Famous composers and their works, Vol. 2

by Unknown

HAYDN'S GRAVE IN HUNDSTHURM CHURCHYARD.

At Gumpendorf, a suburb of Vienna, from whence the remains were taken to the parish church at Eisenstadt.

Fifteen days after his death Mozart's Requiem was performed in honor of his memory at the Schotterkirche. Numerous French officers were among the mourners, and the guard of honor about the bier was chiefly composed of French soldiers No sooner did Haydn's death become known, than funeral services were held in all the principal cities of Europe.

The list of Haydn's compositions is enormous. It includes 125 symphonies; 30 trios for strings, and strings and wind; 77 quartets for strings; 20 concertos for clavier; 31 concertos for various other instruments; 38 trios for piano and strings; 53 sonatas and divertissements for clavier; 4 sonatas for clavier and violin; 14 masses; 1 Stabat Mater; 8 oratorios and cantatas; 19 operas; 42 canons for voice in two and more parts; 175 pieces for the baritone; and a vast collection of other works, among which are a collection of over 300 original Scotch songs in three parts with violin and bass accompaniments and symphonies.

In estimating Haydn's life-work as a composer, the principal stress must be laid on him as a reformer in his art. Contrapuntally, music had reached its highest development, but in many other important directions it was at a low ebb. Concerted music had not yet achieved any prominence as a distinct branch of the art. Vocal music was in the ascendant and the church and the opera-house offered the principal if not the only means for composers to achieve distinction. In Vienna, the Emperor, Joseph II., was a liberal patron of music, and the nobles, after the fashion of nobles generally, followed the example of the court, and entered into rivalry with each other in founding and supporting costly musical establishments of their own. The Viennese, however, had no very marked sympathy with art at its highest. One hundred and twenty-five years ago, Leopold Mozart wrote: "The Viennese public love nothing that is serious or reasonable; they have not the sense to understand it, and their theatres prove sufficiently that nothing but rubbish such as dances, burlesque, harlequinades, ghost magic and devil's tricks will satisfy them. A fine gentleman, even with an order on his breast, may be seen laughing till the tears run down his cheeks, applauding as heartily as he can, some bit of foolish buffoonery; while in a highly pathetic scene he will chatter so noisily with a lady that his wiser and better-mannered neighbors can scarcely hear a word of the piece." From which it will be seen that fashion changes but little as time passes.

Instrumental music was, for the most part, confined to dance tunes, and minuets, allemands, waltzes and ländler were the rage. Presently these rose to importance and musicians began to take greater care in composing them, until at length came the suite, which was formed of a series of dances all written in the same key but varying in accent and character. Then followed a second part to the minuet, in the fifth of the key, and a return to the first part, which proved to be the stepping-stone to form; and the minuet survived the suite, of which it was originally a part, and continued an indispensable element of the symphony down to the time that Beethoven enlarged it into the scherzo.

In considering the influence that Haydn exercised on instrumental music it may perhaps be interesting to take a passing glance at the condition of orchestration when he began to compose. The string band, then, as now, was the foundation of the whole, and the wind instruments were used to add solidity to the score. The orchestra generally consisted of the string quintet, two flutes, two oboes, two bassoons, two trumpets, two horns and tympani. The first oboe did little else than duplicate the first violins, while the second oboe only appeared now and then with a holding note, or doubled the first oboe. The first bassoon either played in unison with the bass or sustained the fundamental harmony, while the second bassoon, from time to time, doubled the first. The violas rarely had an independent part and as a rule duplicated the bass. It is true that Haydn had before him the example of Stamitz, who gave an independent part to the viola in some of his symphonies, but the innovation does not seem to have influenced Haydn. Trumpets, horns and drums had but little to do except to produce noise when contrast in effect was deemed necessary. Unquestionably, Emanuel Bach departed somewhat from this conventional and circumscribed treatment of the orchestra and gave to his wind instruments independent parts. In his symphony in E-flat is to be found, amid the customary unison and octave passages for the strings, some charming and even piquant free writing for the wind, together with a marked feeling for contrasts between the wind and the strings. The horns, especially, are used with a genuine appreciation of their peculiar quality of tone and the effect of their timbre. Occasionally the strings remain silent and the wood wind are heard alone. More than this, for there is an attempt to employ all the instruments in a manner calculated to let their characteristic individualities produce their due effect in regard to tone-color; but, strangely enough, Haydn does not appear to have been in any way swayed by the innovations of his great predecessor, whose clavier works he had studied so assiduously. Still, a near and an inevitable change in the methods of writing for the orchestra was in the air, and the ground was not wholly unprepared for Haydn.

Fac-simile of original sketch made by Haydn for the Austrian Hymn, in which the melody and harmony differ somewhat from the published version.