Haydn's concertos for Lira organizzata, a manually pumped harmonium, are heard in this recording arranged for flute, oboe and orchestra.

The Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra presents here its newest installment in the Haydn Symphony Project, a series of recordings which began in 1999 and will eventually will include every one of Joseph Haydn’s 105 symphonies. This volume includes Symphonies Nos. 6, 7, 8, 35, 46, and 51. The Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra concentrates its activities on the Viennese classics and the early German romantics. It performs these works in accordance with the principles of historical authenticity and has committed its interpretations to disk in a large number of recordings that have received unusually unanimous acclaim from music critics all over the world.

Includes work(s) by Franz Joseph Haydn. Soloists: Aleksandr Khramouchin, Darko Milowich, Xavier Vander Linden.

Some of Haydn’s very greatest and most life-affirming music in performances that match those qualities to a quite extraordinary degree.

The many CDs and sets issued in this anniversary year have provided an opportunity to rethink our reactions to Haydn’s output and to explore lesser known parts of it. The sheer quantity that he wrote as well as its quality means that demands on our purses and our time are already considerable, but I do urge you very strongly to make room for this issue. It contains some of Haydn’s very greatest and most life-affirming music in performances that match those qualities to a quite extraordinary degree. Whatever mood I have been in or however I have felt before listening to these discs I have always finished feeling markedly better. What a composer and what performances!

The last six of Haydn’s Masses, from the Missa in tempore belli (Hob.XXII.9) to the Harmoniemesse (Hob.XXII.14), are clearly amongst his greatest works but getting their character right in performance is much more difficult than one might suppose. I have listened to many performances live and on disc that simply missed the point by being too heavy, technically inadequate, badly balanced or just plain dull. The great virtue of the performances here is their constant alertness to the changing character of the music, and to its essential underlying rhythms. The words “dancing”, “bouncy” and “characterful” appear repeatedly in my notes. The performances are not perfect but the music’s underlying humanity is never in doubt. This applies possibly even more to the earlier and less frequently performed works. The Nikolaimesse for instance has a delightful rural charm, whereas the Cäcilienmesse is presented without apology as the amazing and virtuoso collection of styles that it comprises. I still find the Stabat Mater one of the composer’s less interesting works, but even this work seemed much more enjoyable than usual in this fresh, unstuffy and very clear performance.

What makes all of this surprising is that none of the performers, apart from Jane Glover who took over for the last three recordings, is well known, at least on this side of the Atlantic, and yet my comparisons give them the edge over starrier versions by Hickox, Guest and Bernstein - to mention a few I have listened to recently. The choir is that of Trinity Church, Wall Street, New York, and all the soloists are drawn from it. Bearing in mind Haydn’s virtuoso writing especially for the sopranos this might seem like a recipe for disaster but in fact the uniformly high quality of the soloists is one of the great glories of the set. Ann Hoyt, in particular, who sings soprano solos on most of the earlier recordings, is fully the equal of most of the much better known soloists on earlier sets. Her somewhat boy-like purity of tone and her sensitivity to the text and musical line are worth returning to over and over again. Maybe she is helped a little by the recording - it is difficult to judge the size of her voice as recorded - but the effect as it is presented here is stunning. Her main successor in the later recordings under Jane Glover - Nicole Palmer - is more conventional in tone but still well in command of the music. The many other soloists are also good, and above all work as a team, an essential quality in these works.

Unsurprisingly the rest of the choir are of a similar high standard, singing with accuracy, musicality and fervour which it would be hard to beat. The orchestra, sometimes listed as the REBEL Baroque Orchestra and at others as the Rebel Baroque Orchestra, are a period instrument group who play with real character. One surprise is the organ, which makes a delightfully burbling sound in its solo moments, but is apparently a digital instrument, the church’s pipe organ having been severely damaged on 9/11. [see footnote]

The real hero of the set is however the main conductor, J Owen Burdick, who was director of music at Trinity Church from 1990 to 2008 when he left under difficult circumstances. The bouncing rhythms, clear textures, varied articulation and sheer exuberance are surely the result of his work, and the great success of this set is largely the result of these factors. He does have some idiosyncrasies, certainly, in particular his liking for heavy slowing down at the end of sections of the Mass. After a while I came to expect this, if never to enjoy it, but it is a small price to pay for the quality of the rest of the performances. The three performances conducted by Jane Glover are clearly different in style, to my ears more conventional in their underlying rhythmic attack, but they are by no means an unworthy conclusion to the series.

Although the title of the box is “The Complete Haydn Masses” it does not include the two early Masses “Missa Sunt bona mixta malis” (Hob.XXII.2) and “Missa Rorate coeli desuper” (Hob.XXII.3). A note explains that this is because they are both fragmentary and of uncertain provenance, but given the relatively short length of some of the discs there would have been ample space for them, and perhaps also for some of the shorter sacred works such as the Te Deum. The Stabat Mater is included, getting a whole disc to itself, raising the issue as to why the choral version of The Seven Last Words might not also have been included. All of this is however unimportant. What matters is that this is set gives amazing satisfaction in music of supreme quality. For me this has been the highlight of my anniversary year listening.

-- John Sheppard, MusicWeb International

This is the first of a series of Haydn sonata discs by Emanuel Ax for CBS, probably not complete (see: Fanfare 12:4, p. 479). Three of these four are among the best-known sonatas, and all are suitable candidates for Ax's modern concert grand. He approaches Haydn from the Beethoven end, making his readings a touch weightier and more serious than most other pianists. How fitting, in the case of No. 60: it was written about 1794, and the young man who had been Haydn's pupil a year before published his own first sonatas a year later. The C-Minor Sonata of 1772 also benefits from Ax's serious reading; no "Sturm und Drang" exaggerations are needed. But Ax does not lose sight of other sides of Haydn's personality; his playing of the F-Major Sonata is light and graceful, its Adagio pure bliss. Among other modern-piano recordings, three of these sonatas are played by András Schiff on a Denon disc (Fanfare 9:4); at first Schiff's more pointed staccatos seem livelier; but, after hearing Ax through, Schiff seems a touch fussy, almost Gouldish. One word sums up Ax's Haydn: satisfying. CBS has supported Ax with excellent reproduction; his piano comes through with bright singing highs and warm solid bass, smoothly integrated across the spectrum. How will he do with sonatas farther from Beethoven and from his concert grand? I look forward to finding out.

-- James H. North, FANFARE [9/1989]
reviewing the original release of this set, CBS 44918

SOMM Recordings is pleased to announce the fourth volume in Leon McCawley’s much praised series of Franz Joseph Haydn’s Piano Sonatas. Six Sonatas spanning the years 1766-80 are featured: the earliest the miniature First Sonata in G major, the latest the E flat major Sonata No.51, while Robert Matthew-Walker’s fascinating booklet note charts how deftly Haydn balanced the expectations of others and his own creative ambition. “Intended more to entertain than engage the intellect”, the fleet, divertimento-like First Sonata seems to anticipate the pedagogical leanings of Bartók’s Mikrokosmos more than a century and half later.With its unabashed galant style, the D major-led Sonata No.30 is ‘Papa’ Haydn at his most quicksilver brilliant and delightful, while Sonata No.35, in A flat major – “a masterpiece of piano writing” – displays striking characteristics of early Romanticism. Composed with the enhanced voice of the then newly available fortepiano in mind, sibling Sonatas Nos.48 (C major) and 49 (C sharp minor) maintain a winning Classical poise even as one surprise after another see Haydn pushing the sonata form in new and unexpected directions. Volume I (SOMMCD 0162) received a coveted Diapason d’Or from Diapason magazine, which enthused: “What a range in his interpretation and how many layers of gradation! McCawley ties these together in a special quality of inflexions which make their point with great intelligibility and sensitivity”. BBC Music Magazine declared Volume II (SOMMCD 0602) “should stand high on any list” of quality recordings of Haydn, adding “the sparkle of McCawley’s touch is instantly apparent”. Of Volume III (SOMMCD 0624) Gramophone hailed McCawley as “a thoughtful, keenly intelligent artist in peak form… [Haydn’s] piano works an inexhaustible source of artistic riches.”

Such distinguished soloists would not have given their attention to this unfamiliar music unless it had been of high quality, and that is just what it is. The four ''London'' Trios of 1794-5 were really written for two flutes and cello, but they are none the worse for the flute/violin contrast. Trio No. 4 has only one movement (Haydn must have meant to write more), the other three, and their ebullience taxes the technique of all the players most agreeably, the humorous finales being a particular joy. The 'divertissements', also in three short movements, are from a set of six written in 1784, but much of the inventional comes from the opera Il mondo della luna and one of the baryton trios and so is much earlier still. The sleeve-note confuses by describing first what you think are the ''London'' Trios, but which turn out to be the unmentioned divertimentos; also timings of the movements and the complete works are chaotic. This of course does not matter; what does is that the music is so delightful and so beautifully played and recorded.'

-- Gramophone [10/1985]

HAYDN: SYMPHONIES 22, 78 & 82

"...impeccably, splendidly remastered...I love these recordings and what they represent. And I want everyone I know and everyone I don't know to hear them." - Lloyd Schwartz, University of Massachusetts Boston, New York Arts online journal, for NPR.

HAYDN: String Quartets Op. 77, Nos. 1- 2

The present recording is taken from a live transmission of the Academy concert of May 8, 1972, from the Nationaltheater in Munich. The early death of Karl Richter in February 1981 frustrated the intention of releasing one of the great oratorios from his performing repertoire, Joseph Haydn’s “Creation”, in a studio recording. Happily it has proved possible to obtain the present sound recording from the archives of the Bayerische Staatsoper and, with the kind consent of the participants, to prepare a technically enhanced release. Despite a number of remaining technical inadequacies, such as may be considered characteristic for historic recordings of this nature, this audio document gives a particularly fine impression of the ambience and the authenticity of a live performance with conductor Karl Richter – complementing, as it were, the many available studio recordings of his wide-ranging musical repertoire. Special thanks are due to the musicians and all involved at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich. For his help in advance preparation of this project, we wish to thank by name the opera house’s former Chief Executive of Administration Dr. Roland Felber!

"Bavouzet’s Haydn is unmatched in its zest and its wit. But it is also substantial, informed and deeply rewarding."

--The New York Times on Bavouzet's Haydn Sonatas cycle, 2022

After leaving the boys’ choir of St. Stephens Cathedral in Vienna, one of the ways the young Haydn found to support himself was as a harpsichord teacher. The three early sonatas featured on this recording were almost certainly intended for his students: short, light pieces with few technical demands. The two larger sonatas, both in the key of E flat major, were written some twenty years later and are far more extensive. Both require significantly greater prowess from the performer, and represent Haydn’s ingenuity and skill to the full. The two additional works included here, whilst single-movement compositions, are substantial pieces. The Adagio ma non troppo would become the slow movement of Piano Trio No. 36 whilst the Variations on ‘Gott erhalte’ is based on the second movement of the ‘Emperor’ Quartet, which is itself a set of variations on an anthem composed by Haydn at the request of an Austrian politician for the 29th birthday of the Emperor, and intended as a patriotic hymn comparable to ‘God Save the King’ in England- and a response against the Marseillaise.

REVIEW:

Jean-Efflam Bavouzet is back with the latest volume of his magnificent survey of the Haydn keyboard sonatas...For this latest offering he takes works from three critical periods in Haydn’s life. To make ends meet at 17 he taught harpsichord and some of his earliest sonatas were written for his pupils. These include Nos 5, 6 and 7 – all quite charming and uplifting – which are performed with a sense of affection and delight here by Bavouzet.

The Sonata No 51 in E Flat, which Bavouzet uses to break up the early works, falls into the second critical stage of Haydn’s career. The third momentous turn in his life came when he was befriended by Maria Anna von Genzinger, a mother of six and accomplished pianist and singer...[he] dedicated his Sonata No 59 (often called the Genzinger) to Maria Anna, and it has become one of his most performed piano pieces. Bavouzet does it full justice on this disc, giving a magisterial reading of this gem from the Age of the Enlightenment.

This top-notch disc is filled out with the delicious Adagio ma non troppo, an original version of the slow movement of the Piano Trio No 36, and the variations on the Austrian anthem Gott Erhalte.

--Limelight (Steve Moffatt)

Lars Haugbro, who received his doctoral degree from Cornell University, made his brilliant piano debut in Oslo in 1982 and has since performed as soloist and chamber musician in Scandinavia, Italy, Spain, Russia, and the U.S. He has appeared as soloist with a number of symphony orchestras, including the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, and has made television and radio recordings for the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK). He is often invited to serve as a jury member at the International Edvard Grieg Piano Competition in Bergen, and at the Young Musicians Competition in Oslo, among others.

HAYDN: 6 PARIS SYMPHONIES SAN

HAYDN: ORGAN CONCERTOS NOS 1,