Joseph Haydn
photo: thomas hardy · public domain ↗Joseph Haydn spent much of his career in the service of the Esterhazy princes, where decades of steady output let him effectively shape the Classical symphony and string quartet into their mature forms. Prolific, witty, and endlessly inventive, he was a mentor to the young Beethoven and a friend of Mozart, and his late London symphonies and Op. 76 quartets crowned a lifetime of formal experiment. He is often called the 'father' of both the symphony and the string quartet.
Haydn taught himself composition partly by working through C.P.E. Bach's keyboard sonatas and treatise, absorbing Bach's expressive, quick-turning 'sensitive style' as a model for keyboard writing.
listen forHaydn's late C-major sonata is full of sudden dynamic jolts, dramatic pauses, and abrupt shifts of mood - the volatile, speech-like manner C.P.E. Bach pioneered.
The young Haydn served as accompanist and valet to the celebrated singing teacher Nicola Porpora, who drilled him in vocal composition and Italian style - what Haydn later called the true fundamentals of composition.
listen forThe slow movement of Haydn's 'Le Matin' symphony hands its violin and flute long, aria-like solo lines that sing in the ornate Italian manner Porpora taught.
Haydn learned strict counterpoint by working through Fux's treatise 'Gradus ad Parnassum,' the species-counterpoint manual that trained generations of composers; its disciplined voice-leading underpins Haydn's fugal writing.
listen forThe finale of Haydn's Op. 20 No. 5 quartet is a full fugue on two subjects - the four voices chase one another with exactly the contrapuntal rigor Fux codified.