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Hob. No. |
Genre |
Key |
Title |
Instruments |
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24a:deest |
Lied with Orchestra |
G |
Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser! |
Chorus, Flute, 2 Oboes, 2 Bassoons, 2 Horns in G, |
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26a:43 |
Lied / Song |
G |
Gott erhalte den Kaiser! |
Keyboard |
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17a:deest |
Theme & 4 Variations |
G |
on Gott erhalte den Kaiser! |
Keyboard |
A recent illness allowed me the time to watch much of the Winter Olympic Games, and they reinforced for me how, in the 21st century, we are so steeped in the concept of a National Anthem for every country. Athletes were standing at attention while their country's anthem was played, often singing along or keeping the beat. It is sometimes difficult today to imagine that it was not always so. Over the time discussed in this series of essays, we have hit on many, if not all, of the reasons why, by the end of the 18th century, national anthems, that is, music which expresses and defines a national identity, came into being.
2nd London Notebook
Lord Clermont [Claremont] once gave a large Soupé, and when the King's health was drunk, he ordered the wind band to play the well-known song, "God save the King" in the street during a wild snowstorm. This occurred on 19th Feby 1792, so madly do they drink in England1. Jos. Haydn
When we were looking at the origin of Scottish National Songs, we saw the rise of the Jacobites and the brief civil unrest brought about by the Stuarts as they attempted to reinstate Bonnie Prince Charlie in 1745-46. Brief though it may have been, the Second Jacobite Rebellion had one major accomplishment: it forged a solid association between the Hanover rulers, represented by George II, and the song God Save the King. God Save the King is not the National Anthem by any sort of official proclamation or Act, but it has traditionally been used to represent the United Kingdom and is so powerfully associated with the UK that it seamlessly serves the purpose of an official anthem. And as such, it was the first to bring recognition that works such as this are potent expressions of music's secular power, and the practical significance of a song associated with successful statehood and political might was not lost on the rest of the world.
The populace of London was not noted for respecting persons or institutions, but whenever the anthem…rang out, the critics of the House of Hanover fell silent. At that time national anthems were not a matter of course. It was a novel experience for people to feel in such music the kind of inner force which only religious hymns conveyed. In those times of stress Haydn felt the impulse to write such a "consolatory hymn" for the German [recte. Austrian (MPMcC)] nation, pressed so hard by the threats of the ever-spreading French Revolution.2
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God Save the King - 1745, original text |
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God save great George our king God save our noble king, God save the king! Send him victorious Happy and glorious Long to reign over us God save the king!
Oh Lord our God arise, Scatter his enemies, And make them fall. Confound their politics, Frustrate their knavish tricks, On him our hopes we fix, O save us all.
Thy choicest gifts in store On George be pleas'd to pour Long may he reign; May he defend our laws, And ever give us cause, To say with heart and voice God save the King. |
But God Save the King was not the only game in town by 1797. In 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle of Strasbourg had written an anthem France could call its own. La Marseillaise, originally written to inspire the citizens when the War of the First Coalition was going badly, and especially during the resurgence after the Battle of Valmy in 1792, had been adopted by the National Convention as the national anthem in 1795. This became the first of a line of militant march anthems which dotted Europe in the 19th century, and it was of a different character than either God Save the King or Gott erhalte Franz:
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Allons enfants de la Patrie, Le jour de gloire est arrivé! Contre nous de la tyrannie, L'étendard sanglant est levé, (bis) Entendez-vous dans les campagnes Mugir ces féroces soldats? Ils viennent jusque dans vos bras Égorger vos fils, vos compagnes!
Aux armes, citoyens, Formez vos bataillons, Marchons, marchons! Qu'un sang impur Abreuve nos sillons! |
Arise, children of the Fatherland, The day of glory has arrived! Against us tyranny's Bloody banner is raised, (repeat) Do you hear, in the countryside, The roar of those ferocious soldiers? They're coming right into your arms To cut the throats of your sons, your women!
To arms, citizens, Form your battalions, Let's march, let's march! Let an impure blood Soak our fields! |
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While during Napoleon's reign as Emperor, Veillons au Salut de l'Empire was the unofficial anthem of the regime:
Just a few years after it (La Marseillaise) had been made the country's anthem, Napoleon disowned it because he had seen its power and did not want it inspiring a revolution against him – and because he hated its composer, who had probably had an affair with his wife.
(The Guardian 11/17/15 – no attribution given for explanation)
However, in 1797, Napoleon was just a general, albeit one doing a splendid job. So the sound of La Marseillaise being played and sung before an impending battle or in front of the gates of a city was sure to strike terror into the hearts of any who stood in the way of the destiny of the Army of the Republic. And there were plenty of opportunities in the Habsburg Empire for the French to do just that. Austrian leadership was very much aware of this.
by Joseph Axmann (lithograph )
When Count Franz Joseph von Saurau turned over his materials concerning the Volkslied to the Austrian National ('Imperial' at that time) Library in 1820, the contents included this letter from Haydn to Saurau:
[To FRANZ COUNT SAURAU, VIENNA. German]
[Vienna, 28th January 1797]
Excellence!
Such a surprise and such mark of favour, especially as regards the portrait of my dear monarch, I never before received in acknowledgement of my unworthy talents. I thank Your Excellency with all my heart, and am ready at all times to serve Your Excellency. I shall deliver the proof by 11 o'clock. I am, in profound respect,
Your Excellency's Most humble and obedient servant,
Jos. Haydn.
The 'mark of favour' was a snuffbox with a portrait of the Emperor. I would love to be able to show you a picture of it (or see it myself!) since it still exists, but after a month of searching, I have given it up. Snuff boxes were often works of high art in those days, and this one undoubtedly was. But more importantly, this letter is the earliest hint that something was going on, and by then, it was a done deal, since Haydn was delivering the proof copy that same day. In the previous essay, I reprinted the following excerpt from a pamphlet by Anton Schmid:
[ANTON SCHMID (Custodian of the National Library, Vienna)
– pamphlet: Joseph Haydn & Niccolò Zingarelli (1847)]
…As far as the reasons for which the wonderful Haydn Song was composed, we may present the following circumstances, which several of the finest composers in Vienna, some of whom are dead and some still alive, remembered from those times and communicated to us.
In England, Haydn came to know the favorite British national anthem, God Save the King, and he envied the British nation for a song through which it could, at festive occasions, show in full measure its respect, love and devotion to its ruler.
When the Father of Harmony returned to his beloved Kaiserstadt, he related these impressions to …. Freiherr van Swieten… Haydn wished, too, that Austria could have a similar anthem…. Also, such song could be used in the fight taking place with those forcing the Rhine; to inflame the hearts of the Austrians to new heights of devotion to the Princes and fatherland….
Freiherr van Swieten took counsel with … Count von Saurau… and there came into being a song, which, apart from being one of Haydn's greatest creations, has won the crown of immortality.
[Saurau] forthwith set the [Court] Poet Lorenz Haschka to draft the poetry, and then requested our Haydn set it to music. In January 1797, this double task was resolved, and the first performance of the Song was ordered for the birthday of the Monarch.
Here we see the story as told from the point of view of 'Haydn as Protagonist'. I'm guessing other Haydnists prefer this version, I know I do. But Saurau's letter to Moritz, Count von Dietrichstein when he submitted his materials to the Library in 1820 has a different slant, this from his own point of view.
I often regretted that we had not, like the English, a national air calculated to display to all the world the loyal devotion of our people to the kind and upright ruler of our Fatherland, and to awaken within the hearts of all good Austrians that noble national pride so indispensable to the energetic fulfilment of all the beneficial measures of the sovereign. This seemed to me more urgent at a period when the French Revolution was raging most furiously and when the Jacobins cherished the idle hope of finding among the worthy Viennese [some] partisans and participators in their criminal designs.
I caused that meritorious poet Haschka to write the words and applied to our immortal countryman Haydn to set them to music, for I considered him alone capable of writing anything approaching in merit to the English God save the King. Such was the origin of our national hymn.
These two versions are rather divergent, although only as to the genesis of the idea. What is the truth of the matter?
We have seen Lorenz Leopold Haschka (01 Sept 1749 – 03 Aug 1827) previously, albeit en passant. When Haydn was attending the salons at the home of the Greiner's, Haschka was both the resident poet and also reputedly Charlotte Greiner's live-in lover. Which may have been a step away from his background as a Jesuit, which he left when Joseph II suppressed the order in 1773. Poetry became his livelihood from that time, although he finished his career as a librarian at the University of Vienna. Another commonality with Haydn comes from Haschka's time as a Freemason in the 1780's. Interestingly, he turned from being a Jesuit to writing "vile odes" (Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913) against Pope Pius VI during his visit to Vienna in 1782. After the death of Joseph II, he returned to Catholicism, perhaps because Freemasonry was now outlawed, and became a spy for the police. I have found nothing in his various biographies which explains quite why he was chosen by Saurau for the commission of the Anthem. His style was very different from the poetry which eventually was set by Haydn, and in fact he was as far as possible from being a favorite of the trendy poets of the time. Which could well have made him a favorite of Baron van Swieten.
by Heinrich Friedrich Füger (ca 1797)
To get to the heart of the matter, it is my own opinion that much of the credit claimed by Saurau in this matter really belongs to Swieten. Having been well-informed about the sights and impressions Haydn experienced in England, when he heard Saurau expressing much the same thoughts, he advanced the cause with a suggested plan of action. Saurau saw it as an opportunity to make a political success in a time when it was much needed and proceeded forthwith to do just what he said. Franz Grasberger, author of the book Die Hymnen Osterreichs, ("The Austrian Anthem"), discusses several interesting finds he made in the National Museum, including a little music score dated 1797, which has the music for God Save the King accompanying German lyrics praising Emperor Franz! So the idea was certainly floating around. All it took was the right combination of poet and musician to make it so. And so a combination of talents also became a blending of purposes. Saurau (and Swieten?) had mainly political aims. Haydn, on the other hand, certainly had a vested interest in how the war was going, but he wanted a piece of music which conjured up the nearly religious fervor of a sacred hymn, expressed with the greatest beauty and simplicity.
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'Kaiserlied' 1797, original text |
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German |
English translation |
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Gott erhalte Franz, den Kaiser, |: Gott erhalte Franz, den Kaiser, |
God keep Francis the emperor, God keep Francis the emperor, |
We have previously discussed Haydn's use of folk idiom and themes as a basis for his works. So it should come as no surprise to discover the Austrian National Anthem began with a theme from a very old Croatian folk song (V jutro rano se ja stanem, rano pred zorom...). Modern scholars are more pragmatic about reuse of themes than were those of the late 19th century, who were apparently scandalized to discover this.
Haydn, whose instructions were to compose something approaching in merit the English God Save the King, took one of the Croatian folk melodies of his childhood, which probably suggested itself to him as fitting metrically and rhythmically the opening lines, and altered and extended its later part.
Oxford Music Dictionary (article "Emperor's Hymn")
In comparing the first phrases of the folksong and the anthem, one finds that indeed, the tones are the same, although the values are not, and after the first four bars (Haydn made this into five bars), the music goes off into different directions. I am rather more in tune with Landon's argument: no one knows anything about the Croatian tune, most especially how old it is. Is it the influence for the opening theme? Or is it, in fact, influenced by the opening theme? Landon cites a long list of tunes, by a variety of composers such as Hasse, Mozart and Haydn himself, which share in both the spirit and melody of this work.4
Saurau was nothing if not a great public relations man. He wanted his new Anthem to be rolled out to the masses in a way which would make the greatest impression. Since the Emperor's birthday was just around the corner, on 12 February to be precise, Saurau enlisted the entire network of regional governors and princes and gave them this instruction: in every theater in the empire, on the evening of 12 February, the play, opera or concert will stop, and the entire audience, having been provided with the words, will stand and with the greatest possible ceremony, sing the Volkslied. A piano score was also sent along, and either it was used directly, or as a basis for the local Kapellmeister to make an orchestration. Haydn, himself, made the orchestration for the Burgtheater. The autograph is in the Austrian National Library, dated 1797. There is also a fair copy by Johann Elssler in the Esterházy archives. That said, and with the resurgence of Haydn's music in the late 20th and into the 21st century, do you not, as I do, find it stunning that a recording has never been made by orchestral forces with choir? But I digress….
On the 12th, a mixed program beginning with Act II of Dittersdorf's opera Doktor und Apotheker was playing at the Burg. A letter writer in attendance left us this description of the event:
A worthy man wrote a song for the birthday of our gracious Emperor, and another worthy man – the one who wrote the church music for the ceremony at the Piarists the other day [NB – the Missa in Tempore Belli], set it to music, and the song was given in all the theaters…
The theater was never so jammed, and since some people couldn't see enough to sing (read the words?), they lighted up little lamps… the song will now be sung [everywhere]… But if only they won't sing so much they forget the money, 'cause we aren't to be helped with just singing, in these days.
Since our best Emperor is no friend of compliments and flattery, he came to the theater late, on purpose. But the Viennese were smart, too, and they waited with the song to the monarch, and he had to listen to it all the same; but then he showed how touched he was by his subjects' devotion. [Pohl vol. 3, pg. 116]
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Haydn's autograph of the Variations Original score in British Library (text below from Library description) Autograph: Written in ink on systems of two staves, on the recto of a single leaf. The theme occupies the bottom four staves, and Variation I the upper eight staves. No key signature is given, and tempo directions and expression marks are also absent. On the verso is a note of authenticity, in Italian , by the publisher Artaria, dated Vienna, 11 May 1839, when the manuscript was ceded to Count G. Esterhazy. Haydn's own arrangement of movement II from his string quartet op. 76, no. 3. The autograph, and hence the authenticity of this arrangement, was not known to commentators until recently. |
It's not a very long story for what turned out to be Haydn's most famous and long-lived work. With some online digging, you can find the entire history, right up to today, when the non-controversial third verse is still used as the anthem of Germany. But Haschka's paean to Franz II didn't outlive it's dedicatee, and the multitude of different lyrics, all of them relying for their coherence on Haydn's beautiful melody, ultimately have nothing to do with Haydn, and thus we bid them farewell and stay with the music.
Later this year, we will look at the Opus 76 string quartets, another outstanding product of 1797. And as most of you know, the second movement of Opus 76 #3 in C major is a set of variations on this very same melody. But in addition to the three other versions from this year (orchestra, Lied, quartet), Haydn fashioned the quartet variations into a theme and variations for solo keyboard, as seen above. As you know, I am always very loath to take things out of their own time, but this particular story is best told from a later perspective. Se we will cheat a bit, but when the time comes, we will also return to this story again.
"But curiously, when I am so deeply upset that nothing helps me to escape the torment, and my song Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser once occurs to me, then I feel easier; it helps." A.C. Dies (Seventeenth Visit 6 Feb 1806)5
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As often as warm weather and his strength permitted, he was taken, in the last two years of his life, to his innermost room for the sole purpose of playing his song Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser! on the pianoforte. G.A. Griesinger5 (pg. 49)
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Every day towards midday he sat down to the instrument and played his favorite piece, Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser! A.C. Dies – 1809 (pg. 193)
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It was hoped that the Order of Leopold, founded in 1808 for meritorious Austrians, would also be extended to artists, and Haydn was congratulated thereon in advance. This distinction would have given him much joy. "Then there would be a Chevalier Haydn just like the Chevalier Gluck! Only it is a pity that I have no children to whom it could be useful!"
To the Emperor he would have said on this occasion that among the many songs he had written, Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser! was always one of those he valued most. G.A. Griesinger5 (pg. 57)
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So in Haydn's view, with all of his 106 symphonies, 68 quartets, 62 keyboard sonatas, operas, masses and hundreds of other works, until the end of his life this is the one he loved best and played every day.
Next time, we will look at the quartets considered by many to be his greatest. You should get a head start listening to them now, I am!
Thanks for reading!
1 – H.C. Robbins Landon – The Collected Correspondence & London Notebooks of Joseph Haydn (1959)
2 - H.E. Jacob - JOSEPH HAYDN His Art, Times & Glory (1950)
3 - J. Cuthbert Hadden – Haydn (London, 1934)
4 - H.C. Robbins Landon – Haydn - Chronicle & Works vol. 4 (1978)
5 – Vernon Gotwals (trans.) - JOSEPH HAYDN - Eighteenth-Century Gentleman and Genius (1963)