FRANZ JOSEPH HAYDN

FRANZ JOSEPH HAYDN

(Rohrau, 1732 – Vienna, 1809)

German musicology has made him a kind of patriarch with a lot of devoted and innumerable lineage, and in addition has elevated him to father of the fatherland in Austrian land. A solid, irreproachable figure, not really brilliant but to whom everyone owes something. Even the image of the man – a good, conscientious, serene, ironic person – ended up representing that Apollonian side of the artist seen in a bourgeois key, or respectful of social conventions, tidy, methodical, disciplined: in short, the antithesis of the Dionysian genius, tormented and sublime. All true. But it is also true that if you were to ask someone if they remember a theme, any one by Haydn, they would be perplexed and generally would answer that the overall work of this musician counts, the entirety of a life dedicated to music. A good trick , which does not solve the problem but avoids disarming conclusions. I believe that many will remember the beautiful film by Milòs Forman, Amadeus , and the drama of the mediocrity of Salieri who, having reached the end of his life, pathetically plays on the forte-piano tunes written by him and famous at the time, which however his interlocutor really he doesn't remember ever hearing. Well, like it or not, exactly the same thing happens with Haydn. I recall a statement by Stendhal on his journey to Brianza in 1818, in which the French novelist argues that the bucolic nature of the Lombard hills could only be illustrated, in musical terms, by a few Haydn symphonies. Given that I'm from Lombardy, and that among Haydn's 104 symphonies I don't know one capable of describing that something that exists in the atmosphere of our sky, that Stendhalian impression still amazes me today. Precisely him, that so much of Rossini and of Italian melodrama has understood like few others and sealed in historical pages! Haydn, as well as Brianza, is unable to describe anything, not even the Austria Felix in which he lived. I suspect Stendhal did not know Beethoven. If he had heard the Sixth Symphony he would perhaps have understood many things: that is, what a genius is and what the music of a genius confronted with the mystery of nature can describe (but we'll talk about it). But Haydn was not a genius. He became Haydn, at least in Austria & Surroundings, precisely because in his best years, in those parts, there weren't any geniuses. Not by chance, when Mozart arrived, of whom Haydn could be the father, things changed immediately, and the situation seemed clear to everyone, even to our musician, who somehow admitted it. In the histories of music it is found right in the classical heart of classical music: that is, in the Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven triad, where the first, just to stay in the biblical context, is the Father. But it is better not to be fooled. If you really want to stick to the dictates of the Pentateuch revised in a Christian key, then it's better to talk about another triad, namely Mozart-Beethoven-Schubert. Confusing Almighty God with Haydn is more of a cabaret joke than a blunder . In reality Haydn was above all a musician endowed with common sense, tenacity, lucidity: a craftsman like Salieri, and like Salieri lacking ideas capable of etching themselves into the mind and heart of the listener. He wrote a gigantic amount of music, including Opera: Quartets, Trios, Sonatas, Concerts, Cantatas, Masses and above all Symphonies in immeasurable numbers. Unlike many Italian composers who still don't have a discography worthy of the name (Clementi, Cimarosa, Cherubini, Mercadante, Pacini), everything about Haydn has been recorded, reserving dedicated care to a Mozart or a Beethoven. But of the 104 symphonies that Haydn produced there is not one - and they are all deliciously beautiful - that rises to the level of a masterpiece. You will be able to hear them one after the other, for about thirty hours, and you will never have a moment of bewilderment, of anguish, of exaltation. In short, Haydn must have been the father of the Sonata-Form (that is, of the way of creating Symphonies with a pre-established scheme, a bit like the metric and the prosody in the Sonnet); he may have been a gentleman in a wig and jabot (the last really happy example of the Old Regime), but what we ask ourselves today thinking of him is: what did he write that was so important as to deserve the fame he has, what did he written so memorable as to come down to us as if behind his name a nucleus of wonders and wonders were hidden? Is it worth listening to today? Frankly I don't know, but honestly I think I can say that knowing Haydn's music is equivalent to reading certain novelists like Scott or Guerrazzi, who you know were important in their time and whose books you can still find today in paperback editions. Nothing more. As far as his production is concerned, it is mostly court music, in the majority of cases composed for the idleness of a very powerful Habsburg prince by a man who perhaps really believed that the absolute monarchy was an earthly emanation of an equally absolute God, that the world is as it is, and that rebelling, more than useless, is an outrage against a heavenly order. However, if you really want to get an idea of ​​Franz Joseph Haydn, two or three CDs can do the job without much trouble. Therefore, it is better not to drown in those monstrous complete collections such as the Haydn Edition in 150 CDs and limit yourself to looking for the Symphony n. 100, the so-called Military (but Haydn's Symphonies have evocative titles that would suggest a sort of program music and this is generally not true, since nothing happens by interchanging the titles). The no. 100 is part of the group of the twelve London symphonies , that is, composed during a tour of the musician in England in 1790, and finally intended for the public. You can look for it in the sumptuous, very soft interpretation of Bruno Walter with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra (CBS-SONY). What we find in this beautiful interpretation is precisely an eighteenth-century oil on canvas, with plumed hussars and cannons that don't hurt anyone when they fire, enamelled rococo salons inhabited by some distracted putto, rural views that here and there recall Bellotto . But it's beautiful, pleasant and maybe, every now and then, you even want to hear it again. The same goes for the No. 104, the so-called London (but it could very well also be called Wien or Praha , nobody would notice). Superb vitality, impetuous and solemn as the course of a river is that of Bernstein's New York Philharmonic. Unmatched. In the Masses - he composed about 14 - Haydn gave, in my opinion, the best of himself. It is therefore worth listening to at least one of them, for example n. 9, Missa in tempore belli , i.e. in wartime, i.e. in 1796, in one of the most incandescent moments of the monarchist reaction to the French revolution. It is not known whether the Missa sides with the Habsburgs (given the character I think so) or is an epitaph for human irresponsibility. The fact is that the kings and crowns went well that time, and Napoleon accepted a compromise and did not bring Vienna to its knees. However, Haydn had by now produced a work worthy of memory and admiration. For another title with a theological background, however, The Creation, Die Schöpfung , the record production has surpassed itself, making an impressive amount of recordings of this work. It is an Oratory, which has a beginning that really gives us hope, but then, as usual, it flattens out in the usual conformity in which everyone gets along with everyone, the snake with Yahwè, the Cherub with Eve and the Apple with Adam. In short, even in the Sumerian epic of the Jewish Eden Haydn gets along Catholicly on his own, and no one gets burned. There are many valid editions, but the one conducted by Antal Dorati for Decca in 1976 remains a monument of non-involvement: as should and is fitting with such a composition, of which not one aria or chorale has remained in everlasting memory. After all - except for Brahms and his Haydn Variationen - I have never known anyone who, while shaving in the morning, whistled a Theme by Haydn.

Symphony no. 100 “Military”,

Columbia Symphony Orchestra

Director: Bruno Walter (CBS-Sony, 1961)

Symphony no. 104 “London”,

New York Philharmonic Orchestra

Director: Leonard Bernstein (CBS-Sony, 1973)

Miss in tempore belli

Morison, Thomas, Witsch, Kohn,

Choir and Symphony Orchestra of the Bavarian Radio

Conductor: Rafael Kubelik (Deutsche Grammophon,, 1965)

Die Schöpfung (The Creation) ,

Popp, Hollweg, Moll, Döse, Luxon,

Brighton Festival Choir and Royal Phil. Orchestra,

Conductor: Antal Dorati (Decca, 1976)