Joseph haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn (pronounced) 
ху хори хор и хар (?·i)(Rohrau, near Vienna; 31 March 1732 - Vienna; 31 May 1809), known as Joseph HaydnHe was an Austrian composer. He is one of the highest representatives of the Classical period, besides being known as the "father of symphony" and the "father of the string quartet" thanks to his important contributions to both genres. It also contributed to the instrumental development of the trio with piano and the evolution of the sonata form.
He lived his entire life in Austria and spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy and aristocratic Esterházy family of Hungary. Isolated from other composers and musical tendencies, until the last stretch of his life, he was, as he put it, “forced to be original.” At the time of his death, he was one of the most celebrated composers of All Europe.
He was the brother of Michael, who was also considered a good composer, and Johann Evangelist, a tenor. He had a close friendship with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, of whom it is even believed that he became a mentor, and was a teacher of Ludwig van Beethoven. The complete list of the composer's works can be consulted in the Hoboken catalogue, an ordering system created by Anthony van Hoboken.
Biography
Childhood
Franz Joseph Haydn was born on March 31, 1732 in Rohrau, a small town near Vienna (Austria), at that time the capital of the Holy Roman Empire, and very close to the border with Hungary. He was the second of twelve children born to Mathias Haydn and Anna Maria Koller. His father was a carriage maker and repairer in the employ of the Earl of Harrach, the town's aristocrat, and also served as Marktrichter, a position similar to town mayor. His mother had previously worked as a cook in Earl Harrach's palace. Neither of his parents could read music, however Mathias was a keen folk musician and had taught himself to play the harp during his time as an officer. According to Haydn's last recollection, his childhood with his family was extremely musical and they frequently sang together and with their neighbors.
Haydn's parents realized that their son had a talent for music and knew that in Rohrau he would have no opportunity for a proper musical education. For this reason they accepted the proposal of his relative Johann Matthias Frankh, director of the school and choirmaster in Hainburg, that Joseph learn in his house and practice as a musician. Therefore, at only six years old, Haydn went with Frankh to Hainburg (eleven kilometers away from his hometown) and never lived with his parents again.
Life at Frankh's home was not easy for Haydn, who would later recall frequently going hungry and being constantly humiliated by the filthy state of his clothes. However, he began his musical studies there and was soon able to play the harpsichord and the violin, as well as singing the treble parts in the Hainburg church choir.
There are reasons to think that Haydn's singing impressed those who heard it because it soon attracted the attention of Georg von Reutter, the Kapellmeister of St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna, who was on a tour of the provinces looking for new talents for the children's choir. Haydn successfully passed an audition before Reutter and in 1740 he moved to Vienna, where he remained as a chorister for the next nine years. From 1745 his younger brother, Michael, also joined as a member of the choir.
Haydn lived in the Reutter house with five other choirboys. He received lessons in Latin and other subjects, as well as singing, violin, and keyboard lessons. Reutter was of little help to Haydn in the areas of music theory and music composition, giving him only two lessons during his time as chorister. However, since St. Stephen's was one of the main centers of music in Europe, Haydn was able to learn by serving the professional musicians there.
Like Frankh before him, Reutter didn't always make sure Haydn was properly fed. As biographer Albert Christoph Dies later stated, Haydn was motivated to sing very well, in the hope of gaining more invitations to performances before the aristocracy, where refreshments were normally served to the singers.
Work autonomy
In 1749 Haydn reached the age where he could no longer sing the high tones of choral works. On this flimsy pretext he was fired from his choir job. He was left homeless with nowhere to go, however he was lucky enough to meet a friend, Johann Michael Spangler, with whom he shared a room in his family's cramped attic for a few months. Haydn immediately decided to start his career as a freelance musician.
During those difficult years, Haydn held many different jobs: music teacher, street serenade singer, and finally servant and accompanist to the Italian composer Nicola Porpora, from whom he would later say he had learned "the true fundamentals of composition."
When he was a chorister, Haydn did not receive any serious training in music theory and composition, which he perceived as a major shortcoming. To palliate it, he worked in this sense through contrapuntal exercises on the text Gradus ad Parnassum by Johann Joseph Fux and carefully studied the work of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, whom he would later recognize as an important influence.
Haydn took advantage of these years by acquiring more musical knowledge, to the point that he composed his first string quartets and his first opera, Der krumme Teufel, written for the comic actor Johann Joseph Felix Kurz, artistically known as "Bernardon". The work was successfully premiered in 1753 but was soon withdrawn by the censors.Haydn also noted, apparently without anger, that works he had given without payment were being published and sold in music shops.
Thanks to his increased reputation, Haydn was able to obtain the patronage of an aristocrat, crucial for the development of a composer's career at that time. Countess Thun, after seeing one of Haydn's compositions, quoted and hired him as her singer and keyboard teacher. Baron Carl Josef Fürnberg employed Haydn at his country estate, Weinzierl, where the composer wrote the first quartet for strings. Fürnberg subsequently recommended Haydn to Count Morzin, who became Haydn's first full-time patron in 1757.
Years as Kapellmeister
At the end of this period, in 1759, Haydn received an important job offer: that of Count Morzin's Kapellmeister, that is, musical director. At the same time he was composing his first symphonies for orchestra and conducting the count's ensemble. In 1760, with the security of his position as Kapellmeister, Haydn married. His wife was Maria Anna Theresia Keller (1730-1800), the sister of Therese (b. 1733), with whom Haydn had previously been in love. Haydn and his wife were not a completely happy marriage, the laws of the time did not allow them to separate and they had no children. Both had lovers; Joseph had a long romantic relationship with a singer from the Esterházys, Luigia Polzelli, with whom, according to some biographers, he had one or more children.
The Count of Morzin soon suffered financial difficulties, so after two years he fired all his musicians. However, Haydn immediately found a similar job as assistant to the Kapellmeister of the Esterházy family, one of the richest and most influential in the Austrian Empire, who lived in Vienna in winter and in summer in two palaces owned by him, one to the south. from the capital and another in Hungary. When the old Kapellmeister, Gregor Werner, died in 1766, Haydn was promoted to that position.
As a member of the Esterházy family service, Haydn wore livery and followed the family as they moved to their palaces, the most important of which was the ancestral Esterházy Castle in Eisenstadt and later the Eszterháza, a grand palace built on the 1760s in Hungary. The Esterházys were lovers and connoisseurs of music and gave Haydn all the support he needed for his work, including his own small orchestra. He began working for Prince Pál Antal Esterházy in 1762 and, when he died in 1763, he served his brother Nicolás Esterházy, called the Magnificent, for almost thirty years. In his new position, Haydn had a great responsibility, which consisted of composing music for every occasion, conducting the orchestra, performing chamber music with members of the orchestra and also with family members, as well as organizing the staging of operas (he presented all the weeks two operas and two concerts, plus special works for prominent visitors and daily chamber music concerts in which the prince himself played an unusual stringed instrument known as the bariton, for which Haydn wrote numerous trios). Despite his intense work, Haydn considered himself a lucky man.
Almost 30 years passed during which Haydn worked in this position and in which he composed an endless number of works. Throughout this time, his style developed and his popularity grew. In time he came to compose as many works for publication as for the Esterházys. Works as important as his Paris Symphonies (1785-1786) or The Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross (1786) were composed in those years.
Gradually Haydn also began to feel more isolated and lonely, particularly as the court moved for most of the year to Esterháza, far from Vienna, instead of staying in Eisenstadt, which was closer to the capital. Haydn he was keen to visit Vienna in particular because his friends were there. Particularly important of these friendships was the close and platonic relationship he had with Maria Anna von Genzinger (1750-93), wife of Prince Nicholas's personal physician in Vienna, in 1789. Haydn wrote to Mrs. Genzinger frequently, expressing his lonely state in Eszterháza and his joy at the few occasions when he was able to visit her in Vienna; later Haydn wrote it frequently from London. The untimely death of this of hers in 1793 was a heavy blow to Haydn and he may have composed hers Variations on her in F minor Hob. XVII: 6 in response to her death.
Another of his friends in Vienna was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whom Haydn met around 1784. According to later testimony from Michael Kelly and others, the two composers occasionally performed string quartets together. Haydn was greatly impressed by Mozart's works and praised him lavishly in front of others. Mozart evidently repaid Haydn's honors with the dedication of a set of six string quartets, now called the Haydn Quartets. Both belonged to the same Masonic Lodge, in Vienna.
Travel to London
In 1790, a year after the 1789 French Revolution that shook the whole of Europe, Nicholas, the patriarch of the Esterházys, died, and his successor turned out to be a man with no interest in music, who fired the orchestra and retired to Haydn. For this reason, he accepted the offer of Johann Peter Salomon, a German musical impresario, to travel to England and conduct his new symphonies with a large orchestra. His stay in that country between 1791 and 1792, repeated later between 1794 and 1795, was a great success. Haydn's concerts were massively attended and the composer achieved wide fame and a considerable income. He received an honorary doctorate from Oxford University, and even helped save his friend, the publisher William Napier, from dire financial straits. Charles Burney described the impression the first concert made on him thus: “Haydn himself conducted it from the pianoforte and the vision of that renowned composer uplifted the audience and caused such excitement, attention and delight as never before. musician had gotten in England".
Musically, Haydn's visits to England were also very important, as he composed some of his best-known works there, such as the London Symphonies (among them the Surprise Symphony, the Military Symphony, the Timpani Roll Symphony and the London Symphony), the Reiter Quartet or the Gypsy Rondo for piano trio. The only setback that occurred during his trips to England was the opera Orfeo ed Euridice, also called L'Anima del Filosofo, for which Haydn was hired, but whose representation it was banned due to intrigue. Haydn made many friends during his time on the island and was romantically involved with Rebecca Schroeter.
Between his visits, Haydn gave counterpoint classes to Ludwig van Beethoven in Vienna. Beethoven was dissatisfied with Haydn's work as a teacher and sought help from others; the relationship between the two was sometimes tense.
Last years in Vienna
Haydn had considered staying in England, but eventually returned to Vienna in 1795, where he had a large house built in the suburb of Gumpendorf (present-day Mariahilf district) and decided to devote himself to composing sacred works. for chorus and orchestra. He wrote the greatest symphonic-choral works of his, the oratorios The Creation and The Seasons , as well as six masses for the Eszterházy family, which at that time was again headed by a prince with musical inclinations. He also composed instrumental music, such as the Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra and the last nine string quartets, including those known as Fifths, Emperor and Sunrise.
Starting in 1802, a disease he had previously recurred and developed to such an extent that he was no longer able to compose. This was undoubtedly very difficult for him since, as he recognized, ideas for new works flowed easily in his mind. Despite being well cared for by his servants and lacking for nothing, as well as having friends and being an appreciated musician, Haydn must have spent his last years saddened by not being able to work on his music. During his illness, he often consoled himself by sitting alone at the piano and playing Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser, which he composed himself in 1797 as a patriotic gesture. This tune was later used as the national anthems. from Austria and Germany.
In 1806 he had some cards printed to decline the invitations he received with the following text: «Hin ist alle meine Kraft, alt und schwach bin ich» («All my strength has gone, I am old and I am tired»), extracted from the song The old man, composed in 1796. Haydn died on May 31, 1809 at the age of 77 in Vienna, while the city was attacked by the Napoleon Bonaparte's troops, during the Battle of Aspern-Essling. Among his last words is the attempt to calm and reassure his servants when a cannon shot fell in the neighborhood: "My children, do not be afraid, where Haydn is, there can be no harm."
On May 26, Haydn played his "God Save Francis the Emperor" ("Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser"), with an unusual taste. The same evening he collapsed and was carried to what turned out to be his deathbed. He died peacefully in his own home at 12:40 a.m. on May 31, 1809, at the age of 77. Two weeks later, on June 15, 1809, a funeral service was held at the Schottenkirche in which Mozart's Requiem was performed. He was buried in the Hundsturm Cemetery (now Haydnpark), the Vienna suburb in which he had lived. In 1820 Prince Nikolaus moved Haydn's remains to Eisenstadt, where they have rested ever since in a chapel in the Bergkirche. His head took a different course as it was stolen by phrenologists shortly after burial and the skull was not reunited with the other remains until 1954.
Personality and physical appearance
James Webster states the following about Haydn as a public figure:
Haydn's public life exemplified the ideal of the Enlightenment of honnête homme (honest man): the man whose good worldly character and success are allowed and justified to one another. His modesty and probity were known everywhere. These traits were not requirements for success as a chapel master, entrepreneur and public figure, but contributed to a favorable reception of his music.
Haydn was especially respected by the Eszterházy court musicians, whom he directed, and he maintained a cordial working atmosphere and effectively represented the musicians' interests with his patrons.
Haydn had a great sense of humor, evident in his love of practical jokes that often featured in his music, and he had many friends. For most of his life he benefited from his "naturally cheerful and happy temperament", but in the last years of his life, there is evidence that he suffered from periods of depression, particularly in correspondence with Mrs. Genzinger and in the Dies biography, based on visits to Haydn in his old age.
Haydn was a devout Catholic who often resorted to his rosary when he had trouble composing, a practice he often found effective. He typically began the manuscript of each composition with the phrase "in nomine Domini" ("in the name of God") and ended with "Laus Deo" ("glory to God"). Like Mozart, Haydn was also a Freemason.
Haydn was short in stature, perhaps as a result of having been malnourished for most of his youth. He was not handsome and, like many other people at the time, he survived smallpox so his face was pockmarked with scars from the disease. His biographer Dies wrote: "He could not understand how so many beautiful women in his life could have loved him. They couldn't have been captivated by my beauty".
Haydn also suffered from nasal polyposis for most of his adult life and at times prevented him from composing; this was a disease that caused weakness and agony to its sufferer in the 18th century.
Music analysis
James Webster summarizes the role of Joseph Haydn in the history of classical music as follows:
He highlighted all musical genres... He is familiarly known as "the father of symphony" and, with great justice, he could be considered equally with regard to the string quartet; no other composer approaches his combination of productivity, quality and historical importance in these genres.
Structure and characteristics of your music
A fundamental feature in Haydn's music is the development of larger structures rather than very short and simple motifs, often derived from the usual accompaniment figures. The music is often concentrated quite formally and the important parts of a movement can develop quickly.
Haydn's work was instrumental in the development of what was called sonata form. However, his practice differs in some points from those of Mozart and Beethoven, his younger contemporaries who also excelled in this form of composition. Haydn was particularly fond of the so-called "monothematic exposition", in which the music establishing the dominant key is similar or identical to the opening theme. Haydn also differs from Mozart and Beethoven in his recapitulation sections, where Haydn often rearranges the order of themes in comparison to exposition and uses extensive thematic development.
Haydn's formal inventiveness also led him to integrate the fugue into the classical style and to enrich the rondo form with more logical tonal cohesion. Haydn was also the leading exponent of the double variation form (alternating variations on two themes, which are often major and to a lesser extent versions of each other).
Perhaps more than any other composer, Haydn's music is known for its humor. The most famous example is the sudden high chord in the slow movement of his Surprise Symphony. Haydn's many other musical jokes include numerous false endings (for example, in the quartets Op. 33. No. 2 and Op. 50. No. 3), and the remarkable rhythmic illusion in the third movement trio Op. 50 no 1.
Evolution of Haydn's style
Haydn's earliest works date from the period when the late Baroque style of composition (of which Johann Sebastian Bach and Georg Friedrich Händel were the greatest exponents) had gone out of fashion. This was a time of exploration and uncertainty, and Haydn, born 18 years before Bach's death, was one of the musical explorers of his day. An old contemporary of Haydn's whose works he saw as a major influence was Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach..
The rest of Haydn's work was produced over six decades (roughly 1749 to 1802) and shows a gradual but steady increase in musical complexity and sophistication, developing as Haydn learned from his own experience or other of your colleagues. Several important milestones have been observed in the evolution of his musical style.
In the late 1760s and early 1770s Haydn entered a stylistic period known as Sturm und Drang (storm and momentum). This term was taken from the literary movement that appeared at the same time, although it seems that the musical movement appeared a few years before the literary one. The musical language of the period is similar to that used previously, but is displayed in the works with a greater expressive intensity., especially in works in minor keys. James Webster describes the works of this period as "greater, more passionate, and bolder". Some of his most famous compositions from this period are the Farewell Symphony, the Piano Sonata in C minor (Hob. XVI/20, L. 33) and the Six String Quartets Op. 20 (the “G” quartets), all from 1772. At the same time Haydn began to show interest in in the composition of fugues following the Baroque style and three of the string quartets Op. 20 end with these fugues.
As Sturm und Drang reached its height, Haydn reverted to his more clearly entertaining and fiery style. There are no quartets from that period, and the symphonies incorporate some new features: the first movement now sometimes contained slow introductions, and the instrumentation often included trumpets and timpani. These changes are often related to a major shift in Haydn's professional roles, away from "pure" music and towards the production of operas buffas, which were very popular in the 18th century. style="font-variant:small-caps;text-transform:lowercase">XVIII in Italy. Several of these operas were Haydn's own works and are rarely performed today. Haydn sometimes recycled his music for opera into symphonic works, which helped continue his career as a symphonist during that eventful decade.
In 1779 an important change took place in Haydn's contract that allowed him to publish compositions without the prior permission of his patron. This fact may have encouraged Haydn to resume his career as a composer of "pure" music. The change was made more spectacular in 1781, when Haydn published the six string quartets Opus 33, announcing (in a letter to potential buyers) that they had been written in "an entirely new and special way." Charles Rosen has argued that this statement by Haydn speaks not only of sales but also refers to a number of important advances in Haydn's compositional technique that appear in these quartets, advances that warn of the arrival of the classical style in its point of greatest splendor. These include a fluid form of phrasing, in which each motif emerges from the previous one without interruption, the practice of allowing backing material to become melodic material, and a type of "classical counterpoint" in which each instrumental part maintains its own integrity. These features continue in many of the quatrains Haydn wrote after Opus 33.
In the 1790s, spurred by his travels to England, Haydn developed what Rosen calls his "folk style," a form of composition that, with unprecedented success, created music that had wide popular support but maintaining a rigorous and learned musical structure. An important element of the popular style was the frequent use of traditional music or similar material. Haydn was careful to display this material in appropriate places, such as at the end of expositions of the sonatas or in the opening and closing themes. In these places, the traditional material served as an element of stability, helping to anchor the larger structure. Haydn's folk style can be heard in virtually all of his later works, including the twelve London Symphonies, the last piano quartets and trios and the last two oratorios.
The return to Vienna in 1795 marked the last turning point in the composer's career. Although his musical style evolved little, his intentions as a composer changed. While he remained a servant, and later a busy businessman, Haydn wrote his works quickly and profusely, with frequent deadlines. As a wealthy man, Haydn now felt privileged to take his time and write for posterity. This is reflected in the theme of The Creation (1798) and The Seasons (1801), which address weighty issues such as the meaning of life and the purpose of humanity. and represents an attempt to make the sublime in music. Haydn's new intentions also meant that the composer was willing to spend a lot of time on a single work, as it took him over a year to complete both oratorios. Haydn once claimed that he had worked so long on The Creation because he thought it would be his last work.
Haydn's change in approach was important in the history of music, and other composers soon followed suit. In particular, Ludwig van Beethoven adopted the practice of taking his time on compositions and setting big goals for himself.
Identifier for Haydn's works
Haydn's works are listed in a catalog compiled by Anthony van Hoboken. This is called the Hoboken catalog and assigns each Haydn work an identification number, called the Hoboken number (abbreviated as H. or Hob.). String quartets also have Hoboken numbers, but are generally identified by their opus number, which has the advantage of indicating the groups of six quartets that Haydn jointly published, so, for example, the string quartet Opus 76, n º 3 is the third of six quatrains published in 1799.
Instruments
An Anton Walter fortepiano used by the composer is now on display in the Haydn-Haus in Eisenstadt in Vienna. In Vienna in 1788, Haydn bought a fortepiano made by Wenzel Schantz. When the composer was visiting London for the first time, an English piano maker, John Broadwood, provided him with a grand piano.