Composers

From DIMA

Author: Csiki Boldizsar Tamas

Contents 1 Alexander Scriabin 1.1 Bibliographical notes 1.2 Works for piano 2 Joseph Haydn 2.1 Vienna, 1750-1761 2.2 The composer in the service of the Esterházy princes, 1761-1790 2.3 London, 1791-1795 2.3.1 First trip to London, 1791-1792 2.3.2 The second trip to London, 1794-1795 2.4 Vienna, 1795-1809

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Alexander Scriabin

Bibliographical notes

Following Chopin, Tchaikovsky and Liszt, Alexander Scriabin is the first composer of the 20th century in whose works the joining of the aesthetical-musical message and the piano technique are in perfect balance. Although his compositions evolved along the years towards new sonorous universes, Scriabin remains yet profoundly marked by the achievements and the fundamental features of the Russian school of composition, together with more conservative personalities such as Glazunov, Rachmaninov, Medtner and others.

Even since the age of three the musical talent of the future musician was remarked, who used to improvise at the piano. Later, Anton Rubinstein predicted him a brilliant career.

At eleven he had as teacher for a short while the composer and theoretician G. Konius, at the time a student at the Conservatory, and at 13 he entered the class of the renowned pedagogue Nikolai Zverev, teacher at the Lower school of the Moscow Conservatory.

When Scriabin entered the stage of the Russian music, in 1892, the Conservatories in Moscow and St. Petersburg had already passed through a quarter of a century of intense activity and remarkable composing experiences. In St. Petersburg, the Beliaev Circle was attempting to fulfill its mission of forming the musicians within a revolutionary spirit.

Rimski-Korsakov was connection between this continuity of the Russian school, on the one hand as a colleague of Mussorgsky and Borodin, and on the other as leader of the Beliaev Circle. In this respect, he had the duty to supervise the development of a new generation, aware of itself and original at the same time, but difficult to master.

This is the environment in which young Scriabin began his composing activity among other members of the Beliaev Circle such as Liadov and Glazunov. These features are afterwards seen along Scriabin’s entire work, even in the moment of a maximum estrangement from the tonal-functional system. Up to a certain time, Scriabin was in a way the acknowledged exponent of this school of composition, losing the followers and supporters on his way to the mysteries he would plunge into along the passing of the years. This path, however far it would have brought him, presents nonetheless continuity in overcoming certain moments of composition and the conquest of new ones.

This way, the passing from the tonal system to the partially tonal one, and even atonal, is accomplished with subtle movements, being difficult to define, if not even impossible, a turning point in this direction. Scriabin himself did not acknowledge any break or breach in this matter. He conceived his works from the beginning to the end as having in the background the same material. Because of this, dividing his works in periods based on the stylistic evolution leaves room for another criterion, which we may call a psychological criterion.

The early works, up to the Symphony No. 1 op. 26, marked by Chopin’s influence, are re-directed by a new impulse, or better said by a creative idea, that of the mystery, which will have in its turn a process f permanent awareness. Scriabin’s flame of the ideal – or of the negative ideal – represents until his last works a moving force, which urges the composer to reach new stages of the unknown: the one of the sensual pleasure and the devil’s temptation, the moments of juncture with the music of Liszt (the time between 1901-1905), of weakness, of ecstasy and divine creation (1905-1909), of sublimation of the phenomena of nature (1909-1912), and finally, of a magical regnum (1912-1914).

Triumphant in the Divine Poem (which presents the artistic-musical influences of Wagner’s Gesamtkunstwerk), these diabolical crises continue to unsettle Scriabin even during the much later period when he wrote the two Poems for Piano "Etrangetée" op.63 and the Sonata no.9 op.68. Together with the Symphony No. 3, his last period of composition shows the assimilation of many theological-philosophical dogmas and of several ideas originating in the Russian symbolist poetry. Before his premature death in 1915, Scriabin had worked on a gigantic project entitled Mysterium, by which the composer would have liked to create a possibility of transcendental union of mankind. Although only some of his works are partially shadowed by the diabolical side, they all reveal a state of sublime spiritual exaltation.

Works for piano

The works of Scriabin encompass only two genre domains: the ones of the music for piano and the symphonic music. Approaching them exclusively represented a risk – the one of navigating on the already known seas and of stranding in banality – and at the same time an act of bravery – in the attempt to surpass the familiar, the common -, both genres being carried in the near past Romantic era to previously unknown heights of technical and expressive mastery.

A concert piano player of notable elegance and nobility, Scriabin dedicated to his instrument most part of his compositions, of the 74 works, 67 being pieces for piano (preludes, studies, mazurkas, nocturnes, waltzes, poems, sonatas and other miniatures with or without a program) realized in a great variety of forms and genres, having an unmistakable original expression.

At first impregnated by the spirit of Chopin – the works written until the age of 20 - Scriabin’s style evolved continuously both in the performance field, as well as in the compositional one, of the musical language, becoming one of the most original in the musical landscape of the first decades of the 20th century.

Scriabin’s musical works evolved in three distinct periods. In the first one Scriabin was explicitly influenced by Chopin. Afterwards, he became interested in philosophy, becoming acquainted with several philosophical systems, without involving himself deeply in either of them. Reading Goethe, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer and Shelling, Scriabin decided to formulate his own system, which wanted to reflect as accurately as possible his own view of the world. The Wagnerian idea on the total opera (“Gesamtkunstwerk”) attracted him from the start. Like Wagner, Scriabin did not consider the music as a pure art, in itself. This idea seemed absurd for him. The music must express something, so that the concept of the total opera could constitute a synthesis of philosophy, religion and art, which, by trans-substantialization into sound, permitted the reaching of ecstasy. The music could become thus a way of rediscovering the magic powers.

It is interesting the division into periods of the works for piano in the view of the musicologist Eaglefield Hull, as follows:

• The 1st period: from op. 1 to op. 18 – young age pieces, of accumulation; still significant, being polished works, which do not reveal a beginner’s hand;
• The 2nd period: from the Sonata no. 2 op. 19 to op. 49 – these compositions reveal the entire personality and genius of the composer;
• The 3rd period: from op. 51 to op. 74 – Scriabin’s genius in its fullness; the most mature works which illustrate the explorations and innovations of his musical language.

Joseph Haydn

Haydn was born on 31 March 1732 in the village of Rohrau, situated in a region of lower Austria where, beside the Austrian majority population, the demographic sphere and the rick folklore spectre of the region were determined by an ethnical diversity of Hungarians and Croats. He was not born to a family of musicians, but nonetheless, the first musical impressions were decisive in his childhood. His father, Mathias Haydn (1699-1763), a wheel builder, had a great passion for music. Without benefiting from a specialized education, without knowledge of music notes, he played the harp. Helped by the sensible musical hearing and a very good memory, he could memorize and play the Austrian, Hungarian and Croat folk songs, played by the strolling musicians passing through Rohrau. The composer’s mother, Ana Maria Koller (1707-1754), contributed to the musical awareness of her son with her pleasant voice, singing cradle songs, love songs and ballads during her household works. Haydn inherited and learnt from his mother the sense and exigency for order, cleanliness a trait of character which will come in useful in passing the hard times of his life. The transparency and clarity of his manuscripts reflect this propensity toward order inherited from his mother side. His sense and gift for music was already seen at the age of five, when he build from pieces of wood an instrument resembling the violin, which he used to accompany himself while singing the songs learnt from his parents.

Johann Mathias Franck was a close relative of the Haydn family. Starting with 1732 he was appointed teacher and school master of the Haynburh primary school, being also the conductor of the choir of the Catholic church. On the occasion of a visit to the house of the Haydn family, he discovered the talent of the young boy, and hosted him, with his parents’ consent, in his house in Haynburg. Guiding his steps in the elementary school, he also unveiled the foundations of the musical craft and initiated him in the art of choral singing. Although J. M. Franck had multiple obligations at school and an intense choral activity, so that he was not able to thoroughly involve in the permanent education of the child, Haydn will nonetheless follow important steps in the musical field.

The necessary step to a superior level in the professional evolution during the childhood of the young musician was fulfilled thanks to Johann Georg Reutter, who on the occasion of his visit to Haynburg, with the purpose of finding new choir members for the Saint Stephen Cathedral in Vienna, noticed the crystalline voice of Haydn, and decided to bring him to the capital. This happened in 1739 or 1740, as approximated by Griesinger and Dies.

All of Haydn’s biographers agree with respect to the self-taught aspect of his professional upbringing, especially in the art of composition: the foundation of his musical training was laid through his own forces, ideas and efforts. In order to obtain the bases of the musician craft and the art of composition, it was of primordial importance the study of two music theory works, existing in Vienna at the time: Gradus ad Parnassum, written by Johann Joseph Fux in 1725 and Der vollkommene Cappelmaister by Johann Mattheson, published in 1739.

Vienna, 1750-1761

He beginning of the 1750s represented in Haydn’s life an extremely difficult and tiresome period, when he gained his existence by playing the organ, or being employed as violinist in strolling orchestras, composing menuets, serenades, divertisments for various occasions, waltz arias for balls, or even by teaching music lessons.

The person who opened the way toward this closed world until then was the renowed poet Metastasio, who also lived in Michaelerhaus. He played an important role in refining Haydn’s artistic taste: from his conversations with the poet, Haydn acquired the ability of giving his musical compositions brilliance, fluidity, of making them balanced and harmonious, as poetry. Metastasio also was the character in Haydn’s life who recommended him to Nicolo Martinez to teach piano in his house. Nicolo Martinez was the representative of Spain to the Asutrian Royal Court and mediated this way indirectly his acquaintance with the renowned professor Nicolo Porpora. Apart from the piano lessons dedicated to Mariana Martinez - the ten year old daughter of Nicolo Martinez, a talented child, with a particularly beautiful voice – Haydn was thrilled to accompany her singing lessons with Porpora. He would be later considered by Haydn s his only teacher in learning the foundations of composition technique. He would accompany the canto lessons of Porpora’s student for three years, absorbing the Italian bel-canto style and learning the Italian language which he will afterwards speak fluently.

Another important relation from the first Viennese period of Haydn’s life was the one with baron Karl Joseph Fürnberg, who observing his talent, hired him as music teacher for his children and invited him to lead a quartet formed of talented amateur musicians. The first string quartets were commissioned by baron Fürnberg and are the result of the musical environment lived at his residence at Weinzierl.

In 1759, given the recommendation of baron Fürnberg, Haydn was employed as musical director and composer at the court of count Ferdinand Maximilian Morzin.

The year 1761 brought a radical change in Haydn’s life. Count Morzin was unable to finance the orchestra anymore, and dismissed the entire musical ensemble led by him. He was immediately offered the position of second Kapellmeister of the musical orchestra at the court of the Esterházy prince estate. This turning point in his life proved to be decisive, giving him a long term option which was to last for three decades, under the service of four sovereign princes.

The composer in the service of the Esterházy princes, 1761-1790

Haydn’s predecessor as Kapellmeister was Gregor Joseph Werner, who held the title since 1928. Hiring Haydn coincided with the prince’s wish to modernize and extend the musical ensemble, an intention that was made difficult and postponed until the moment (1761) by the conservative views of the old Gregor Joseph Werner. At the beginning of Haydn’s activity there the orchestra was of small dimensions, of approximately 13-15 instrumentalists, that were usually distributed as follows: 6 violins, a viola, a cello, a double bass, a flute (in certain pieces), 2 oboes, 2 horns, 1 bassoon. Haydn conducted the orchestra at the first violin, as a keyboard instrument for continuo (harpsichord) was only found in the prince’s theatre. To this ensemble will be later added in the 1770s more instruments, given the rise in importance of Haydn’s opera performances at the Esterházy court. His activity with the orchestra represented a good opportunity to experiment and perform his latest compositions.

In the first half of the 1760s Haydn wrote especially instrumental music: symphonies, concerts, trios and divertimentos for piano and string instruments, as well as vocal pieces, written to celebrate important events.

Starting with 1776 especially, opera and theatre will be in the hotspot of the Esterházy residence, shading and substantially reducing the practice of purely instrumental music. The opera, as an artistic performance, had a great prestige in the large cities and at the nobility courts, including of course the Esterházy residence. Haydn had to prepare on a weekly basis two-three opera performances, which meant also some alterations in the score to adapt the music to the possibilities of the musical ensemble, as well as to verify the work of the transcribers, training the singers, and the rehearsals. During a decade and a half Haydn conducted more than 70 operas composed in the era (such as the operas of Cimarosa, Paisiello, Anfossi), played in over a thousand performances. With regard to his own writings of the kind, we are able to identify 12 Italian operas: 3 opera seria, 4 opera buffa and 5 operas half-seria.

Among the important events of Haydn’s life in this period was his encounter with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who in 1781 had left Salzburg to settle in Vienna. Their first meeting was certainly in Vienna, though there are no accurate details regarding the exact time of this event.

Given the personality and the artistic level gained by both composers, the nature of their relation was exemplary for all music history, based on sentiments of appreciation and reciprocal admiration, acknowledging in one another a friend and an equal partner in their vocation.

The year 1790 brought Haydn his long wanted freedom, on September 28 prince Nikolaus Esterházy died, and the son and heir to his wealth – Anton – lacking artistic inclinations, dissolved the entire music and theatre ensemble. Haydn was kept, but with a diminished income, without official duties. The will included the obligation on Haydn’s part of informing the heir of any trip in view.

London, 1791-1795

First trip to London, 1791-1792

On 15 December 1790 Haydn left for London, accompanied by Salomon. The capital of the British kingdom was at the time the largest and most developed city in the world from an economic point of view, harbouring and active and very varied musical life, to which contributed many artists, coming from all over the world.

The capital of the British kingdom also provided Haydn with the opportunity of listening many famous piano players, both amateur and professionals, whose names he noted in the London notes between 1791-1792: Muzio Clementi, Johann Ladislaus Dussek, Adalbert Gyrowetz, Joseph Diettenhofer, Charles Burney, Miss Esther Burney, Nicolas Joseph Hüllmandel, Johann G. Graff, Miss Cecilia Barthelemon, Johann B. Cramer, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Therese Jensen and Heinrich Gerhard von Lenz.

Haydn also bought to London some new compositions, such as the string quartets op. 64, the symphonies No. 90-92. Among the new compositions of 1791-1792 are the first six “London” symphonies No. 93-98 and the opera L’anima del filosofo, which in the end was not presented on the stage of the theatre lead by Gallini, given to a political intrigue. Focusing his creative forces on these works, Haydn did not write in that period any compositions for piano.

With every new concert in London, Haydn conquered new and new successes, his fame and reputation growing day by day. Valued everywhere, in July of the same year he was conferred the title of Doctor honoris causa of Oxford University, occasion with which the Symphony o. 92 was played, which was since called the Oxford Symphony. For the event he wrote a Canon cancrizans for three voices, which could also be rendered in recurrence.

The second trip to London, 1794-1795

In the summer of 1793 Haydn signed a contract with Salomon for other six symphonies, thus leaving on 19 January 1794 to London again. This time he was accompanied by Johann Elssler, his personal secretary, the son of the transcriber Johann Florian Elssler (formerly employee at Eszterháza), who helped him around 1765 with writing the first catalogue, named Entwurf-katalog.

On 22 January 1794 the prince Anton Esterházy died and was succeeded by his son, Nikolaus II (1765-1833), who informed Haydn of his wish to reconstitute the chapel and asked him to return at the leadership of the musical ensemble of the court.

Vienna, 1795-1809

Given the prestige brought by the two trips to England, for the first time in his life Haydn enjoyed the full appraisal of the inhabitants of Vienna. This time he was received as a cultural hero. Haydn confessed to his biographer Griesinger that he first became famous in Germany, given his reputation in England.

Nikolaus Esterházy II was already waiting impatiently his Kapellmeister to renew the musical life at the Eszterháza court. Haydn’s foremost duty was to compose a mass every year. Not being burdened with daily activities, he had time to work on what he wanted, composing less instrumental music, among which is the concert for trumpet, trios with piano, string quartets, and devotion in these last seven years especially to vocal sacred music: masses for prince Esterházy and oratorios for Vienna.

An important composition from a political point of view is dated to the winter of 1796-1797, namely the national anthem Gott erhalte Franz der Kaiser on lyrics by the poet Lorenz Leopold Haschka. On 12 February 1797, the emperor’s birthday, the anthem was sung in all the theatres of the Habsburg Empire and was greeted with acclamation, becoming both the anthem of Austria as well as of Germany. During his last years of life Haydn would often play on the piano this song.

The last appearance on stage of old Haydn was when he conducted Die sieben letzten Worte unseres Erlösers am Kreuze,on 26 December 1803, organized for the benefit of Saint Marx hospital.