1783 - The Music part 2 - Welcome to Eszterháza, Princess

Hob. #	Genre	Key	Number	Instrument(s)	Notes
16:40	Sonata	G	54	Fortepiano	Dedicated to Princess Marie Hermenegild Esterházy Published by Bossler (1784)
16:41	Sonata	Bb	55	Fortepiano
16:42	Sonata	D	56	Fortepiano

 

Title page of Hummel's 1785 edition

With all the major events which came under Haydn's purview, from running the opera to providing music for all occasions, to directing the playhouse and marionette theater (still in business, thank you) to trying to create a private income nest egg for himself by composing and selling music all over Europe, one of the 'little' things we tend to forget about, if we even knew it, was to give music lessons to members of the Princely household.

Retracing the lineage of the House of Esterházy may seem a bit off course, but in short order, we recall in 1763 the year opened with the wedding of the Prince's son, Anton, celebrated in part with one of Haydn's first operas, Acide. This same Anton would become Reigning Prince himself only in 1790 upon the death of his father, Nicholas I. The payoff after this long wait didn't last for long, though, since Anton himself died in 1794. We're getting closer to the story here, folks, just hang with me for a minute! Anton fathered a son in 1765 and named him Nicholas, after his own father. Nicholas became Prince Nicholas II in 1794, thus becoming the fourth and final Princely employer in Haydn's career. I hope this didn't spoil the mystery ending for you, I just need to jump around in time once in a while.

Often called the 'Bossler Sonatas'
after the original publisher

So, now we come to the nut of the tale. In our present year, the now seventeen-going-on-eighteen years old Princeling, Nicholas, married the fifteen year old Maria Josepha Hermenegild, Princess von und zu Liechtenstein. And to tie this all together, Haydn became her music teacher, and to throw in another spoiler, they became best friends for life. Whenever, in future, you will see the name Maria Hermenegild, this is the lady we are speaking of. Because, as you know, there were one heck of a lot of Maria's in that world so it's easy to get confused. These three sonatas were given to her by Haydn as a wedding present. They were published in 1784 by the firm Bossler, and from there to the world. It was just one year later that Hummel published them in the edition shown here, still with the dedication to Marie.

Sonata #1 in G – Hob 16:40

I	Allegro innocente	6/8
II	Presto	4/4

Sonata #2 in Bb- Hob 16:41

I	Allegro	4/4
II	Allegro di molto	2/4

Sonata #3 in D – Hob 16:42

I	Andante con espressione	3/4
II	Vivace assai	2/4

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Princess Marie Esterházy in 1795
Painting by Maria Kauffmann

Discussing and analyzing Classic Era music these days, most especially that of Haydn, it is virtually impossible to avoid the topic of rhetoric. In the 21^st century, as in the 19^th and 20^th, rhetoric has a vaguely negative connotation, deriving, at least in some part, from the 19^th century's distaste for following longstanding rules for anything, discourse included. But in the 18^th century, all civilized discussion proceeded from a method defined by the Ancient Greeks and perfected by the Romans. Everything, from pleadings in law courts to debates in legislative assemblies to college lectures, was presented in this rhetorical fashion. Music was also included in this ideal, because music was believed to be exactly like an argument or debate, where a premise was proposed and then its merits argued. Haydn was considered by all of his peers, his critics and his audience to be the master above all of this particular skill. A Cicero of Sonatas, if you will. It is a major strike against modern listeners, and one which we owe the Romantics, that we cannot listen to 18^th century music the way audiences did then, because, mostly, we still don't completely understand how they heard music. Safe to say, they were listening for different things than we are.

One of the artist/musicologists who has been a key proponent of rhetoric in Haydn's music is Tom Beghin. In addition to books and essays written, Beghin has also completed an outstanding series of the complete keyboard sonatas of Haydn, performed on replicas of original keyboards, and, in the Blu-Ray DVD version, complete with interactive sound adjustments so the listener can replicate different listening environments. Here is an example of Beghin's approach to Haydn's music, taken from the liner notes for these three sonatas:

…What we're "reading," I suggest, is a musical letter, addressed to a lady-in-waiting, a reigning-princess-in-becoming. Curious about Marie's personality (beyond well-known anecdotes about her public life at a later age, including her fond patronage of Haydn), I traveled to the Esterházy archives in Budapest and found piles of largely unstudied documents: poems, musings, quasi-philosophical notes, abundant letters in her own hand as well as letters addressed to her. As I read more—especially those letters directed to her close friend Maria Ludovica Beatrix, Austrian empress and third wife of Emperor Franz— I was struck by similarities between Joseph's sonata and Marie's letters. Often Marie's letters start with a celebration of friendship—keen sentimental observations, having to do with the heart and emotion. Then, suddenly, without transition or logic, there's a shift to an informative concluding part: a quick, upbeat, and gossipy report of some party or theater performance. This exact shift— from a long empfindsam first part, twice involving variations, to a fast, short, and witty finale—we find in each of the sonatas. The model, clearly, is not that of a learned three-part oration, but the more private, conversational letter, a genre that women—as men readily acknowledged—excelled in. Judging by his own well-composed letters to female friends such as Marianne von Genzinger, Haydn had also mastered the genre…

Beghin's premise here, that Haydn crafted these works as a reflection of Marie's personality, exposes just how personal a piece of music can be when the composer and the dedicatee and the performer are so well known to each other. This is not to say that no one else could play them, much to their pleasure, but the spark of personal intimacy can only be recreated when the performer attempts to be in a receptive frame of mind towards the original meaning. Of course, thousands don't subscribe to all this, but whether you do or don't, it is hard to dismiss as simply uninteresting.

One last thought before I leave you with these Bossler Sonatas. I have been researching these works for quite some time, in particular the first of them, Hob 16:40. The opening movement is a set of variations, based on a folk-like melody. I have worn out my library, then I wore out Google afterwards, and other than 'folk-like melody' I can't find anything which takes a step further and tries to identify it. It is clear to me that this song/theme is the same one used in the American folk song Sweet Betsy from Pike, which wasn't written until around 1860, it being a song about the California Gold Rush of 1849. But the tune it is based on traces back to an English-from-Dutch folksong called Willikins and his Dinah, dates of which are given as 'circa 1820'. Clearly there is a disconnect in the transmitted history, since it seems unlikely that Haydn was actually the composer of Sweet Betsy from Pike! Far more likely that he knew an earlier variant of the song and used it as a theme for his variations. If anyone reading this has some information about this, you would be doing me a great favor by emailing me to discuss.

Next time we will close out the year with the only opera seria which Haydn composed for the Prince.

Thanks for reading!