Five years after Joseph Haydn entered St. Stephen's, his brother Michael joined the choir. It was just at that time that Joseph's voice began to change. One day when the Empress heard him she said his voice sounded more like a rooster's crowing than anything else. The choirmaster, taking the hint, prepared to dismiss him.
But before Joseph said good-bye to his schoolmates his spirit of fun bubbled over again. Someone had left a pair of new scissors where he found them.
What should he cut with them?
Ah, he knew. He would cut off the pigtail of one of the choir boys. And he did.
Joseph Haydn was never lazy. His father and mother had taught him to love work. He was industrious, happy-hearted, and made friends easily. People loved him and he began to meet those who could help him. One of these was the great poet, Metastasio. Another was the singing master, Nicholas Porpora, who taught him music composition in return for which the boy brushed the master's clothes, polished his boots, did anything and everything, even to running errands. And all because he was so anxious to be taught how to compose music.
Then soon afterward Haydn met Gluck, the opera composer; and another time Wolfgang Mozart and his father, Leopold Mozart. So you see he was getting on famously.
GLUCK
L. MOZART