The Cambridge Companion to Haydn

An introduction to the musical work and cultural world of Joseph Haydn.

Caryl Clark (Edited by)

9780521541077, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 24 November 2005

340 pages, 2 b/w illus. 1 map 5 tables 38 music examples
24.4 x 17 x 1.8 cm, 0.54 kg

'This is an important book for music libraries, particularly in its laying to rest of some myths which have grown up around the composer …' Reference Reviews

This Companion provides an accessible and up-to-date introduction to the musical work and cultural world of Joseph Haydn. Readers will gain an understanding of the changing social, cultural, and political spheres in which Haydn studied, worked, and nurtured his creative talent. Distinguished contributors provide chapters on Haydn and his contemporaries, his working environments in Eisenstadt and Eszterháza, and humor and exoticism in Haydn's oeuvre. Chapters on the reception of his music explore keyboard performance practices, Haydn's posthumous reputation, sound recordings and images of his symphonies. The book also surveys the major genres in which Haydn wrote, including symphonies, string quartets, keyboard sonatas and trios, sacred music, miscellaneous vocal genres, and operas composed for Eszterháza and London.

Part I. Haydn in Context: 1. Haydn's career and the idea of the multiple audience Elaine Sisman
2. A letter from the wilderness: revisiting Haydn's Esterházy environments Rebecca Green
3. Haydn's aesthetics James Webster
4. First among equals: Haydn and his fellow composers David Wyn Jones
Part II. Stylistic and Interpretive Contexts: 5. Haydn and humour Scott Burnham
6. Haydn's exoticisms: 'difference' and the Enlightenment Matthew Head
Part III. Genres: 7. Orchestral music: symphonies and concertos David Schroeder
8. The quartets Mary Hunter
9. Intimate expression for a widening public: the keyboard sonatas and trios Michelle Fillion
10. Sacred music James Dack
11. The sublime and the pastoral in The Creation and The Seasons James Webster
12. Miscellaneous vocal genres Katalin Komlós
13. Haydn in the theatre: the operas Caryl Clark
Part IV. Performance and Reception: 14. A composer, his dedicatee, her instrument, and I: thoughts on performing Haydn's keyboard sonatas Tom Beghin
15. Haydn and posterity: the long nineteenth century James Garrett
16. The kitten and the tiger: Tovey's Haydn Lawrence Kramer
17. Recorded performances: a symphonic study Melanie Lowe.

Subject Areas: Classical music [c 1750 to c 1830 AVGC4], Music [AV]