JOSEPH HAYDN MUSICAL GENIUS

Joseph Haydn's popularity has blossomed over the last few years due to the accessibility of his music via a multitude of paths such as radio, television, the internet, the media and concert venues. But the main reason is that people just love his music. Haydn has been recorded as writing; 106 Symphonies, 70 String Quartets, 25 Operas, 45 Piano Trios, 3 Keyboard Duets, 17 Overtures, 29 String Trios, 16 String Duos, 30 Instrument Concertos, 13 Marches, 127 Baryton Trios, 24 Baryton Duos,  3 Baryton Concertos, 
13 Divertimentos with keyboard, 32 pieces for a Mechanical Clock, 4 versions of “The Seven Last Words of Christ”, 3 Choral Works,          14 Masses, 3 Requiems, 24 Sacred Works, 35 Orchestral Cantatas, 16 Songs, 550 Folk Songs, and 8 Incidental Music.

This totals up to 1238 pieces of music that are documented, many more go unrecorded. What an amazing amount of compositions from this musical genius, unprecedented in his own time, and certainly not equalled over the past three hundred years. Joseph’s ability to produce sublime music for each of  these twenty four categories of music perhaps provides an insight into why his music has survived over the years. A recent “Telegraph” publication describes his work  as “The most serenely life-affirming composer in history”. Joseph was an innovator and with this ability he was able to arrange folk music into his own musical form. His prolific arrangements of 550 Folk Songs demonstrates how he listened to the sounds that surrounded him and sympathetically converted those sounds into structured music, incorporating passages of folk music in his symphonies.  In his own words, following his “isolation” working for nearly thirty years for the Esterhazy family, “I was set apart from the World, there was nobody nearby to confuse and annoy me in my course, and so I could not help becoming original”. 

During his long period of employment at Esterhaza Haydn’s compositions had been circulated and known throughout Europe, and by 1790 he was Europe’s most celebrated composer, but the death of Prince Nikolaus was the conduit for a dramatic change in Joseph’s lifestyle when Johann Peter Salomon contracted him to work in London where his music was already very popular. He was effectively “free” and self employed. Joseph Haydn’s arrival in London, with his immense popularity, must have been similar to The Beatles arrival in New York. The admiring fans were about to experience “live” performances of their hero’s music. The Beatles' music is still popular today, sixty years after their first performances, indicating that innovation, moving away from convention, has a part in the success of adventurous composers.

At the age of sixty Haydn’s prolific output of music, in all categories, continued to impress  his fans. His ability to define  human sensitivities in his music was at its height during his stays in London. His twelve “London” symphonies  demonstrate Joseph’s understanding of life with their moments of jubilation and humour. The visits to England stimulated Joseph’s imagination, especially when he took the opportunity whilst in Oxford where he was honoured with a degree of Doctor of Music,  to visit Herschel’s “Great Forty-Foot Telescope”, where the seeds of “The Creation” were sown, and his  introduction of the double forte burst of music with the word “Light” from the chorus, in one bar of music, foreshadowed the current scientific “Big Bang” theory.

Richard Wigmore, in his “Pocket Guide to Haydn”, states “ For nigh on two decades Haydn had been an international superstar, feted from Edinburgh to Naples, from Lisbon to St Petersburg. No composer, not even Handel, certainly not Mozart, had ever been as widely celebrated in his own lifetime.  Now The Creation, Haydn’s joyous celebration of the universe, an idyllic vision that contrasted poignantly  with the turbulence of the Napoleonic Wars, set the final seal of his fame”.

Haydn’s music in all its forms displays deep musical knowledge, humour and elegance which are characteristics that are recognized and loved by audiences and musicians all  over the World. Renowned pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet for example described Joseph Haydn’s piano sonatas as “sublime music”. Haydn was in fact a prolific genius. His recent popularity, coming out of the shadows cast by Mozart, is largely due to the work of American musicologist Professor H C Robbins Landon in the mid and late twentieth century. Professor Landon was also responsible, in conjunction with John Reid, for the formation, in 1993, of the English Haydn Festival, based in Bridgnorth, Shropshire, UK.

During his lifetime, even to the present day, Haydn’s innovative ideas have been acknowledged by his contemporaries with Mozart, in 1785, dedicating his six Opus 10 string quartets to Haydn, and in 1917 Prokofiev writing his first symphony in  the  Classical style.
Haydn has always been popular with English audiences even when he was alive as is demonstrated by the adoration of his acclaimed London Symphonies written from 1791 to 1795. His staying power and vitality can be explained by his natural constitution and doggedness and his love and joy of creating music. Also he may have been helped by sometimes praying for divine inspiration first thing in the morning.

Joseph Haydn, “Father of the Symphony” and “Father of the String Quartet”.

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                            References:  Richard Wigmore; “Pocket Guide to Haydn”                                                                                                  Jean-Efflam Bavouzet;  Notes for his Cds on Haydn’s piano sonatas                                                           English Haydn Festival;  www.englishhaydn.com                                                                                            Wikipedia      

Authors:     
                Dr Joseph Whitehouse. PhD.    (Artistic Advisor, The English Haydn Festival)
                Michael Proudman.  B.Sc.  C Eng.  (Organiser, The English Haydn Festival)

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    c        11th March 2024