anton Bruckner, since his fame and repute was still at a high mark even 40 years after his death, when Bruckner went to school at St. Florian.
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Aumann%20Requiem%20Te%20Deum%20Letzbor%20cover_zpsolyftn4z.jpg)
Aumann, Franz Josef [Franz-Seraph, Johann, Leopold] (b Traismauer, 24 Feb 1728; d St Florian, 30 March 1797).
Austrian composer. He was a choirboy in the Vienna Jesuit hostel, where he befriended Michael Haydn and J.G. Albrechtsberger. In 1753 he entered the Augustinian monastery of St Florian; in the following year he took vows there, in 1757 was ordained a priest and from 1755 until his death served as regens chori. His works, circulated only in manuscript, show the influence of the Neapolitan and Venetian schools, although the local traditions of Vienna and Salzburg as well as the particular performance requirements of his monastery also affected his style. His early masses and requiem settings are in a strong, cantata-like idiom with many sectional divisions, although the later through-composed Missa brevis shows a preference for simpler settings (two missae brevissimae are accompanied only by continuo). He wrote two secular Singspiele which contributed to the development of the Austrian dialect farce. His contemporaries commented particularly on his command of counterpoint, and his colourful harmony and delight in formal experimentation impressed the young Bruckner. A Missa profana, sub-titled 'a mass to satirize stuttering, bad singing and the onerous office of a schoolmaster', is attributed to Mozart and to Florian Gassmann in two Viennese copies, but a manuscript of the work in Göttweig and a notice in the Vienna Nationalbibliothek show it to be Aumann's.
Gunar Letzbor leads Ars Antiqua Austria, although he doesn't play violin on this disk. The St. Florian's Boys Choir, which still exists today, are also featured. All the singers are male.
The works are one of Aumann's 12 Requiems and a splendid little Te Deum. Also included for you Bruckner fans are two of Bruckner's Posaunesatz (Pieces for Trombone) which are pretty cool too.
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It appears that http://shop.tiroler-landesmuseen.at/cd-dvd/klingende-kostbarkeiten-aus-tirol.html
might be new to you. Sorry I didn't get this up last month when the prices were down to 8 € instead of the usual 18 and 23 €. This is Tyrol, Innsbruck, (I didn't see any Senfl) and a bit more 19th century. I will wait for the next price reduction.
Some names for you:
Johann Baptist GÄNSBACHER - Requiem in Es-Dur
Josef NETZER - Festmesse in B-Dur, Benedicam Dominum, Justus ut palma, Omnes gentes plaudite Johann Sebastian BACH / Bearbeitung
Josef PEMBAUR - Festmesse in F-Dur mit Graduale Haec dies und Offertorium Victimae paschali laudes (1884)
Johann STADLMAYR - Messe (Missa Dies est laetitiae), Nr. 5 aus Missa octo vocum, Augsburg 1596/1610
Matthaus NAGILLER (1815-1874) Festmesse in B-Dur, op. 18, 1852
Quote from: listener on January 22, 2015, 06:06:54 PM
It appears that http://shop.tiroler-landesmuseen.at/cd-dvd/klingende-kostbarkeiten-aus-tirol.html
might be new to you. Sorry I didn't get this up last month when the prices were down to 8 € instead of the usual 18 and 23 €. This is Tyrol, Innsbruck, (I didn't see any Senfl) and a bit more 19th century. I will wait for the next price reduction.
Some names for you:
Johann Baptist GÄNSBACHER - Requiem in Es-Dur
Josef NETZER - Festmesse in B-Dur, Benedicam Dominum, Justus ut palma, Omnes gentes plaudite Johann Sebastian BACH / Bearbeitung
Josef PEMBAUR - Festmesse in F-Dur mit Graduale Haec dies und Offertorium Victimae paschali laudes (1884)
Johann STADLMAYR - Messe (Missa Dies est laetitiae), Nr. 5 aus Missa octo vocum, Augsburg 1596/1610
Matthaus NAGILLER (1815-1874) Festmesse in B-Dur, op. 18, 1852
Wow, is that ever a focused group of items for sale! And very large for all that. Thanks for this interesting link, I will have fun exploring. :)
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Perhaps when I began this thread I narrowed the scope of it beyond what I really wanted, or how it turned out to be. 'Austria', that is, The Holy Roman Empire, was a culture unto itself in the latter 17th through 18th centuries. The Habsburg rulers were music lovers in the extreme, even being performers and composers. And the traditions they carried on were unique to the area. An example of this is the trombone. Outside of Austria the trombone was virtually extinct. But inside it was thriving. It was used in all sorts of sacred music for purposes ranging from accompanying singers to doubling the continuo when needed. In addition, there were consorts of trombones at varying tessituras. Small choirs of them playing together are amazing!
By saying 'narrowing the scope too much', I mean that sacred music in general, in that time and place, consisted of more than just mass Ordinaries and Propers, but also oratorios, nearly always on sacred subjects such as for Holy Week, Easter and Christmas. Nearly all of these also featured trombones, trumpets, timpani, clarini, in addition to the more usual instruments (bassoons, strings & organ, for example).
Here are a couple of disks I have been listening to lately, both of which feature trombones accompanying voices, along with other instruments, of course. I will be posting my explorations here, including masses and oratorios from composers such as Fux, Caldara, Tuma, Porsile and others, along with the Classic Era works we have already been looking at. If this music appeals to you, feel free to add your input. I know it isn't for everyone, but I doubt it isn't for anyone! :)
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Trombone%20amp%20Voice%20Habsburg_zpsrjta4qdz.jpg)(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Fede%20e%20Amor_zpsluce9uww.jpg)
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This may be within your revised scope for this thread. Have anybody heard it (I haven't but I'm curious):
[asin]B00JVBTT1K[/asin]
Quote from: The new erato on February 08, 2015, 09:04:16 AM
This may be within your revised scope for this thread. Have anybody heard it (I haven't but I'm curious):
[asin]B00JVBTT1K[/asin]
Certainly it would be, and no, I haven't heard it yet. 'The struggle of repentance and conversion', a classic sacred oratorio subject if I ever heard one! Thanks for pointing it out, I will wish list it right now! :)
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I'm very good at scrounging release lists......!
Even though I haven't been posting much in this thread, I have still been relentlessly collecting masses and adjunct music to go along with them. I am actually preparing another blog to give me space to write out some things I have on my mind; amazingly (to me), I have a good following in France who drop by the Haydn thread whenever I post anything on his masses. Bless their hearts. 0:)
So, here are my latest acquisitions. First, I will say I got a very interesting book, The Viennese Concerted Mass of the Early Classic Period by Bruce MacIntyre. It is full of good information, although it is strictly on mass ordinaries, nothing of any substance on adjunct music or Propers. And you know, that is only half the job in MY book! Apparently the subject awaits a good informative blog. :)
I picked up this disk of masses yesterday, although I had it as a download already, I wanted the disk in hand, along with the (informative) liner notes;
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Albrechtsberger%20M%20Haydn%20masses%20cover.jpg)
The Michael Haydn is another version of the excellent St. Jerome Mass for Oboes and Bassoons, which we discussed earlier with the BIS Philodor Ensemble disk. Very well done, although it doesn't have the Timete Dominum which Haydn wrote as an Offertory Motet, and it is missed.
The main thing on this disk though is the Albrechtsberger 'Assumption Mass', which he composed on a commission from Nicholas II Esterházy in 1802, thus one of his last masses (he died in 1809, almost the same time as Haydn!). And it received its world premiere at Eisenstadt under the baton of none other than Joseph Haydn! It also includes the Gradual and Offertory motets which Albrechtsberger wrote to go with it. The whole thing is well done by the players and singers, easy to recommend!
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Gottlieb%20Muffat%20Organ%20works%20cover.jpg)
The other disk I am listening to right now (again!). It is 25 assorted toccatas, capriccios, ricercars and canzonas for organ by Gottlieb Muffat, son of the famous Georg Muffat, and Hof organist for the Habsburgs from 1717 to 1764. He was a student of Fux, directly, not just through his book, and the top organist in Vienna. He wrote a lot of music like this, but it has only recently been made into playable form and now some has been recorded. I hope this is an ongoing project! It is recorded, not in Vienna, but in Switzerland, in a church which has the same setup that St. Stephen's had; several organs, small ones for accompanying just the chorus, and a larger one for playing with the band without drowning them out, and then a big one with 2 manuals and pedals for playing big solo works during entrance and exit. So these are divided up between the different organs, 7 on the 'Evangelist Organ', 8 on the 'Epistle Organ' and 10 on the 'Large Organ'. Playing is great, sound quality is great, the music itself is excellent, and if you enjoy embellishing a mass in a realistic sort of way, such as I have proposed here many times over, this disk is indispensable! :)
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Pleased to note here that my decision to finally purchase this disk has been amply rewarded:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Haydn%20et%20al%20Out%20of%20Hainburg%20cover.jpg)
Performed by this same group who did my recommended Haydn Organ Concertos recording:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Haydn%20Organ%20Concertos%20Holzapfel%20cover.jpg)
The playing is every bit as good, and this one has singing also, and the singers are superb. Barbara Fink, Ida Aldrian, Daniel Johannsen & Klemens Sander.
Some highlights for me were the outstanding Hob 23b:2 Salve Regina in g minor, which instantly rose to the top of the list of recordings I have of it. A World premiere of an organ concerto in F by Georg Reutter, an organ arrangement by Fux himself of his Sonata a 6 (K 366) and a Prelude & Fugue in C by Albrechtsberger (Op 6 #1) are also very nice. The Michael Haydn works, a Prelude and Verses for a Magnificat, and an super aria "Ah! Jesu recipe" which can be either a Passion or Advent aria are also typically excellent Michael Haydn.
If you are interested at all in this 18th Century Austrian church music genre, you owe it to yourself to scoop this up before it becomes rare. 0:)
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Quote from: Gurn Blanston on July 01, 2015, 06:20:03 PM
Pleased to note here that my decision to finally purchase this disk has been amply rewarded:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Haydn%20et%20al%20Out%20of%20Hainburg%20cover.jpg)
Performed by this same group who did my recommended Haydn Organ Concertos recording:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/Gurn_Blanston/CD%20Covers/Haydn%20Covers/Haydn%20Organ%20Concertos%20Holzapfel%20cover.jpg)
The playing is every bit as good, and this one has singing also, and the singers are superb. Barbara Fink, Ida Aldrian, Daniel Johannsen & Klemens Sander.
Some highlights for me were the outstanding Hob 23b:2 Salve Regina in g minor, which instantly rose to the top of the list of recordings I have of it. A World premiere of an organ concerto in F by Georg Reutter, an organ arrangement by Fux himself of his Sonata a 6 (K 366) and a Prelude & Fugue in C by Albrechtsberger (Op 6 #1) are also very nice. The Michael Haydn works, a Prelude and Verses for a Magnificat, and an super aria "Ah! Jesu recipe" which can be either a Passion or Advent aria are also typically excellent Michael Haydn.
If you are interested at all in this 18th Century Austrian church music genre, you owe it to yourself to scoop this up before it becomes rare. 0:)
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I didn't know this one. Thanks for the recommendation!
At this point, I'm sure you have heard more masses (and more frequently) than many catholics. Be cautious,
Gurn, conversion could be waiting for you on the next corner. ;D
Quote from: Gordo on July 02, 2015, 04:42:35 AM
At this point, I'm sure you have heard more masses (and more frequently) than many catholics. Be cautious, Gurn, conversion could be waiting for you on the next corner. ;D
If
Gurn converted, one thing's for sure:
Haydn would burst with joy up there. :D
Quote from: Gordo on July 02, 2015, 04:42:35 AM
I didn't know this one. Thanks for the recommendation!
At this point, I'm sure you have heard more masses (and more frequently) than many catholics. Be cautious, Gurn, conversion could be waiting for you on the next corner. ;D
Quote from: Florestan on July 02, 2015, 05:02:35 AM
If Gurn converted, one thing's for sure: Haydn would burst with joy up there. :D
I never researched the contents of it, that's why I didn't buy it earlier. The other day I saw a track listing somewhere and I was, like 'damn, what was I thinking?'.
What I really like is ritual, and these was no one like the 18th century Catholics for ritual. And they could support it in style, too! Fortunately, faith and religion are 2 different things, as is proved day in and day out even in modern times. 0:)
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