Franz Joseph Haydn

(Franz) Joseph Haydn, 31 March 1732 31 May 1809) was a prominent and prolific
Austrian composer of the Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber
music such as the piano trio and his contributions to musical form have earned him the epithets
"Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet".
Haydn spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Esterhzy family at their
remote estate. 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". At the time of his death, aged 77,
he was one of the most celebrated composers in Europe.
Early Life
Joseph Haydn was the brother of Michael Haydn himself a highly regarded composer
and Johann Evangelist Haydn, a tenor. He was also a friend of Mozart and a teacher
of Beethoven.
Joseph Haydn was born in Rohrau, Austria, a village that at that time stood on the border
with Hungary. His father was Mathias Haydn, a wheelwright who also served as "Marktrichter",
an office akin to village mayor. Haydn's mother Maria, ne Koller, had previously worked as a
cook in the palace of Count Harrach, the presiding aristocrat of Rohrau. Neither parent could
read music; 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 neighbors.
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 they accepted
a proposal from their relative Johann Matthias Frankh, the schoolmaster and choirmaster
in Hainburg, that Haydn be apprenticed to Frankh in his home to train as a musician. Haydn
therefore went off with Frankh to Hainburg 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) away and never again lived
with his parents. He was about six years old.
Life in the Frankh household was not easy for Haydn, who later remembered being frequently
hungry[4] and humiliated by the filthy state of his clothing. He began his musical training there,
and could soon play both harpsichord and violin. The people of Hainburg heard him
sing treble parts in the church choir.
There is reason to think that Haydn's singing impressed those who heard him, because in 1739 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 successfully auditioned with Reutter, and after several months of further training moved
to Vienna (1740), where he worked for the next nine years as a chorister.

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. The choirboys
were instructed in Latin and other school subjects as well as voice, violin, and keyboard. Reutter
was of little help to Haydn in the areas ofmusic theory and composition, giving him only two
lessons in his entire time as chorister. 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.
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 very well, in
hopes of gaining more invitations to perform before aristocratic audienceswhere the singers
were usually served refreshments.
Compositions
Year Title
1795

A cold frosty morning ("When innocent pastime..."), folk song for voice, violin &
keyboard, H. 31a/107
Vocal Music

1795

A country lassie ("In simmer when the hay was mawn"), folk song for voice, violin
& keyboard, H. 31a/144
Vocal Music

1801

A jacobite air ("O Phely happy be that day"), folk song for voice, violin, cello &
keyboard, H. 31a/231
Vocal Music

1794

A Pastoral Song ("My mother bids me bind my hair"), song for voice & keyboard
(English Canzonettas I), H. 26a/27
Vocal Music
Song

1796

Abendlied zu Gott ("Herr! Herr! Der du mir das Leben"), for 4 voices & keyboard,
H. 25c/9
Vocal Music
Art Song

1762

Acide e Galatea, opera, H. 28/1

Opera
Opera

1770

Adagio for baryton in D major (lost), H. 12/13

Chamber Music
Solo

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, English see fn.; 27 January 1756 5 December 1791), baptised
as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential
composer of the Classical era. Born in Salzburg, Mozart showed prodigious ability from his
earliest childhood. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five
and performed before European royalty.
At 17, Mozart was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court, but grew restless and traveled in
search of a better position. While visiting Vienna in 1781, he was dismissed from his Salzburg
position. He chose to stay in the capital, where he achieved fame but little financial security.
During his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-known symphonies, concertos,
and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his death.
The circumstances of his early death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his
wife Constanze and two sons.
He
composed
over
600
works,
many
acknowledged
as
pinnacles
of symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral music. He is among the most
enduringly popular of classical composers, and his influence on subsequent Western art music is
profound; Ludwig van Beethoven composed his own early works in the shadow of Mozart,
and Joseph Haydn wrote that "posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years".
Early Life
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born on 27 January 1756 to Leopold Mozart (17191787)
and Anna Maria, ne Pertl (17201778), at 9 Getreidegasse in Salzburg. This was the capital of
the Archbishopric of Salzburg, an ecclesiastic principality in what is now Austria, then part of
the Holy Roman Empire. He was the youngest of seven children, five of whom died in
infancy. His elder sister was Maria Anna (17511829), nicknamed "Nannerl". Mozart was
baptized the day after his birth at St. Rupert's Cathedral. The baptismal record gives his name in
Latinized form as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. He generally called
himself "Wolfgang Amad Mozart"[6] as an adult, but his name had many variants.
Leopold Mozart, a native of Augsburg, was a minor composer and an experienced teacher. In
1743, he was appointed as fourth violinist in the musical establishment of Count Leopold Anton
von Firmian, the ruling Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg.[8] Four years later, he married Anna
Maria in Salzburg. Leopold became the orchestra's deputy Kapellmeister in 1763. During the
year of his son's birth, Leopold published a violin textbook, Versuch einer grndlichen
Violinschule, which achieved success.
When Nannerl was seven, she began keyboard lessons with her father while her three-year-old
brother looked on. Years later, after her brother's death, she reminisced:
He often spent much time at the clavier, picking out thirds, which he was ever striking, and his
pleasure showed that it sounded good.... In the fourth year of his age his father, for a game as it
were, began to teach him a few minuets and pieces at the clavier.... He could play it faultlessly

and with the greatest delicacy, and keeping exactly in time.... At the age of five, he was already
composing little pieces, which he played to his father who wrote them down.
These early pieces, K. 15, were recorded in the Nannerl Notenbuch.
There is some scholarly debate of whether Mozart was four or five years old when he created his
first musical compositions, though there is little doubt that Mozart composed his first three
pieces of music within a few weeks of each other: KVs 1a, 1b and 1c.
Solomon notes that, while Leopold was a devoted teacher to his children, there is evidence that
Mozart was keen to progress beyond what he was taught. His first ink-spattered composition and
his precocious efforts with the violin were of his own initiative and came as a surprise to his
father. Leopold eventually gave up composing when his son's musical talents became evident. In
his early years, Mozart's father was his only teacher. Along with music, he taught his children
languages and academic subjects.
Compositions
Year Title
1766

A Berenice...Sol nascente, recitative and aria for soprano & orchestra, K. 70 (K. 61c)
Vocal Music
Occasional Music

1781

A questo seno deh vieni...Or che il cielo, recitative and aria for soprano & orchestra,
K. 374
Vocal Music
Aria

1787

Abendempfindung an Laura ("Abend ist's"), song for voice & piano, K. 523
Vocal Music
Art Song

1788

Acis and Galatea, pastorale (reorchestration of Handel's HWV 49), K. 566

Choral
Oratorio

1790

Adagio and Allegro for mechanical organ in F minor, K. 594

Keyboard

1788

Adagio and Fugue for string quartet (or string orchestra) in C minor, K. 546
Chamber Music
Fugue

1791

Adagio and Rondo for glass harmonica, flute, oboe, viola & cello in C minor, K. 617
Chamber Music/Suite

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven baptised 17 December 1770 26 March 1827) was a German
composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras
in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential of all composers. His
best-known compositions include 9 symphonies, 5 piano concertos, 1 violin concerto, 32 piano
sonatas, 16 string quartets, his great Mass the Missa solemnis and an opera, Fidelio.
Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of the Holy Roman Empire,
Beethoven displayed his musical talents at an early age and was taught by his father Johann van
Beethoven and by composer and conductor Christian Gottlob Neefe. At the age of 21 he moved
to Vienna and began studying with Joseph Haydn, quickly gaining a reputation as a virtuoso
pianist. He lived in Vienna until his death. By his 30s his hearing began to deteriorate, and by the
last decade of his life he was almost totally deaf. In 1811 he gave up conducting and performing
in public but continued to compose; many of his most admired works come from these last 15
years of his life.
Beethoven was the grandson of Ludwig van Beethoven (de) (171273), a musician from the
town of Mechelen in the Duchy of Brabant in the Flemish region of what is now Belgium, who
at the age of twenty moved to Bonn. Ludwig (he adopted the German cognate of
the Dutch Lodewijk) was employed as a bass singer at the court of the Elector of Cologne,
eventually rising to become, in 1761, Kapellmeister (music director) and thereafter the preeminent musician in Bonn. The portrait he commissioned of himself towards the end of his life
would remain proudly displayed in his grandson's rooms as a talisman of his musical heritage.
[4]
Ludwig had one son, Johann (17401792), who worked as a tenor in the same musical
establishment and gave lessons on piano and violin to supplement his income. Johann
married Maria Magdalena Keverich (de) in 1767; she was the daughter of Johann Heinrich
Keverich (17011751), who had been the head chef at the court of the Archbishopric of Trier.
Early Life
Beethoven was born of this marriage in Bonn. There is no authentic record of the date of his
birth; however, the registry of his baptism, in aRoman Catholic service at the Parish of St. Regius
on 17 December 1770, survives. As children of that era were traditionally baptised the day after
birth in the Catholic Rhine country, and it is known that Beethoven's family and his
teacher Johann Albrechtsberger celebrated his birthday on 16 December, most scholars accept
16 December 1770 as Beethoven's date of birth. Of the seven children born to Johann van
Beethoven, only Ludwig, the second-born, and two younger brothers survived infancy. Caspar
Anton Carl was born on 8 April 1774, and Nikolaus Johann, the youngest, was born on
2 October 1776.
Beethoven's first music teacher was his father. Although tradition has it that Johann van
Beethoven was a harsh instructor, and that the child Beethoven, "made to stand at the keyboard,
was often in tears," the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians claimed that no solid
documentation supported this, and asserted that "speculation and myth-making have both been
productive." Beethoven had other local teachers: the court organist Gilles van den Eeden (d.

1782), Tobias Friedrich Pfeiffer (a family friend, who taught Beethoven the piano), and Franz
Rovantini (a relative, who instructed him in playing the violin and viola). Beethoven's musical
talent was obvious at a young age. Johann, aware of Leopold Mozart's successes in this area
(with son Wolfgang and daughter Nannerl), attempted to exploit his son as a child prodigy,
claiming that Beethoven was six (he was seven) on the posters for Beethoven's first public
performance in March 1778.
Sometime after 1779, Beethoven began his studies with his most important teacher in
Bonn, Christian Gottlob Neefe, who was appointed the Court's Organist in that year. Neefe
taught Beethoven composition, and by March 1783 had helped him write his first published
composition: a set of keyboard variations (WoO 63). Beethoven soon began working with Neefe
as assistant organist, at first unpaid (1781), and then as a paid employee (1784) of the court
chapel conducted by the Kapellmeister Andrea Luchesi. His first three piano sonatas, named
"Kurfrst" ("Elector") for their dedication to the Elector Maximilian Friedrich (17081784),
were published in 1783. Maximilian Frederick noticed Beethoven's talent early, and subsidised
and encouraged the young man's musical studies.
Maximilian Frederick's successor as the Elector of Bonn was Maximilian Franz, the youngest
son of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, and he brought notable changes to Bonn. Echoing
changes made in Vienna by his brother Joseph, he introduced reforms based on Enlightenment
philosophy, with increased support for education and the arts. The teenage Beethoven was almost
certainly influenced by these changes. He may also have been influenced at this time by ideas
prominent in freemasonry, as Neefe and others around Beethoven were members of the local
chapter of the Order of the Illuminati.
In March 1787 Beethoven traveled to Vienna (possibly at another's expense) for the first time,
apparently in the hope of studying with Mozart. The details of their relationship are uncertain,
including whether they actually met. Having learned that his mother was ill, Beethoven returned
about two weeks after his arrival. His mother died shortly thereafter, and his father lapsed deeper
into alcoholism. As a result, Beethoven became responsible for the care of his two younger
brothers, and spent the next five years in Bonn.
Beethoven was introduced in these years to several people who became important in his life.
Franz Wegeler, a young medical student, introduced him to the von Breuning family (one of
whose daughters Wegeler eventually married). Beethoven often visited the von Breuning
household, where he taught piano to some of the children. Here he encountered German and
classical literature. The von Breuning family environment was less stressful than his own, which
was increasingly dominated by his father's decline.[16] Beethoven also came to the attention
of Count Ferdinand von Waldstein, who became a lifelong friend and financial supporter.
In 1789 Beethoven obtained a legal order by which half of his father's salary was paid directly to
him for support of the family. He also contributed further to the family's income by
playing viola in the court orchestra. This familiarised Beethoven with a variety of operas,
including three by Mozart that were performed at court in this period. He also befriended Anton
Reicha, a flautist and violinist of about his own age who was a nephew of the court orchestra's
conductor, Josef Reicha.
Compositions

Year Title
1813

'Tis but in Vain, folk song for voice & piano trio, WoO 153/15
Vocal Music
Song

1815

'Tis Sunshine at Last, folk song for voice & piano trio, WoO 153/13
Vocal Music
Song

1816

A Madel, ja a Madel, folk song for voice & piano trio, WoO 158a/6
Vocal Music
Song

1810

A Wand'ring Gypsy, folk song for voice & piano trio, WoO 152/23
Vocal Music
Song

1820

Abendlied unterm gestirnten Himmel, song for voice & piano, WoO 150
Vocal Music
Song

1796

Abschiedsgesang an Wiens Bürger, song for voice & piano (or orchestra),
WoO 121
Vocal Music
Art Song

1816

Ach Bächlein, Bächlein, kühle Wasser, folk song for voice &
piano trio, WoO 158a/14
Vocal Music
Song

1815

Adagio for 3 horns in F major, Hess 297

Chamber Music

1796

Adagio for piano & mandolin in E flat major, WoO 43/2

Chamber Music
Piece