Joseph Haydn

Franz Joseph Haydn[a] (/ˈhaɪdən/ HY-dən, German: [ˈfʁants

ˈjoːzɛf ˈhaɪdn̩] ( listen); 31 March[b] 1732 – 31 May 1809) was an
Austrian composer of the Classical period. He was instrumental in
the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and
piano trio.[2] His contributions to musical form have led him to be
called "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String
Quartet".[3][4]

Haydn spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy
Esterházy family at their Eszterháza Castle. Until the later part of
his life, this isolated him from other composers and trends in music
so that he was, as he put it, "forced to become original".[c] Yet his
music circulated widely, and for much of his career he was the most
celebrated composer in Europe.

He was a friend and mentor of Mozart, a tutor of Beethoven, and Portrait of Haydn by Thomas Hardy
the elder brother of composer Michael Haydn. (1791)[1]

Life and career

Early life

Joseph Haydn was born in Rohrau, Austria, a village that at that

time stood on the border with Hungary.[5] His father was Mathias
Haydn, a wheelwright who also served as "Marktrichter", an office
akin to village mayor. Haydn's mother Maria, née Koller, had
previously worked as a cook in the palace of Count Harrach, the
presiding aristocrat of Rohrau. Neither parent could read music;[d]
however, Mathias was an enthusiastic folk musician, who during
the journeyman period of his career had taught himself to play the
harp. According to Haydn's later reminiscences, his childhood
family was extremely musical, and frequently sang together and
with their neighbours.[6]

Haydn's parents had noticed that their son was musically gifted and
knew that in Rohrau he would have no chance to obtain serious
musical training. It was for this reason that, around the time Haydn
turned six, they accepted a proposal from their relative Johann
Matthias Frankh, the schoolmaster and choirmaster in Hainburg,
St. Stephen's Cathedral. In the
that Haydn be apprenticed to Frankh in his home to train as a foreground is the Kapellhaus
musician. Haydn therefore went off with Frankh to Hainburg and (demolished 1804) where Haydn
he never again lived with his parents. lived as a chorister.
Life in the Frankh household was not easy for Haydn, who later remembered being frequently hungry[7]
and humiliated by the filthy state of his clothing.[8] He began his musical training there, and could soon
play both harpsichord and violin. He also sang treble parts in the church choir.

There is reason to think that Haydn's singing impressed those who heard him, because in 1739[e] he was
brought to the attention of Georg von Reutter, the director of music in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna,
who happened to be visiting Hainburg and was looking for new choirboys. Haydn passed his audition with
Reutter, and after several months of further training moved to Vienna (1740), where he worked for the next
nine years as a chorister. It is also popularly believed that Haydn sang at the funeral of Antonio Vivaldi in
1741.

Haydn lived in the Kapellhaus next to the cathedral, along with Reutter, Reutter's family, and the other four
choirboys, which after 1745 included his younger brother Michael.[9] The choirboys were instructed in
Latin and other school subjects as well as voice, violin, and keyboard.[10] Reutter was of little help to
Haydn in the areas of music theory and composition, giving him only two lessons in his entire time as
chorister.[11] However, since St. Stephen's was one of the leading musical centres in Europe, Haydn
learned a great deal simply by serving as a professional musician there.[12]

Like Frankh before him, Reutter did not always bother to make sure Haydn was properly fed. As he later
told his biographer Albert Christoph Dies, Haydn was motivated to sing well, in hopes of gaining more
invitations to perform before aristocratic audiences, where the singers were usually served refreshments.[13]

Struggles as a freelancer

By 1749, Haydn had matured physically to the point that he

was no longer able to sing high choral parts. Empress Maria
Theresa herself complained to Reutter about his singing,
calling it "crowing".[14] One day, Haydn carried out a prank,
snipping off the pigtail of a fellow chorister.[14] This was
enough for Reutter: Haydn was first caned, then summarily
dismissed and sent into the streets.[15] He had the good
fortune to be taken in by a friend, Johann Michael
Spangler,[16] who shared his family's crowded garret room
with Haydn for a few months. Haydn immediately began his
pursuit of a career as a freelance musician.
Map showing locations where Haydn lived
Haydn struggled at first, working at many different jobs: as a
or visited
music teacher, as a street serenader, and eventually, in 1752,
as valet–accompanist for the Italian composer Nicola
Porpora, from whom he later said he learned "the true
fundamentals of composition".[17] He was also briefly in
Count Friedrich Wilhelm von Haugwitz's employ, playing the
organ in the Bohemian Chancellery chapel at the
Judenplatz.[18]

While a chorister, Haydn had not received any systematic

training in music theory and composition. As a remedy, he
worked his way through the counterpoint exercises in the text
Gradus ad Parnassum by Johann Joseph Fux and carefully
Morzin Palace, Dolní Lukavice, Czech
studied the work of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, whom he
Republic
later acknowledged as an important influence.[19] He said of
CPE Bach's first six keyboard sonatas, "I did not leave my clavier till I played them through, and whoever
knows me thoroughly must discover that I owe a great deal to Emanuel Bach, that I understood him and
have studied him with diligence." According to Griesinger and Dies, in the 1750s Haydn studied an
encyclopedic treatise by Johann Mattheson, a German composer.[20]

As his skills increased, Haydn began to acquire a public reputation, first as the composer of an opera, Der
krumme Teufel, "The Limping Devil", written for the comic actor Joseph Felix von Kurz, whose stage
name was "Bernardon". The work was premiered successfully in 1753, but was soon closed down by the
censors due to "offensive remarks".[21] Haydn also noticed, apparently without annoyance, that works he
had simply given away were being published and sold in local music shops.[22] Between 1754 and 1756
Haydn also worked freelance for the court in Vienna. He was among several musicians who were paid for
services as supplementary musicians at balls given for the imperial children during carnival season, and as
supplementary singers in the imperial chapel (the Hofkapelle) in Lent and Holy Week.[23]

With the increase in his reputation, Haydn eventually obtained aristocratic patronage, crucial for the career
of a composer in his day. Countess Thun,[f] having seen one of Haydn's compositions, summoned him and
engaged him as her singing and keyboard teacher.[g] In 1756, Baron Carl Josef Fürnberg employed Haydn
at his country estate, Weinzierl, where the composer wrote his first string quartets. Of them, Philip G.
Downs said "they abound in novel effects and instrumental combinations that can only be the result of
humorous intent".[24] Their enthusiastic reception encouraged Haydn to write more. It was a turning point
in his career. As a result of the performances, he became in great demand both as a performer and a
teacher.[20] Fürnberg later recommended Haydn to Count Morzin, who, in 1757,[h] became his first full-
time employer.[25] His salary was a respectable 200 florins a year, plus free board and lodging.[26]

The years as Kapellmeister

Haydn's job title under Count Morzin was Kapellmeister, that is,
music director. He led the count's small orchestra in Unterlukawitz
and wrote his first symphonies for this ensemble – perhaps
numbering in the double figures. Philip Downs comments of these
first symphonies: "the seeds of the future are there, his works
already exhibit a richness and profusion of material, and a
disciplined yet varied expression."[20] In 1760, with the security of
a Kapellmeister position, Haydn married. His wife was the former
Maria Anna Theresia Keller (1729–1800),[27] the sister of Therese
(b. 1733), with whom Haydn had previously been in love. Haydn
and his wife had a completely unhappy marriage,[28] from which
time permitted no escape. They produced no children, and both
took lovers.[i]

Count Morzin soon suffered financial reverses that forced him to Haydn's wife. Unauthenticated
dismiss his musical establishment, but Haydn was quickly offered a miniature attributed to Ludwig
similar job (1761) by Prince Paul Anton, head of the immensely Guttenbrunn
wealthy Esterházy family. Haydn's job title was only Vice-
Kapellmeister, but he was immediately placed in charge of most of
the Esterházy musical establishment, with the old Kapellmeister Gregor Werner retaining authority only for
church music. When Werner died in 1766, Haydn was elevated to full Kapellmeister.

As a "house officer" in the Esterházy establishment, Haydn wore livery and followed the family as they
moved among their various palaces, most importantly the family's ancestral seat Schloss Esterházy in
Eisenstadt and later on Esterháza, a grand new palace built in rural Hungary in the 1760s. Haydn had a
huge range of responsibilities, including composition, running the orchestra, playing chamber music for and
with his patrons, and eventually the mounting of operatic productions. Despite this backbreaking
workload,[j] the job was in artistic terms a superb opportunity for Haydn.[29][30] The Esterházy princes
(Paul Anton, then from 1762 to 1790 Nikolaus I) were musical connoisseurs who appreciated his work and
gave him daily access to his own small orchestra. During the nearly thirty years that Haydn worked at the
Esterházy court, he produced a flood of compositions, and his musical style continued to develop.

Much of Haydn's activity at the time followed the musical taste of his
patron Prince Nikolaus. In about 1765, the prince obtained and began to
learn to play the baryton, an uncommon musical instrument similar to the
bass viol, but with a set of plucked sympathetic strings. Haydn was
commanded to provide music for the prince to play, and over the next ten
years produced about 200 works for this instrument in various ensembles,
the most notable of which are the 126 baryton trios. Around 1775, the
prince abandoned the baryton and took up a new hobby: opera productions,
previously a sporadic event for special occasions, became the focus of
musical life at court, and the opera theater the prince had built at Esterháza
came to host a major season, with multiple productions each year. Haydn
Prince Nikolaus Esterházy, served as company director, recruiting and training the singers and
Haydn's most important preparing and leading the performances. He wrote several of the operas
patron performed and wrote substitution arias to insert into the operas of other
composers.

1779 was a watershed year for Haydn, as his contract was renegotiated: whereas previously all his
compositions were the property of the Esterházy family, he now was permitted to write for others and sell
his work to publishers. Haydn soon shifted his emphasis in composition to reflect this (fewer operas, and
more quartets and symphonies) and he negotiated with multiple publishers, both Austrian and foreign. His
new employment contract "acted as a catalyst in the next stage in Haydn's career, the achievement of
international popularity. By 1790 Haydn was in the paradoxical position ... of being Europe's leading
composer, but someone who spent his time as a duty-bound Kapellmeister in a remote palace in the
Hungarian countryside."[31] The new publication campaign resulted in the composition of a great number
of new string quartets (the six-quartet sets of Op. 33, 50, 54/55, and 64). Haydn also composed in response
to commissions from abroad: the Paris symphonies (1785–1786) and the original orchestral version of The
Seven Last Words of Christ (1786), a commission from Cádiz, Spain.

The remoteness of Eszterháza, which was farther from

Vienna than Eisenstadt, led Haydn gradually to feel
more isolated and lonely.[32] He longed to visit Vienna
because of his friendships there.[33] Of these, a
particularly important one was with Maria Anna von
Genzinger (1754–1793), the wife of Prince Nikolaus's
personal physician in Vienna, who began a close,
platonic relationship with the composer in 1789. Haydn
wrote to Mrs. Genzinger often, expressing his loneliness
at Esterháza and his happiness for the few occasions on
which he was able to visit her in Vienna. Later on,
Haydn wrote to her frequently from London. Her View of Eszterháza
premature death in 1793 was a blow to Haydn, and his F
minor variations for piano, Hob. XVII:6, may have been
written in response to her death.[34]
Another friend in Vienna was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whom Haydn had met sometime around 1784.
According to later testimony by Michael Kelly and others, the two composers occasionally played in string
quartets together.[35][36] Haydn was hugely impressed with Mozart's work and praised it unstintingly to
others. Mozart evidently returned the esteem, as seen in his dedication of a set of six quartets, now called
the "Haydn" quartets, to his friend. In 1785 Haydn was admitted to the same Masonic lodge as Mozart, the
"Zur wahren Eintracht" in Vienna.[37][k]

The London journeys

In 1790, Prince Nikolaus died and was succeeded as prince by his son
Anton. Following a trend of the time,[39] Anton sought to economize by
dismissing most of the court musicians. Haydn retained a nominal
appointment with Anton, at a reduced salary of 400 florins, as well as a
1000-florin pension from Nikolaus.[40] Since Anton had little need of
Haydn's services, he was willing to let him travel, and the composer
accepted a lucrative offer from Johann Peter Salomon, a German violinist
and impresario, to visit England and conduct new symphonies with a large
orchestra.

The choice was a sensible one because Haydn was already a very popular
composer there. Since the death of Johann Christian Bach in 1782, Haydn's
Portrait by Ludwig
music had dominated the concert scene in London; "hardly a concert did
Guttenbrunn, painted
not feature a work by him".[41] Haydn's work was widely distributed by
c. 1791–92, depicts Haydn
publishers in London, including Forster (who had their own contract with
c. 1770
Haydn) and Longman & Broderip (who served as agent in England for
Haydn's Vienna publisher Artaria).[41] Efforts to bring Haydn to London
had been made since 1782, though Haydn's loyalty to Prince Nikolaus had prevented him from
accepting.[41]

After fond farewells from Mozart and other friends,[42] Haydn departed from Vienna with Salomon on 15
December 1790, arriving in Calais in time to cross the English Channel on New Year's Day of 1791. It was
the first time that the 58-year-old composer had seen the sea. Arriving in London, Haydn stayed with
Salomon in Great Pulteney Street (London, near Piccadilly Circus)[43] working in a borrowed studio at the
Broadwood piano firm nearby.[43]

It was the start of a very auspicious period for Haydn: both the 1791–1792 journey, along with a repeat
visit in 1794–1795, were greatly successful. Audiences flocked to Haydn's concerts; he augmented his
fame and made large profits, thus becoming financially secure.[l] Charles Burney reviewed the first concert
thus: "Haydn himself presided at the piano-forte; and the sight of that renowned composer so electrified the
audience, as to excite an attention and a pleasure superior to any that had ever been caused by instrumental
music in England."[m] Haydn made many new friends and, for a time, was involved in a romantic
relationship with Rebecca Schroeter.

Musically, Haydn's visits to England generated some of his best-known work, including the Surprise,
Military, Drumroll and London symphonies; the Rider quartet; and the "Gypsy Rondo" piano trio. The
great success of the overall enterprise does not mean that the journeys were free of trouble. Notably, his
very first project, the commissioned opera L'anima del filosofo was duly written during the early stages of
the trip, but the opera's impresario John Gallini was unable to obtain a license to permit opera performances
in the theatre he directed, the King's Theatre. Haydn was well paid for the opera (£300) but much time was
wasted.[n] Thus only two new symphonies, no. 95 and no. 96 Miracle, could be premiered in the 12
concerts of Salomon's spring concert series in 1791. Another problem arose from the jealously competitive
 efforts of a senior, rival orchestra, the Professional Concerts, who
recruited Haydn's old pupil Ignaz Pleyel as a rival visiting
composer; the two composers, refusing to play along with the
concocted rivalry, dined together and put each other's symphonies
on their concert programs.

The end of Salomon's series in June gave Haydn a rare period of

relative leisure. He spent some of the time in the country
(Hertingfordbury),[44] but also had time to travel, notably to
Hanover Square Rooms, principal
Oxford, where he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the
venue of Haydn's performances in
university. The symphony performed for the occasion, no. 92 has
London
since come to be known as the Oxford Symphony, although it had
been written in 1789.[45] Four further new symphonies (Nos. 93,
94, 97 and 98) were performed in early 1792.

While traveling to London in 1790, Haydn had met the young Ludwig van
Beethoven in his native city of Bonn. On Haydn's return, Beethoven came
to Vienna and was Haydn's pupil up until the second London journey.
Haydn took Beethoven with him to Eisenstadt for the summer, where
Haydn had little to do, and taught Beethoven some counterpoint.[46] While
in Vienna, Haydn purchased a house for himself and his wife in the suburbs
and started remodeling it. He also arranged for the performance of some of
his London symphonies in local concerts.

By the time he arrived on his second journey to England (1794–1795),

Haydn had become a familiar figure on the London concert scene. The
1794 season was dominated by Salomon's ensemble, as the Professional
Concerts had abandoned their efforts. The concerts included the premieres Haydn as portrayed by John
of the 99th, 100th, and 101st symphonies. For 1795, Salomon had Hoppner in England in 1791
abandoned his own series, citing difficulty in obtaining "vocal performers
of the first rank from abroad", and Haydn joined forces with the Opera
Concerts, headed by the violinist Giovanni Battista Viotti. These were the venue of the last three
symphonies, 102, 103, and 104. The final benefit concert for Haydn ("Dr. Haydn's night") at the end of the
1795 season was a great success and was perhaps the peak of his English career. Haydn's biographer
Griesinger wrote that Haydn "considered the days spent in England the happiest of his life. He was
everywhere appreciated there; it opened a new world to him".[47]

Years of celebrity in Vienna

Haydn returned to Vienna in 1795. Prince Anton had died, and his successor Nikolaus II proposed that the
Esterházy musical establishment be revived with Haydn serving again as Kapellmeister. Haydn took up the
position on a part-time basis. He spent his summers with the Esterházys in Eisenstadt, and over the course
of several years wrote six masses for them including the Lord Nelson mass in 1798.

By this time Haydn had become a public figure in Vienna. He spent most of his time in his home, a large
house in the suburb of Windmühle,[o] and wrote works for public performance. In collaboration with his
librettist and mentor Gottfried van Swieten, and with funding from van Swieten's Gesellschaft der
Associierten, he composed his two great oratorios, The Creation (1798) and The Seasons (1801). Both
were enthusiastically received. Haydn frequently appeared before the public, often leading performances of
The Creation and The Seasons for charity benefits, including Tonkünstler-Societät programs with massed
musical forces. He also composed instrumental music: the popular Trumpet Concerto, and the last nine in
his long series of string quartets, including the Fifths, Emperor, and Sunrise.
Directly inspired by hearing audiences sing God Save the King in London,
in 1797 Haydn wrote a patriotic "Emperor's Hymn" Gott erhalte Franz den
Kaiser, ("God Save Emperor Francis"). This achieved great success and
became "the enduring emblem of Austrian identity right up to the First
World War" (Jones). The melody was used for von Fallersleben's
Deutschlandlied (1841), which was written as part of the German
unification movement and whose third stanza is today the national anthem
of the Federal Republic of Germany. (Modern Austria uses a different
anthem.)

During the later years of this successful period, Haydn faced incipient old
age and fluctuating health, and he had to struggle to complete his final
works. His last major work, from 1802, was the sixth mass for the Wax sculpture of Haydn by
Esterházys, the Harmoniemesse. Franz Thaler, c. 1800

Retirement, illness, and death

By the end of 1803, Haydn's condition had declined to the point that he became physically unable to
compose. He suffered from weakness, dizziness, inability to concentrate and painfully swollen legs. Since
diagnosis was uncertain in Haydn's time, it is unlikely that the precise illness can ever be identified, though
Jones suggests arteriosclerosis.[48] The illness was especially hard for Haydn because the flow of fresh
musical ideas continued unabated, although he could no longer work them out as compositions.[p] His
biographer Dies reported Haydn saying in 1806:

"I must have something to do—usually musical ideas are pursuing me, to the point of torture, I
cannot escape them, they stand like walls before me. If it's an allegro that pursues me, my
pulse keeps beating faster, I can get no sleep. If it's an adagio, then I notice my pulse beating
slowly. My imagination plays on me as if I were a clavier."[q] Haydn smiled, the blood rushed
to his face, and he said "I am really just a living clavier."

The winding down of Haydn's career was gradual. The Esterházy

family kept him on as Kapellmeister to the very end (much as they
had with his predecessor Werner long before), but they appointed
new staff to lead their musical establishment: Johann Michael Fuchs
in 1802 as Vice-Kapellmeister[49] and Johann Nepomuk Hummel
as Konzertmeister in 1804.[50] Haydn's last summer in Eisenstadt
was in 1803,[49] and his last appearance before the public as a
conductor was a charity performance of The Seven Last Words on
26 December 1803. As debility set in, he made largely futile efforts
House in Vienna (now a museum) at composition, attempting to revise a rediscovered Missa brevis
where Haydn spent the last years of from his teenage years and complete his final string quartet. The
his life former project was abandoned for good in 1805, and the quartet
was published with just two movements.[51]

Haydn was well cared for by his servants, and he received many visitors and public honors during his last
years, but they could not have been very happy years for him.[52] During his illness, Haydn often found
solace by sitting at the piano and playing his "Emperor's Hymn". A final triumph occurred on 27 March
1808 when a performance of The Creation was organized in his honour. The very frail composer was
brought into the hall on an armchair to the sound of trumpets and drums and was greeted by Beethoven,
Salieri (who led the performance) and by other musicians and members of the aristocracy. Haydn was both
moved and exhausted by the experience and had to depart at intermission.[53]

Haydn lived on for 14 more months. His final days were hardly
serene, as in May 1809 the French army under Napoleon launched
an attack on Vienna and on 10 May bombarded his neighborhood.
According to Griesinger, "Four case shots fell, rattling the windows
and doors of his house. He called out in a loud voice to his alarmed
and frightened people, 'Don't be afraid, children, where Haydn is,
no harm can reach you!'. But the spirit was stronger than the flesh,
for he had hardly uttered the brave words when his whole body
began to tremble."[54] More bombardments followed until the city
fell to the French on 13 May.[55] Haydn, was, however, deeply Bergkirche in Eisenstadt, site of
moved and appreciative when on 17 May a French cavalry officer Haydn's tomb
named Sulémy came to pay his respects and sang, skillfully, an aria
from The Creation.[r]

On 26 May Haydn played his "Emperor's Hymn" with unusual gusto three times; the same evening he
collapsed and was taken to what proved to be to his deathbed.[54] He died peacefully in his own home at
12:40 a.m. on 31 May 1809, aged 77.[55] On 15 June, a memorial service was held in the Schottenkirche at
which Mozart's Requiem was performed. Haydn's remains were interred in the local Hundsturm cemetery
until 1820, when they were moved to Eisenstadt by Prince Nikolaus. His head took a different journey; it
was stolen by phrenologists shortly after burial, and the skull was reunited with the other remains only in
1954, now interred in a tomb in the north tower of the Bergkirche.

Character and appearance

James Webster writes of Haydn's public character thus:
"Haydn's public life exemplified the Enlightenment ideal
of the honnête homme (honest man): the man whose
good character and worldly success enable and justify
each other. His modesty and probity were everywhere Haydn's signature on a work of music: di me
acknowledged. These traits were not only prerequisites giuseppe Haydn ("by me Joseph Haydn"). He
to his success as Kapellmeister, entrepreneur and public writes in Italian, a language he often used
figure, but also aided the favorable reception of his professionally.
music."[56] Haydn was especially respected by the
Esterházy court musicians whom he supervised, as he
maintained a cordial working atmosphere and effectively represented the musicians' interests with their
employer; see Papa Haydn and the tale of the "Farewell" Symphony. Haydn had a robust sense of humor,
evident in his love of practical jokes[57] and often apparent in his music, and he had many friends. For
much of his life he benefited from a "happy and naturally cheerful temperament",[58] but in his later life,
there is evidence for periods of depression, notably in the correspondence with Mrs. Genzinger and in
Dies's biography, based on visits made in Haydn's old age.

Haydn was a devout Catholic who often turned to his rosary when he had trouble composing, a practice
that he usually found to be effective.[59] He normally began the manuscript of each composition with "in
nomine Domini" ("in the name of the Lord") and ended with "Laus Deo" ("praise be to God").[60]
Haydn's early years of poverty and awareness of the
financial precariousness of musical life made him astute
and even sharp in his business dealings. Some
contemporaries (usually, it has to be said, wealthy ones)
were surprised and even shocked at this. Webster writes:
"As regards money, Haydn…always attempted to
maximize his income, whether by negotiating the right to
sell his music outside the Esterházy court, driving hard
bargains with publishers or selling his works three and
four times over [to publishers in different countries]; he
regularly engaged in 'sharp practice'” which nowadays
might be regarded as plain fraud.[61] But those were
days when copyright was in its infancy, and the pirating Laus Deo ("praise be to God") at the conclusion
of musical works was common. Publishers had few of a Haydn manuscript[s]
qualms about attaching Haydn's name to popular works
by lesser composers, an arrangement that effectively
robbed the lesser musician of livelihood. Webster notes that Haydn's ruthlessness in business might be
viewed more sympathetically in light of his struggles with poverty during his years as a freelancer—and
that outside of the world of business, in his dealings, for example, with relatives, musicians and servants,
and in volunteering his services for charitable concerts, Haydn was a generous man – offering to teach the
two infant sons of Mozart for free after their father's death.[61] When Haydn died he was certainly
comfortably off, but by middle class rather than aristocratic standards.

Haydn was short in stature, perhaps as a result of having been

underfed throughout most of his youth. He was not handsome, and
like many in his day he was a survivor of smallpox; his face was
pitted with the scars of this disease.[t] His biographer Dies wrote:
"he couldn't understand how it happened that in his life he had been
loved by many a pretty woman. 'They couldn't have been led to it
by my beauty.' "[62]

His nose, large and aquiline, was disfigured by the polyps he

suffered during much of his adult life,[63] an agonizing and
debilitating disease that at times prevented him from writing
music.[64]

Works Portrait of Joseph Haydn by

Christian Ludwig Seehas, 1785
James Webster summarizes Haydn's role in the history of classical
music as follows: "He excelled in every musical genre.  ... He is
familiarly known as the 'father of the symphony' because he composed 107 symphonies,[65] and could with
greater justice be thus regarded for the string quartet; no other composer approaches his combination of
productivity, quality and historical importance in these genres"[4]

Structure and character of his music

A central characteristic of Haydn's music is the development of larger structures out of very short, simple
musical motifs, often derived from standard accompanying figures. The music is often quite formally
concentrated, and the important musical events of a movement can unfold rather quickly.[u]
 Haydn's work was central to the development of what
came to be called sonata form. His practice, however,
differed in some ways from that of Mozart and
Beethoven, his younger contemporaries who likewise
excelled in this form of composition. Haydn was
particularly fond of the so-called monothematic
exposition, in which the music that establishes the
dominant key is similar or identical to the opening
theme. Haydn also differs from Mozart and Beethoven
in his recapitulation sections, where he often rearranges
the order of themes compared to the exposition and uses
extensive thematic development.[v]
Original copy of "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser"
in Haydn's hand Haydn's formal inventiveness also led him to integrate
the fugue into the classical style and to enrich the rondo
form with more cohesive tonal logic (see sonata rondo
form). Haydn was also the principal exponent of the double variation form—variations on two alternating
themes, which are often major- and minor-mode versions of each other.

Perhaps more than any other composer's, Haydn's music is known for its humor.[w] The most famous
example is the sudden loud chord in the slow movement of his "Surprise" symphony; Haydn's many other
musical jokes include numerous false endings (e.g., in the quartets Op. 33 No. 2 and Op. 50 No. 3), and the
remarkable rhythmic illusion placed in the trio section of the third movement of Op. 50 No. 1.[66]

Much of the music was written to please and delight a prince, and its emotional tone is correspondingly
upbeat. This tone also reflects, perhaps, Haydn's fundamentally healthy and well-balanced personality.
Occasional minor-key works, often deadly serious in character, form striking exceptions to the general rule.
Haydn's fast movements tend to be rhythmically propulsive and often impart a great sense of energy,
especially in the finales. Some characteristic examples of Haydn's "rollicking" finale type are found in the
"London" Symphony No. 104, the String Quartet Op. 50 No. 1, and the Piano Trio Hob XV: 27. Haydn's
early slow movements are usually not too slow in tempo, relaxed, and reflective. Later on, the emotional
range of the slow movements increases, notably in the deeply felt slow movements of the quartets Op. 76
Nos. 3 and 5, the Symphonies No. 98 and 102, and the Piano Trio Hob XV: 23. The minuets tend to have
a strong downbeat and a clearly popular character. Over time, Haydn turned some of his minuets into
"scherzi" which are much faster, at one beat to the bar.

One of the most apt tributes to Haydn was spoken by the poet John Keats. Keats, dying of tuberculosis,
was brought to Rome by his friends in November 1820, in the hope that the climate might help to mitigate
his suffering. (The poet died a few weeks later on 23 February 1821, at the age of 25.) According to his
friend Joseph Severn: "About this time he expressed a strong desire that we had a pianoforte, so that I
might play to him, for not only was he passionately fond of music, but found that his constant pain and
o'erfretted nerves were much soothed by it. This I managed to obtain on loan, and Dr. Clark procured me
many volumes and pieces of music, and Keats had thus a welcome solace in the dreary hours he had to
pass. Among the volumes was one of Haydn's Symphonies, and these were his delight, and he would
exclaim enthusiastically, 'This Haydn is like a child, for there is no knowing what he will do next.' "[67]

Style

Haydn's early work dates from a period in which the compositional style of the High Baroque (seen in J. S.
Bach and Handel) had gone out of fashion. This was a period of exploration and uncertainty, and Haydn,
born 18 years before the death of Bach, was himself one of the musical explorers of this time.[68] An older
contemporary whose work Haydn acknowledged as an important influence was Carl Philipp Emanuel
Bach.[19]

Tracing Haydn's work over the six decades in which it was produced (roughly from 1749 to 1802), one
finds a gradual but steady increase in complexity and musical sophistication, which developed as Haydn
learned from his own experience and that of his colleagues. Several important landmarks have been
observed in the evolution of Haydn's musical style.

In the late 1760s and early 1770s, Haydn entered a stylistic period known as "Sturm und Drang" ("storm
and stress"). This term is taken from a literary movement of about the same time, though it appears that the
musical development actually preceded the literary one by a few years.[x] The musical language of this
period is similar to what went before, but it is deployed in work that is more intensely expressive, especially
in the works in minor keys. James Webster describes the works of this period as "longer, more passionate,
and more daring".[69] Some of the most famous compositions of this time are the "Trauer" (Mourning)
Symphony No. 44, "Farewell" Symphony No. 45, the Piano Sonata in C minor (Hob. XVI/20, L. 33), and
the six "Sun" Quartets Op. 20, all from c. 1771–72. It was also around this time that Haydn became
interested in writing fugues in the Baroque style, and three of the Op. 20 quartets end with a fugue.

Following the climax of the "Sturm und Drang", Haydn returned to a lighter, more overtly entertaining
style. There are no quartets from this period, and the symphonies take on new features: the scoring often
includes trumpets and timpani. These changes are often related to a major shift in Haydn's professional
duties, which moved him away from "pure" music and toward the production of comic operas. Several of
the operas were Haydn's own work (see List of operas by Joseph Haydn); these are seldom performed
today. Haydn sometimes recycled his opera music in symphonic works,[70] which helped him continue his
career as a symphonist during this hectic decade.

In 1779, an important change in Haydn's contract

permitted him to publish his compositions without prior
authorization from his employer. This may have
encouraged Haydn to rekindle his career as a composer
of "pure" music. The change made itself felt most
dramatically in 1781, when Haydn published the six Op.
33 String Quartets, announcing (in a letter to potential
purchasers) that they were written in "a new and
completely special way".[y] Charles Rosen has argued
that this assertion on Haydn's part was not just sales talk
but meant quite seriously, and he points out a number of
important advances in Haydn's compositional technique
that appear in these quartets, advances that mark the
advent of the Classical style in full flower. These include Joseph Haydn Playing Quartets
a fluid form of phrasing, in which each motif emerges
from the previous one without interruption, the practice
of letting accompanying material evolve into melodic material, and a kind of "Classical counterpoint" in
which each instrumental part maintains its own integrity. These traits continue in the many quartets that
Haydn wrote after Op. 33.[z]

In the 1790s, stimulated by his England journeys, Haydn developed what Rosen calls his "popular style", a
method of composition that, with unprecedented success, created music having great popular appeal but
retaining a learned and rigorous musical structure.[aa] An important element of the popular style was the
frequent use of folk or folk-like material (see Haydn and folk music). Haydn took care to deploy this
material in appropriate locations, such as the endings of sonata expositions or the opening themes of finales.
In such locations, the folk material serves as an element of stability, helping to anchor the larger
structure.[72] Haydn's popular style can be heard in virtually all of his later work, including the twelve
"London" symphonies, the late quartets and piano trios, and the two late oratorios.

The return to Vienna in 1795 marked the last turning point in Haydn's career. Although his musical style
evolved little, his intentions as a composer changed. While he had been a servant, and later a busy
entrepreneur, Haydn wrote his works quickly and in profusion, with frequent deadlines. As a rich man,
Haydn now felt that he had the privilege of taking his time and writing for posterity. This is reflected in the
subject matter of The Creation (1798) and The Seasons (1801), which address such weighty topics as the
meaning of life and the purpose of humankind and represent an attempt to render the sublime in music.
Haydn's new intentions also meant that he was willing to spend much time on a single work: both oratorios
took him over a year to complete. Haydn once remarked that he had worked on The Creation so long
because he wanted it to last.[73]

The change in Haydn's approach was important in the history of classical music, as other composers were
soon following his lead. Notably, Beethoven adopted the practice of taking his time and aiming high.[ab]

Identifying Haydn's works

Anthony van Hoboken prepared a comprehensive catalogue of Haydn's works. The Hoboken catalogue
assigns a catalog number to each work, called its Hoboken number (abbreviated H. or Hob.). These
Hoboken numbers are often used in identifying Haydn's compositions.

Haydn's string quartets also have Hoboken numbers, but they are usually identified instead by their opus
numbers, which have the advantage of indicating the groups of six quartets that Haydn published together.
For example, the string quartet Opus 76, No. 3 is the third of the six quartets published in 1799 as Opus 76.

Instruments

An "Anton Walter in Wien" fortepiano used by the composer is now on display in Haydn-Haus in
Eisenstadt.[74] In Vienna in 1788 Haydn bought himself a fortepiano made by Wenzel Schantz. When the
composer was visiting London for the first time, an English piano builder, John Broadwood, supplied him
with a concert grand.[75]

See also
Biography portal
Classical music
portal
Opera portal

List of compositions by Joseph Haydn

List of concertos by Joseph Haydn
List of masses by Joseph Haydn
List of operas by Joseph Haydn
List of piano trios by Joseph Haydn
List of solo piano compositions by Joseph Haydn
List of string quartets by Joseph Haydn
 List of symphonies by Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn's ethnicity
Haydn's birthplace
List of Haydn's residences

References
Informational notes

a. See Haydn's name. Haydn was baptized "Franciscus Josephus" (Franz Joseph), but
"Franz" was not used during Haydn's lifetime and is avoided by scholars today ("Haydn,
Joseph" Webster & Feder (2001)).
b. The date is uncertain. Haydn told others he was born on this day Geiringer (1982, p. 9);
Jones (1810, 8), but some of his family members reported 1 April instead (Geiringer). The
difficulty arises from the fact that in Haydn's day official records recorded not the birth date
but the date of baptism, which, in Haydn's case, was 1 April Jones (2009a, pp. 2–3).
c. Haydn made the remark to his friend and biographer Georg August Griesinger; cited from
English version by Vernon Gotwals (Griesinger 1963, p. 17)
d. Haydn reported this in his 1776 Autobiographical sketch.
e. Finscher 2000, p. 12. Jones (2009:7) dates the visit to early summer, i.e. cherry season,
since during the visit Reutter plied the child with fresh cherries as a means of inducing him
to learn to sing a trill.
f. Various individuals bore the title "Countess Thun" over time. Candidates for the countess
who engaged Haydn are (a) "the elder Countess Maria Christine Thun", (Webster 2002); (b)
Maria Wilhelmine Thun (later a famous salon hostess and patroness of Mozart), (Volkmar
Braunbehrens, 1990, Mozart in Vienna).
g. Webster 2002, p. 8. Webster expresses doubts, since the source is the early biography of
Nicolas-Étienne Framery, judged (Webster 2002, p. 1) the least reliable of Haydn's early
biographers.
h. This date is uncertain, since the early biography of Griesinger (1963) gives 1759. For the
evidence supporting the earlier date see Landon & Jones (1988, p. 34) and Webster (2002,
p. 10).
i. Mrs. Haydn's paramour (1770) was Ludwig Guttenbrunn, an artist who produced the portrait
of Haydn seen above (Landon & Jones 1988, p. 109). Joseph Haydn had a long
relationship, starting in 1779, with the singer Luigia Polzelli, and was probably the father of
her son Antonio (Landon & Jones 1988, p. 116).
j. (Landon & Jones 1988, p. 100) write: "Haydn's duties were crushing. We can notice the
effect in his handwriting, which becomes hastier as the 1770s turn to the 1780s: the notation
starts to become ever more careless in the scores and the abbreviations multiply."
k. There is no evidence that Haydn ever attended a meeting after his admittance ceremony,[38]
and he was dropped from the lodge's rolls in 1787.
l. According to Jones, the London visits yielded a net profit of 15,000 florins. Haydn continued
to prosper after the visits and at his death left an estate valued at 55,713 florins. These were
substantial sums; for comparison, the house he bought in Gumpendorf in 1793 (and then
remodeled) cost only 1370 florins (all figures from Jones 2009, pp. 144–146).
m. From Burney's memoirs; quoted from Landon & Jones (1988, p. 234)
n. The premier performance did not take place until 1951, during the Florence May Festival.
Maria Callas sang the role of Euridice. The opera and its history are discussed in Geiringer
1982, pp. 342–343.
o. The house, at Haydngasse 19, has since 1899 been a Haydn museum Haydnhaus (http://w
ww.wienmuseum.at/de/standorte/haydnhaus.html), Vienna Museum).
p. Of Haydn's plight, Rosen (1997) wrote, "The last years of Haydn's life, with all his success,
comfort, and celebrity, are among the saddest in music. More moving than the false pathos of
a pauper's grave for Mozart ... is the figure of Haydn filled with musical ideas which were
struggling to escape, as he himself said; he was too old and weak to go to the piano and
submit to the discipline of working them out."
q. "Clavier" in the original German is ambiguous; literally "keyboard", it is used by extension to
denote a keyboard instrument such as the piano or harpsichord. Dies 1810, p. 141.
r. "Mit Würd' und Hoheit angetan", the aria narrating the creation of humankind; Griesinger
(1810, p. 51). According to the less-reliable Dies, the date was 25 May, the officer's name
was Sulimi, and he sang an aria from The Seasons (Dies 1810, in the English translation
from Gotwals 1963, p. 193).
s. The inscription continues (in abbreviations) "et Beatae Virgini Mariae et omnibus sanctis"
("and to the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints"). The image is taken from the 1900
edition of Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians; it does not identify the work in
question.
t. The date of Haydn's bout with smallpox is not preserved. It was prior to the time he was
hired by Countess Thun (i.e. as a young adult; see above), since it is recorded that when
she first encountered Haydn she observed his scars as part of the generally poor impression
his appearance made on her. See Geiringer 1982, p. 34.
u. Sutcliffe (1989, p. 343) mentions this in a criticism of contemporary Haydn performance
practice: "[Haydn's] music sometime seems to 'live on its nerves' ... It is above all in this
respect that Haydn performances often fail, whereby most interpreters lack the mental agility
to deal with the ever-changing 'physiognomy' of Haydn's music, subsiding instead into an
ease of manner and a concern for broader effects that they have acquired in their playing of
Mozart."
v. Hughes (1970, p. 112) writes: "Having begun to 'develop', he could not stop; his
recapitulations begin to take on irregular contours, sometimes sharply condensed,
sometimes surprisingly expanded, losing their first tame symmetry to regain a balance of a
far higher and more satisfying order."
w. Steven Isserlis calls him "the funniest of the great composers" (preface to Richard Wigmore,
The Faber Pocket Guide to Haydn (Faber, 2011)). Brendel (2001) focuses on the humor of
both Haydn and Beethoven. Rosen (1997, p. 111) attributes to Haydn "an aptitude for the
facetious that no other composer enjoyed".
x. See Webster (2002, p. 18): "the term has been criticized: taken from the title of a play of 1776
by Maximilian Klinger, it properly pertains to a literary movement of the middle and late
1770s rather than a musical one of about 1768–1772".
y. Original German "Neu, gantz besonderer Art"[71]
z. Rosen's case that Opus 33 represents a "revolution in style" (1971 and 1997, 116) can be
found in chapter III.1 of Rosen (1997). For dissenting views, see Larsen (1980, p. 102) and
Webster (1991). For discussion of the development of the same trend in Haydn's style in the
symphonies that preceded the Opus 33 quartets see Rosen (1988, pp. 181–186).
aa. Rosen discusses the popular style in ch. VI.1 of Rosen (1997).
ab. For discussion, see Antony Hopkins (1981) The Nine Symphonies of Beethoven,
Heinemann, London, pp. 7–8.

Citations

1. For date of portrait see Jones 2009a, p. vi.

 2. Smallman, Basil (1992). The Piano Trio: Its History, Technique, and Repertoire (https://archiv
e.org/details/pianotrioitshist0000smal/). Oxford University Press. pp. 16–19 (https://archive.o
rg/details/pianotrioitshist0000smal/page/16). ISBN 978-0-19-318307-0.
3. Rosen 1997, pp. 43–54.
4. Webster & Feder 2001.
5. Brenet, Michel (1972). Haydn. New York: B. Blom.
6. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, pp. 80–81).
7. Griesinger 1963, p. 9.
8. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, p. 82).
9. Jones2009a, pp. 12–13. A third brother, Johann Evangelist Haydn, also pursued a musical
career as a tenor, but achieved no distinction and was for some time supported by Joseph.
10. Finscher 2000, p. 12.
11. Griesinger 1963, p. 10.
12. Landon & Jones 1988, p. 27.
13. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, p. 87).
14. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, p. 89).
15. Geiringer 1982, p. 27.
16. Or Spängler (1722-1794), https://www.musiklexikon.ac.at/ml/musik_S/Spangler_Familie.xml
17. Larsen 1980, p. 8.
18. Rita Steblin, "Haydns Orgeldienste 'in der damaligen Gräfl. Haugwitzischen Kapelle' ", in:
Wiener Geschichtsblätter 65/2000, pp. 124–134.
19. Geiringer 1982, p. 30
20. Dodds, Glen Lyndon (2015). Haydn: The Life & Work of a Musical Genius. Albion Press.
21. Tom Beghin; Sander M. Goldberg (2007). Haydn and the Performance of Rhetoric (https://bo
oks.google.com/books?id=TFBILY-jSUsC&pg=PA94). University of Chicago Press. p. 94.
ISBN 978-0-226-04129-2. Retrieved 14 January 2015.
22. Griesinger 1963, p. 15.
23. Dexter Edge, "New Sources for Haydn's Early Biography", unpublished paper given at the
AMS Montréal, 7 November 1993 (see Webster & Feder 2001, vol. 11, p. 265.
24. Downs, Philip G. (1992). Classical music : the era of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven (https://
www.worldcat.org/oclc/25317243). New York: W. W. Norton. ch. 11. ISBN 0-393-95191-X.
OCLC 25317243 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/25317243).
25. Geiringer 1982, pp. 34–35.
26. Redfern 1970, p. 9.
27. Michael Lorenz, "Joseph Haydn's Real Wife" (http://michaelorenz.blogspot.co.at/2014/09/jos
eph-haydns-real-wife_11.html) (Vienna 2014). As Lorenz notes, the identity of Haydn's wife
was mistaken for most of the history of Haydn scholarship.
28. See, e.g., Geiringer 1982, pp. 36–40
29. Webster 2002, p. 13.
30. Landon & Jones 1988, p. 37.
31. Jones 2009b, p. 136.
32. Geiringer 1982, p. 60.
33. For details see Geiringer 1982, Chapter 6
34. Geiringer 1982, p. 316, citing Robbins Landon.
35. Webster & Feder 2001, section 3.4.
36. Deutsch 1965, 234
37. "In the Services of Esterházy" (https://www.austria.info/uk/things-to-do/cities-and-culture/jose
ph-haydn-life-and-works/in-the-services-of-esterhazy). austria.info. Retrieved 17 December
2018.
38. Larsen 1980.
39. Jones 2009a.
40. Geiringer 1982, p. 96.
41. Jones 2009b, p. 325.
42. For narratives of Haydn's last days in Mozart's company, see Haydn and Mozart
43. Jones 2009b, p. 137
44. "Hertfordshire's Haydn Connection" (https://www.hertsmusicfest.org.uk/haydn). Hertfordshire
Festival of Music. Retrieved 31 March 2022.
45. Oxford Symphony, article by Jane Holland in Jones 2009b, p. 266
46. Geiringer 1982, pp. 131–135.
47. Webster 2002, p. 37.
48. For symptoms see Jones 2009a, p. 146; for the arteriosclerosis hypothesis see Jones
2009b, p. 216.
49. Jones 2009a, p. 209.
50. Jones 2009a, pp. 214–215.
51. Jones 2009a, p. 213.
52. Geiringer 1982, p. 198 gives the testimony of Haydn's early biographer Giuseppe Carpani.
53. Geiringer 1982, pp. 186–187.
54. Griesinger 1963, p. 50.
55. Jones 2009b, p. 142
56. Webster 2002, p. 44. These same traits, and his connection to the aristocracy contributed to
the decline in his reputation in the nineteenth century: Proksch 2015
57. Griesinger 1963, p. 20; Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, pp. 92–93).
58. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Gotwals 1963, p. 91).
59. Griesinger 1963, p. 54.
60. Larsen 1980, p. 81.
61. Webster 2002, section 6
62. Dies 1810, (in the English translation from Landon & Jones 1988, p. 157)
63. Hadden 1902, p. 158.
64. Cohen, Jack (1998), "The agony of nasal polyps and the terror of their removal 200 years
ago", The Laryngoscope 108(9): 1311–1313 (September 1998).
65. "Franz Joseph Haydn (1732–1809): Composer: Biography, music and facts" (https://www.cla
ssicfm.com/composers/haydn/). Classic FM (UK).
66. The means by which Haydn fools the listener as to the location of the downbeat are
discussed by Danuta Mirka (2009) Metric Manipulations in Haydn and Mozart: Chamber
Music for Strings, 1787–1791, Oxford University Press, pp. 197–198.
67. Sharp, W. (1892), The Life and Letters of Joseph Severn, p. 67, Sampson Low, Marston &
Company.
68. Rosen (1997, p. 57). "[T]he period from 1750 to 1775 was penetrated by eccentricity, hit-or-
miss experimentation, resulting in works which are still difficult to accept today because of
their oddities". Similar remarks are made by Hughes (1970, pp. 111–112).
69. Webster 2002, p. 18.
70. Webster & Feder 2001, section 3.iii.
71. Sisman 1993, p. 219.
72. Rosen 1997, pp. 333–337.
73. Geiringer 1982, p. 158.
74. Latcham, Michael (1997). "Mozart and the Pianos of Gabriel Anton Walter". Early Music. 25
(3): 383–400. doi:10.1093/earlyj/XXV.3.383 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fearlyj%2FXXV.3.38
3). ISSN 0306-1078 (https://www.worldcat.org/issn/0306-1078). JSTOR 3128423 (https://ww
w.jstor.org/stable/3128423).
75. Badura-Skoda, Eva (2000). "Mozart's Walter fortepiano". Early Music. XXVIII (4): 686.
doi:10.1093/earlyj/xxviii.4.686 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fearlyj%2Fxxviii.4.686).
ISSN 1741-7260 (https://www.worldcat.org/issn/1741-7260).

Bibliography

Biographical sources

Dies, Albert Christoph (1810). Biographische Nachrichten von Joseph Haydn nach
mündlichen Erzählungen desselben entworfen und herausgegeben [Biographical Accounts
of Joseph Haydn, written and edited from his own spoken narratives]. Vienna:
Camesinaische Buchhandlung. English translation in: Dies, Albert Christoph (1963).
"Biographical Accounts of Joseph Haydn". In Gotwals, Vernon (ed.). Haydn: Two
Contemporary Portraits. (translation by Vernon Gotwals). Milwaukee: Univ. of Wisconsin
Press. ISBN 978-0-299-02791-9. One of the first biographies of Haydn, written on the basis
of 30 interviews carried out during the composer's old age.
Finscher, Ludwig (2000). Joseph Haydn und seine Zeit. Laaber: Laaber-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-
921518-94-6. Highly detailed discussion of life and work; in German.
Geiringer, Karl; Geiringer, Irene (1982). Haydn: A Creative Life in Music (https://archive.org/d
etails/haydncreativelif00geir_0) (3rd ed.). University of California. ISBN 978-0-520-04316-9.
The first edition was published in 1946 with Karl Geiringer as the sole author.
Griesinger, Georg August (1963). "Biographical Notes Concerning Joseph Haydn". In
Vernon Gotwals (ed.). Haydn: Two Contemporary Portraits. Translated by Vernon Gotwals.
Milwaukee: University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 978-0-299-02791-9. A translation from the
original German: Biographische Notizen über Joseph Haydn (https://archive.org/details/bub
_gb_sGhDAAAAcAAJ) (1810). Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel. Like Dies's, a biography
produced from interviews with the elderly Haydn.
Hadden, James (1902). Haydn (https://archive.org/details/haydnhad00hadduoft). J. Dent.
Reissued 2010 by Cambridge University Press.
Hughes, Rosemary (1970). Haydn (Revised ed.). New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
ISBN 978-0-460-02281-1. Originally published in 1950. Gives a sympathetic and witty
account of Haydn's life, along with a survey of the music.
Jones, David Wyn (2009a). The Life of Haydn. Oxford University Press. Focuses on
biography rather than musical works; an up-to-date study benefiting from recent scholarly
research on Haydn's life and times.
Jones, David Wyn (2009b). Oxford Composer Companions: Haydn. Oxford University Press.
A comprehensive one-volume collection of detailed contributions by Haydn scholars.
Landon, H. C. Robbins (1976–1980). Haydn: Chronicle and Works. Bloomington, Indiana:
Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-37003-7. An extensive compilation of original
sources in five volumes.
Landon, H. C. Robbins; Jones, David Wyn (1988). Haydn: His Life and Music (https://archiv
e.org/details/haydnhislifemusi00land). Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-37265-9.
Biography chapters by Robbins Landon, excerpted from Landon 1976–1980 and rich in
original source documents. Analysis and appreciation of the works by Jones.
 Larsen, Jens Peter (1980). "Joseph Haydn". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and
Musicians. Published separately as The New Grove: Haydn (https://archive.org/details/newg
rovehaydn00lars). New York: Norton. 1982. ISBN 978-0-393-01681-9.
Redfern, Brian L. (1970). Haydn: A Biography, with a Survey of Books, Editions &
Recordings (https://books.google.com/books?id=NZ20AAAAIAAJ). Archon Books.
ISBN 978-0-208-00886-2.
Webster, James; Feder, Georg (2001). "Joseph Haydn". The New Grove Dictionary of Music
and Musicians. Published separately as a book: The New Grove Haydn. New York:
Macmillan. 2002. ISBN 978-0-19-516904-1. Careful scholarship with little subjective
interpretation; covers both life and music, and includes a very detailed list of works.

Criticism and analysis

Brendel, Alfred (2001). "Does classical music have to be entirely serious?" (https://archive.or
g/details/isaiahberlincele00/page/193). In Margalit, Edna; Margalit, Avishai (eds.). Isaiah
Berlin: A Celebration. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. pp. 193–204 (https://archive.or
g/details/isaiahberlincele00/page/193). ISBN 978-0-226-84096-3. On jokes in Haydn and
Beethoven.
Proksch, Bryan (2015). Reviving Haydn: New Appreciations in the Twentieth Century.
Rochester, New York: University of Rochester Press. ISBN 978-1-58046-512-0. Surveys the
decline in Haydn's reputation in the nineteenth century before examining the factors that led
to a resurgence in the twentieth.
Rosen, Charles (1997). The classical style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven (https://archive.org/d
etails/classicalstyleha00rose) (2nd ed.). New York: Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-31712-1. First
edition published in 1971. Covers much of Haydn's output and seeks to explicate Haydn's
central role in the creation of the classical style. The work has been influential, provoking
both positive citation and work (e.g., Webster 1991) written in reaction.
Rosen, Charles (1988). Sonata forms (https://archive.org/details/sonataforms00rose)
(2nd ed.). New York: Norton.. Further discussion of Haydn's style and technique as it relates
to sonata form.
Sisman, Elaine (1993). Haydn and the Classical Variation. Cambridge: Harvard University
Press. ISBN 978-0-674-38315-9.
Sutcliffe, W. Dean (1989). "Haydn's Musical Personality". The Musical Times. 130 (1756):
341–344. doi:10.2307/966030 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F966030). JSTOR 966030 (https://
www.jstor.org/stable/966030).
Webster, James (1991). Haydn's "Farewell" symphony and the idea of classical style:
through-composition and cyclic integration in his instrumental music. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-38520-6. This book focuses on a single work,
but contains many observations and opinions about Haydn in general.

Further reading
Celestini, Federico (2010). "Aspekte des Erhabenen in Haydns Spätwerk". In Celestini,
Federico; Dorschel, Andreas (eds.). Arbeit am Kanon. Vienna: Universal Edition. pp. 16–41.
ISBN 978-3-7024-6967-2. On the sublime in Haydn's later works; in German.
Clark, Caryl, ed. (2005). The Cambridge Companion to Haydn. Cambridge Companions to
Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-83347-9. Covers each of
the genres Haydn composed in as well as stylistic and interpretive contexts and
performance and reception.
Clark, Caryl; Day-O'Connell, Sarah, eds. (2019). The Cambridge Haydn Encyclopedia.
Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press. ISBN 9781107129016. Sixty-seven scholars
 contribute over eighty entries as well as seven longer thematic essays on biography and
identity, ideas, institutions, musical materials, people and networks, performance, and place.
Griffiths, Paul (1983). The String Quartet. New York: Thames & Hudson. ISBN 978-0-500-
01311-3.
Hughes, Rosemary (1966). Haydn String Quartets. London: BBC. A brief (55 page)
introduction to Haydn's string quartets.
Macek, Bernhard A. (2012). Haydn, Mozart und die Großfürstin. Eine Studie zur
Uraufführung der "Russischen Quartette" op. 33 in den Kaiserappartements der Wiener
Hofburg (in German). Vienna. ISBN 978-3-901568-72-5.
Sutcliffe, W. Dean (1992). Haydn, string quartets, op. 50. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press. ISBN 978-0-521-39103-0. Covers not just Op. 50 but also its relevance to Haydn's
other output as well as his earlier quartets.
Tolley, Thomas (2017). " 'Divorce a la mode': The Schwellenberg Affair and Haydn's
Engagement with English Caricature". Music in Art: International Journal for Music
Iconography. 42 (1–2): 273–307. ISSN 1522-7464 (https://www.worldcat.org/issn/1522-746
4).

External links
"Joseph Haydn" (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Joseph-Haydn) by Karl Geiringer,
Raymond L. Knapp, H. C. Robbins Landon, Encyclopædia Britannica
Free scores by Joseph Haydn at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
Free scores by Joseph Haydn in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
Joseph Haydn-Institut (https://www.haydn-institut.de/) (in German)
The Haydn Society of North America (https://www.haydnsocietyna.org/)
"Discovering Haydn" (https://bbc.co.uk/haydn). BBC Radio 3.

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