Autobiographical sketch (Haydn)
Encyclopedia
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
's Autobiographical sketch (1776) is the only autobiographical document ever prepared by this composer. Haydn wrote the sketch, which is about two pages long, at the request (relayed to him by a chain of two mutual acquaintances) of Ignaz de Luca, who was preparing a volume of brief biographies of Austrian luminaries entitled Das gelehrte Oesterreich ("Learned Austria"). The sketch was published in 1778, in Volume 1, Part 3 of this work. At the time of writing Haydn was 44 years old.
Content
The sketch may be read in its entirety by following the External Link given below.The sketch begins with a brief account of the first 29 years of Haydn's life. Haydn mentions his early home life in Rohrau, his early education in Hainburg, his subsequent career as a choirboy in Vienna, his struggles during eight years of freelance work, and his appointments as Kapellmeister
Kapellmeister
Kapellmeister is a German word designating a person in charge of music-making. The word is a compound, consisting of the roots Kapelle and Meister . The words Kapelle and Meister derive from the Latin: capella and magister...
, first with Count Morzin
Count Morzin
Count Morzin was an aristocrat of the Austrian Empire during the 18th century. He is remembered today as the first person to employ the composer Joseph Haydn as his Kapellmeister, or music director...
and then with the hugely wealthy Esterházy family. For a detailed account of this period of Haydn's life, including material from other sources, see Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
.
Having related his rise to career success, Haydn says nothing at all of the years 1761-1776 spent working in the Esterházy court, but concludes his narrative with a declaration of loyalty to his employer:
- I was engaged as ... Capellmeister of His Highness the Prince EsterházyNikolaus EsterházyNikolaus Esterházy was a Hungarian prince, a member of the famous Esterházy family. His building of palaces, extravagant clothing, and taste for opera and other grand musical productions led to his being given the title "the Magnificent"...
, in whose service I wish to live and die.
Haydn held to his word: despite considerable tedium and loneliness during the time his employer required him to live in isolated Esterháza, he remained in official service to Prince Esterházy and his heirs up to his death in 1809.
The sketch goes on to list what Haydn regarded as his most important works up to that time: the operas Le pescatrici
Le pescatrici
Le pescatrici Hob. 28/4, is an opera in three acts by Joseph Haydn set to a libretto by Carlo Goldoni...
, L'incontro improvviso
L'incontro improvviso
L’incontro improvviso is an opera in three acts by Joseph Haydn first performed at Eszterháza on 29 August 1775 to mark the four-day visit of Archduke Ferdinand, Habsburg governor of Milan and his consort Maria Beatrice d'Este...
, and L'infedelta delusa
L'infedeltà delusa
L'infedeltà delusa , Hob. 28/5, is an operatic burletta per musica by Joseph Haydn. The Italian libretto was by Marco Coltellini, perhaps reworked by Carl Friberth who also took part in the first performance.-Performance history:...
; his oratorio Il Ritorno di Tobia (1775) and his Stabat Mater
Stabat Mater (Haydn)
Joseph Haydn's Stabat Mater Hob. XXa:1 was written in 1767, for soprano, alto, tenor and bass soloists, mixed choir, 2 oboes both doubling English horn in the sections in E-flat major, strings and organ continuo. The first performance is believed to have taken place March 25, 1768 in Vienna with...
(1767). All of these are vocal music; Haydn omits pre-1776 instrumental works that arguably have received greater critical acclaim in modern times, such as the "Farewell" Symphony
Symphony No. 45 (Haydn)
Symphony No. 45 in F-sharp minor, known as the "Farewell" Symphony , was composed by Joseph Haydn in 1772....
or the string quartets, Opus 20
String Quartets, Op. 20 (Haydn)
The six string quartets opus 20 by Joseph Haydn are among the works that earned Haydn the sobriquet "the father of the string quartet." The quartets are considered a milestone in the history of composition; in them, Haydn develops compositional techniques that were to define the medium for the next...
. Musicologist David Schroeder notes that "in the eighteenth century vocal music was considered pre-eminent. With opinion such as this as the common currency, it should not surprise us that Haydn ... listed only vocal works among those he considered his finest."
Haydn also offers an assessment of his then-current reputation as a composer, expressing appreciation for the praise and support of Johann Adolph Hasse
Johann Adolph Hasse
Johann Adolph Hasse was an 18th-century German composer, singer and teacher of music. Immensely popular in his time, Hasse was best known for his prolific operatic output, though he also composed a considerable quantity of sacred music...
, Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf
Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf
----August Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf was an Austrian composer, violinist and silvologist.-1739-1764:...
, and Gottfried van Swieten
Gottfried van Swieten
Gottfried, Freiherr van Swieten was a diplomat, librarian, and government official who served the Austrian Empire during the 18th century...
, as well as considerable resentment directed at various (unnamed) critics in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
.
- I have been fortunate enough to please almost all nations except the Berliners; this is shown by the public newspapers and letters addressed to me. I only wonder that the Berlin gentlemen, who are otherwise so reasonable, preserve no medium in their criticism of my music, for in one weekly paper they praise me to the skies, whilst in another they dash me sixty fathoms deep into the earth, and this without explaining why; I know very well why: because they are incapable of performing some of my works, and are too conceited to take the trouble to understand them properly.
The sketch concludes thus:
- My highest ambition is only that all the world regard me as the honest man I am.
- I offer all my praises to Almighty God, for I owe them to Him alone: my sole wish is to offend neither my neighbour, nor my gracious Prince, nor above all our merciful God.
The sketch as rhetoric
The musicologist Elaine SismanElaine Sisman
Elaine Rochelle Sisman is the Anne Parsons Bender Professor of Music at Columbia University, where she has taught since 1982...
has offered a novel interpretation of the sketch as having been written, whether consciously or not, according to principles of rhetoric
Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...
laid down in the Middle Ages. She notes that Haydn studied Latin as a schoolboy, and that traditional Latin instruction would likely have included the principles of rhetoric. Sisman annotates the sections of Haydn's original letter as follows.
- The sketch is a classic rhetorically organized composition, drawing particularly on the medieval ars dictaminis, the art of letter-writing: first an introduction (exordium), incorporating the so-called "securing of good-will" (benevolentiae captatio, in this case by self-deprecation); then the narration of facts (narratio, his biography); the supporting evidence (corraboratio, the list of pieces); the refutation of his enemies' arguments (confutatio, the Berlin critics); and the conclusion, revealing again his good qualities as well as those whom he admires and respects (peroratio).
External links
- An OCROptical character recognitionOptical character recognition, usually abbreviated to OCR, is the mechanical or electronic translation of scanned images of handwritten, typewritten or printed text into machine-encoded text. It is widely used to convert books and documents into electronic files, to computerize a record-keeping...
-scanned version of Robbins Landon (1959). The text of the autobiographical sketch may be found using the Find function of one's web browser: search for "autobiographical sketch".