# Haydn: A Muscular Mozart



## Captainnumber36

I know Haydn came before Mozart and that the two interacted in their lifetimes, but how fitting do you find this description of Haydn' music to be?

:tiphat:


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## mbhaub

Less tidy.

Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me. There's really very, very little Mozart that I can stand. Haydn though is much more enjoyable to listen to and to play. It's more down to earth and human. But then Mozart wrote the G minor symphony - and it gets no better than that.


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## Captainnumber36

mbhaub said:


> Less tidy.
> 
> Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me. There's really very, very little Mozart that I can stand. Haydn though is much more enjoyable to listen to and to play. It's more down to earth and human. But then Mozart wrote the G minor symphony - and it gets no better than that.


By less tidy, do you mean Haydn was heavier where you find Mozart to be light?


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## CnC Bartok

I'd say Haydn is more "rustic" than Mozart. If that means more muscular clog dances, then great. There are far more works from Haydn that I love unreservedly than there are of Wolfgang's, especially the Symphonies, but also the quartets, trios and choral pieces.


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## wkasimer

mbhaub said:


> Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me.


Perhaps you're listening to the wrong performers?


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## RICK RIEKERT

mbhaub said:


> Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me.


Had not this gentile hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions and a supreme gift for musical composition? If you pricked him, did he not bleed? If you tickled him, did he not laugh?


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## BiscuityBoyle

Just call him the "not gay Mozart" and be done with it :lol:

I like the "down to earth" bit. I think it was Andras Schiff who said that Haydn and Beethoven were fundamentally "human" composers, while Mozart was an otherworldly creature. Not to imply he is the greater composer, but that there's something fundamentally incomprehensible about him.


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## mbhaub

Captainnumber36 said:


> By less tidy, do you mean Haydn was heavier where you find Mozart to be light?


In Mozart, every note is perfectly placed. Every dynamic, every phrase is perfect. He left nothing to chance, and his scores are amazingly precise. Not so with Haydn, who sometimes left things ambiguous and put a lot on the players to figure out. Hence, things like the HC Robbins Landon editions of the symphonies which try to clarify and correct some of the messiness. Mozart's scoring is flawless - no composer of his age had such a natural gift for using the orchestra. Haydn and early Beethoven, while very good, never quite have that Mozartian transparency. In Mozart every phrase is perfectly judged. Someone said Haydn is more down to earth - yes, he was. Rustic - I like that, too. Lighter? Yes - that remarkable scoring in everything. And repetitive.

Listen to the minuet of a classical symphony. Can't tell if it's Mozart or Haydn? Try singing the words "Are you the O'Reilly who runs this hotel?". If the words fit, it's Haydn - and it's amazing how often it works.

As to performers, I started listening to Mozart and Haydn when the big band approach was popular: Bruno Walter, Beecham, Colin David, Bernstein etc. Then onto the HIP phase - Mozart suffers badly I think in this method - his music cannot take non-vibrato in the strings. Haydn gets by somewhat better.


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## jdec

Haydn's music is great, but he ain't a Mozart, and he knew it.


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## Captainnumber36

jdec said:


> Haydn's music is great, but he ain't a Mozart, and hew knew it.


I find the two very similar...if anything, I think Haydn is more consistently interesting. Take his Piano Sonatas for one, and I'm starting to listen to his SQs more!

I'm trying to avoid saying it, but I just think Haydn had much bigger ____.


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## laurie

Well, that's just rude


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## Captainnumber36

laurie said:


> Well, that's just rude


I wasn't trying to be. I love Mozart!


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## Phil loves classical

I would call Mozart is a more impulsive Haydn in general. Personally I find Haydn’s music more charming, and Mozart’s more beautiful, while more harrowing at times, but when he was neither he was more boring. Haydn was more gentlemanly, and restrained in general.


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## Boston Charlie

Captainnumber36 said:


> I find the two very similar...if anything, I think Haydn is more consistently interesting. Take his Piano Sonatas for one, and I'm starting to listen to his SQs more!
> 
> I'm trying to avoid saying it, but I just think Haydn had much bigger ____.


If your presupposition is true then it almost didn't happen. I read somewhere that as a child Haydn had a very beautiful boy-soprano singing voice and had designs on becoming a castrato against the wishes of his father. Haydn's Dad interceded just in time while young Joseph was literally on the chopping block.


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## Mandryka

Captainnumber36 said:


> how fitting do you find this description of Haydn' music to be?
> 
> :tiphat:


........
No at all.


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## Mandryka

wkasimer said:


> Perhaps you're listening to the wrong performers?


.............
Yes


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## Captainnumber36

Boston Charlie said:


> If your presupposition is true then it almost didn't happen. I read somewhere that as a child Haydn had a very beautiful boy-soprano singing voice and had designs on becoming a castrato against the wishes of his father. Haydn's Dad interceded just in time while young Joseph was literally on the chopping block.


lol. :lol:
15 Characters


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## Mandryka

Captainnumber36 said:


> I find the two very similar...if anything, I think Haydn is more consistently interesting. Take his Piano Sonatas for one,


I don't think that Haydn wrote any piano music as "interesting" as 310 and 457


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## Captainnumber36

Mandryka said:


> I don't think that Haydn wrote any piano music as "interesting" as 310 and 457


I enjoy both Mozart's and Haydn's Piano Sonatas quite a bit actually. I misspoke.


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## elgar's ghost

This may not make much sense but I've always found Mozart's orchestral, chamber and instrumental music spontaneous and flighty whereas Haydn's seems more deliberate and earthbound. However, with many of his later choral works Haydn cut the guy-rope and soared aloft.


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## Larkenfield

Captainnumber36 said:


> I know Haydn came before Mozart and that the two interacted in their lifetimes, but how fitting do you find this description of Haydn' music to be?
> 
> :tiphat:


I would consider it a poor comparison. While both were classical era composers, they did not sound alike, even if sometimes the listener can be fooled. When Haydn was "muscular," he was being rhythmically muscular as Haydn and not as another Mozart. He came first to begin with, and while he greatly admired Mozart, he maintained his own identity and consummate craftsmanship, especially in his symphonies and string quartets. When Haydn and Mozart were being forceful or muscular, I would describe what they were doing as Art as well as self-expression and they did not go beyond a certain line of balance and proportion where their passions seemed to be controlling them rather than the other way around, though depending upon the composer, there's nothing wrong with that. The Romantics were more willing to let it all hang out and say what's on their mind personally, and one can really hear the anger, explosiveness or muscularity in some of their work. But I would be leery of drawing a comparison between the two composers and describing Haydn's power and force in Mozart's terms. I don't think that works in characterizing Haydn's music. Both were great masters, and so was Beethoven. But Beethoven's use of muscularity and force was off the charts compared to them, and he didn't care who knew it because the world was ready for something different when he came along. If one wants to draw a comparison, it might be more accurate to say that Beethoven was a muscular Haydn.


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## Captainnumber36

Larkenfield said:


> I would consider it a poor comparison. While both were classical era composers, they did not sound alike, even if sometimes the listener can be fooled. When Haydn was "muscular," he was being rhythmically muscular as Haydn and not as another Mozart. He came first to begin with, and while he greatly admired Mozart, he maintained his own identity and consummate craftsmanship, especially in his symphonies and string quartets. When Haydn and Mozart were being forceful or muscular, I would describe what they were doing as Art as well as self-expression and they did not go beyond a certain line of balance and proportion where their passions seemed to be controlling them rather than the other way around, though depending upon the composer, there's nothing wrong with that. The Romantics were more willing to let it all hang out and say what's on their mind personally, and one can really hear the anger, explosiveness or muscularity in some of their work. But I would be leery of drawing a comparison between the two composers and describing Haydn's power and force in Mozart's terms. I don't think that works in characterizing Haydn's music. Both were great masters, and so was Beethoven. But Beethoven's use of muscularity and force was off the charts compared to them, and he didn't care who knew it because the world was ready for something different when he came along. If one wants to draw a comparison, it might be more accurate to say that Beethoven was a muscular Haydn.


But did Mozart consistently reach the "muscularity" in his music as Haydn did? I see the Jupiter Symphony as quite Muscular.


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## KenOC

Mozart was only muscular when it was called for. Haydn took steroids and constantly failed his pee-in-the-bottle tests! He was banned from the musical Olympics from 1772 through 1788. Something we often forget today...


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## brianvds

mbhaub said:


> Listen to the minuet of a classical symphony. Can't tell if it's Mozart or Haydn? Try singing the words "Are you the O'Reilly who runs this hotel?". If the words fit, it's Haydn - and it's amazing how often it works.


Works for Beethoven's fourth too - let no one claim B learned nothing from H.



> As to performers, I started listening to Mozart and Haydn when the big band approach was popular: Bruno Walter, Beecham, Colin David, Bernstein etc. Then onto the HIP phase - Mozart suffers badly I think in this method - his music cannot take non-vibrato in the strings. Haydn gets by somewhat better.


Me, I very much prefer the HIP approach.


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## Woodduck

BiscuityBoyle said:


> I like the "down to earth" bit. I think it was Andras Schiff who said that Haydn and Beethoven were fundamentally "human" composers, while Mozart was an otherworldly creature. Not to imply he is the greater composer, but that there's something fundamentally incomprehensible about him.


When I listen to Mozart I have no sense of who he was; I don't feel any particular sort of man - or woman - behind the music, which is like an exquisite silken garment which I know must conceal a person only because clothing doesn't walk by itself. When I hear Haydn I feel as if I'm sitting with an unpretentious but well-dressed middle-aged fellow in a pub, enjoying a pot of ale, talking politics and laughing at his puns as the sunlight streams in through the window.


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## PlaySalieri

Woodduck said:


> *When I listen to Mozart I have no sense of who he was; I don't feel any particular sort of man - or woman - behind the music, *which is like an exquisite silken garment which I know must conceal a person only because clothing doesn't walk by itself. When I hear Haydn I feel as if I'm sitting with an unpretentious but well-dressed middle-aged fellow in a pub, enjoying a pot of ale, talking politics and laughing at his puns as the sunlight streams in through the window.


"To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim."

Oscar Wilde


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## Woodduck

stomanek said:


> "To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim."
> 
> Oscar Wilde


Wilde's own work - including that apparently profound but basically just clever assertion - positively screams "OSCAR WILDE!"

I would say that the extent to which an composer's work conveys his personality is a matter of no importance except to individual listeners who respond to it.


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## KenOC

Woodduck said:


> I would say that the extent to which an composer's work conveys his personality is a matter of no importance except to individual listeners who respond to it.


Given the huge range of musical expression in his works, and how different the works are one from another, I doubt we can discern Beethoven's personality from his music any more than we can Shakespeare's from his plays.

"An artist must be able to assume many humors." --Beethoven


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## Luchesi

Captainnumber36 said:


> But did Mozart consistently reach the "muscularity" in his music as Haydn did? I see the Jupiter Symphony as quite Muscular.


If we can agree on what we mean by muscularity then we should remember that any piece can be played in any manner (muscularly or daintily) and you can even change the metaphorical meanings thereby.. Obviously it will get ridiculous at some point, but tinkering for yourself with Mozart and Haydn is great fun. You can't do it with as much humor in Beethoven or Bach, and for me this reveals the time periods in which they were influenced -- and then they subsequently developed past (in my opinion).

And so, perhaps Mozart and Haydn weren't influenced to the same high degree by the Baroque and they therefore weren't developing past their own time.

You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.. I was just reading some of the Robert Newman threads from 2006 and 2007 and there seems to be quite a sensitivity against his type of 'explorations'. I guess he's been banned.


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## Captainnumber36

Luchesi said:


> If we can agree on what we mean by muscularity then we should remember that any piece can be played in any manner (muscularly or daintily) and you can even change the metaphorical meanings thereby.. Obviously it will get ridiculous at some point, but tinkering for yourself with Mozart and Haydn is great fun. You can't do it with as much humor in Beethoven or Bach, and for me this reveals the time periods in which they were influenced -- and then they subsequently developed past (in my opinion).
> 
> And so, perhaps Mozart and Haydn weren't influenced to the same high degree by the Baroque and they therefore weren't developing past their own time.
> 
> You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.. I was just reading some of the Robert Newman threads from 2006 and 2007 and there seems to be quite a sensitivity against his type of 'explorations'. I guess he's been banned.


I don't think you need to be concerned with being banned with this sort of exploration. And if we are, this board is too conservative!


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## Woodduck

KenOC said:


> Given the huge range of musical expression in his works, and how different the works are one from another, I doubt we can discern Beethoven's personality from his music any more than we can Shakespeare's from his plays.
> 
> "An artist must be able to assume many humors." --Beethoven


Unfortunately Beethoven has been caricatured as the temperamental, rebellious genius shaking his fist at the sky and at tradition, as if he had written nothing but the 5th symphony. Wagner has been similarly simplified to make his most tabloid-worthy traits stand for the whole of him, and any number of other artists exist in our imaginations as one-dimensional, cartoonish characters easier for us to understand than real, complex, contradictory human beings.

The relationship between an artist's style and his personality is not simple or obvious, as Mozart's work makes clear. Often what we call someone's "personality" conceals important things about him, things he may be uncomfortable expressing in any form other than his art. Whether or not we get a sense of artists' personalities from their work, that work should at least provide us with a clue to their complex humanity and give us pause before we try to interpret the art in terms of what we think we know about them as people. The more we explore the work of great artists, the harder it is to credit such simplistic caricatures as "Papa Haydn," Bach the "humble servant of the Lord," Wagner the "proto-Nazi," or Mozart the "divine child" (or, if you're an "Amadeus" fan, the "potty-mouthed idiot savant").


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## Captainnumber36

Woodduck said:


> Unfortunately Beethoven has been caricatured as the temperamental, rebellious genius shaking his fist at the sky and at tradition, as if he had written nothing but the 5th symphony. Wagner has been similarly simplified to make his most tabloid-worthy traits stand for the whole of him, and any number of other artists exist in our imaginations as one-dimensional, cartoonish characters easier for us to understand than real, complex, contradictory human beings.
> 
> The relationship between an artist's style and his personality is not simple or obvious, as Mozart's work makes clear. Often what we call someone's "personality" conceals important things about him, things he may be uncomfortable expressing in any form other than his art. Whether or not we get a sense of artists' personalities from their work, that work should at least provide us with a clue to their complex humanity and give us pause before we try to interpret the art in terms of what we think we know about them as people. The more we explore the work of great artists, the harder it is to credit such simplistic caricatures as "Papa Haydn," Bach the "humble servant of the Lord," Wagner the "proto-Nazi," or Mozart the "divine child" (or, if you're an "Amadeus" fan, the "potty-mouthed idiot savant").


I think it's human nature to find useful simplified concepts that help us make sense of the nature of something. You are right, things are more complex, and we should keep that in mind, but the simplified conceptions have their place too.


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## Luchesi

Thanks Captainnumber36 - Does it matter to us who is documented to be the composer of this work or that work? Why?

So if I answer, I think it's important to know that an inspiring sequence of works comes from the one man who's traditionally accepted to be the composer. If not? and if many different creators penned various pieces in an important series, then we're really lost I think.

This question seems ditzy and fatuous, but it came up in a music theory presentation I recently gave. The reason we care seems obvious to me, but not to this sincere questioner..


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## Kieran

It's the muscle between your ears wot counts... :tiphat:


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## Woodduck

Captainnumber36 said:


> I think it's human nature to find useful simplified concepts that help us make sense of the nature of something. You are right, things are more complex, and we should keep that in mind, but *the simplified conceptions have their place* too.


I really don't know what that place is. I know I've spent an inordinate amount of time on this forum trying to break down simplified views of Wagner's thinking and works, and it's like trying to cut through chaparral with a penknife. Simplified views appeal to laziness, and if left unchecked easily become cultural cliches that stunt minds for generations.

I'm not criticizing this thread, by the way.The differences between Mozart and Haydn make a good topic for discussion. I'd say Haydn and Mozart are both muscular, but Haydn is more of a gymnast and Mozart more of a figure skater. How's that for simplification?


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## Captainnumber36

Woodduck said:


> I really don't know what that place is. I know I've spent an inordinate amount of time on this forum trying to break down simplified views of Wagner's thinking and works, and it's like trying to cut through chaparral with a penknife. Simplified views appeal to laziness, and if left unchecked easily become cultural cliches that stunt minds for generations.
> 
> I'm not criticizing this thread, by the way.The differences between Mozart and Haydn make a good topic for discussion. I'd say Haydn and Mozart are both muscular, but Haydn is more of a gymnast and Mozart more of a figure skater. How's that for simplification?


I think of science. When we devise a theory that is a useful way of explaining something, we sometimes keep using it but at the same time need people like you to keep testing it to see how it is not useful or false. That doesn't mean the theory doesn't explain a general phenomenon.

It's when people get stuck in their ways of thinking and aren't open to being critiqued where trouble begins, and that is the majoirty of people.

Great simplification btw!

:lol:


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## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> If we can agree on what we mean by muscularity then we should remember that any piece can be played in any manner (muscularly or daintily) and you can even change the metaphorical meanings thereby.. Obviously it will get ridiculous at some point, but tinkering for yourself with Mozart and Haydn is great fun. You can't do it with as much humor in Beethoven or Bach, and for me this reveals the time periods in which they were influenced -- and then they subsequently developed past (in my opinion).
> 
> And so, perhaps Mozart and Haydn weren't influenced to the same high degree by the Baroque and they therefore weren't developing past their own time.
> 
> *You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.. I was just reading some of the Robert Newman threads from 2006 and 2007 and there seems to be quite a sensitivity against his type of 'explorations'. I guess he's been banned.*


Hmmm. Funny you should mention Newman.Your username is close to Mr Newman's hero Luchresi - the "real" composer of the bulk of Mozart's work.

what wild thoughts? what is it in Mr Newman's threads that interests you - I am all ears.


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> Hmmm. Funny you should mention Newman.Your username is close to Mr Newman's hero Luchresi - the "real" composer of the bulk of Mozart's work.
> 
> what wild thoughts? what is it in Mr Newman's threads that interests you - I am all ears.


Yes indeed, I spotted the same thing.


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## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> If we can agree on what we mean by muscularity then we should remember that any piece can be played in any manner (muscularly or daintily) and you can even change the metaphorical meanings thereby.. Obviously it will get ridiculous at some point, but tinkering for yourself with Mozart and Haydn is great fun. You can't do it with as much humor in Beethoven or Bach, and for me this reveals the time periods in which they were influenced -- and then they subsequently developed past (in my opinion).
> 
> And so, perhaps Mozart and Haydn weren't influenced to the same high degree by the Baroque and they therefore weren't developing past their own time.
> 
> You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.. I was just reading some of the Robert Newman threads from 2006 and 2007 and there seems to be quite a sensitivity against his type of 'explorations'. *I guess he's been banned*


what leads you to that conclusion? The fact it says banned under his username by any chance.

You are observant I must say.


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## JosefinaHW

I just started to listen to Paul Johnson's biography of Mozart because I have been astonished by how many kilobytes have been spent on TC attempting to devalue Mozart's music (and Mozart the man).

Unless Paul Johnson is grossly in error Mozart was highly conscientious and serious about his music, while at the same time he loved humor of all kinds, including humor IN his music. Yes, he mentions that scatological humor was very common in Mozart's day and from other reading I know that it was popular in Luther's time as well as Bach's. Mozart was also extremely intelligent, not only with regard to music, but with languages: He was almost fluent in English by the time he left England. He was very well-versed in singing technique, which apparently made him appreciated for his patience, sensitivity, and instructive-ness to the many singers he worked with throughout his life. He loved conversing with other musicians about music and thus learned the strengths and weaknesses of the instruments of the orchestra. His love and understanding of the viola raised it to the level of a solo instrument. I am not even a third of a way through the book yet.

At first I thought I understood what you all meant by "muscularity," the first that came to my mind was Beethoven's Fifth. The large number of technically more powerful instruments, performing dramatic, almost brutal short motives. I also immediately thought of Haydn's _Creation_. Unless I am not far enough in my reading, Mozart was composing early-on to prove his knowledge of music and composing abilities to courts, archbishops and the pope-his focus was on those requests. Clement XIV who according to Johnson was an expert in Ecclesiastical music knighted Mozart into the Order of the Golden Spur when he was only thirteen. It is my impression (yes, I could be mistaken), that he was also composing to support himself, his father and his sister on their extensive travels. So he was composing a great deal with the pleasure of his audience in mind.

Personally, I do NOT think this is a "sell-out" to the quality of music; in fact, I am extremely grateful to all the composers who have thought that music should be beautiful for the audience! I get annoyed at reading time after time that the primary purpose of art music is to be innovative, without regard for the aesthetic appreciation of the audience. Of course I understand that innovation is important, but in the majority of cases it should not be the type that shocks or rakes the audience over the coals. It's like the Theater of the Absurd; sometimes we need to be made to feel uncomfortable or feel our growing edges, but in greater part there should be beauty and other forms of enjoyment in art music.

Back to "muscularity." I remember when I was a young piano student and I wanted to perform a Beethoven sonata at an upcoming rehearsal. My teacher told me that a less dramatic piece would better demonstrate the control of my body (power of my muscles), my sensitivity, and my understanding of how to handle the pauses in Mozart's music. Looking back at that, it might have been a kind way of getting me to change my mind, but, then again…. It did make me smile when Johnson said the same thing with regard to why Mozart was a gifted viola player (although not for concerts, because of the length of his arms). Sounding "light" and "delicate" takes muscle and intellectual power.


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## JosefinaHW

P.S. I know that Maynard Solomon has written a much longer biography of Mozart. I have so much other reading right now I had to choose a biography in audiobook format.


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## Captainnumber36

JosefinaHW said:


> I just started to listen to Paul Johnson's biography of Mozart because I have been astonished by how many kilobytes have been spent on TC attempting to devalue Mozart's music (and Mozart the man).
> 
> Unless Paul Johnson is grossly in error Mozart was highly conscientious and serious about his music, while at the same time he loved humor of all kinds, including humor IN his music. Yes, he mentions that scatological humor was very common in Mozart's day and from other reading I know that it was popular in Luther's time as well as Bach's. Mozart was also extremely intelligent, not only with regard to music, but with languages: He was almost fluent in English by the time he left England. He was very well-versed in singing technique, which apparently made him appreciated for his patience, sensitivity, and instructive-ness to the many singers he worked with throughout his life. He loved conversing with other musicians about music and thus learned the strengths and weaknesses of the instruments of the orchestra. His love and understanding of the viola raised it to the level of a solo instrument. I am not even a third of a way through the book yet.
> 
> At first I thought I understood what you all meant by "muscularity," the first that came to my mind was Beethoven's Fifth. The large number of technically more powerful instruments, performing dramatic, almost brutal short motives. I also immediately thought of Haydn's _Creation_. Unless I am not far enough in my reading, Mozart was composing early-on to prove his knowledge of music and composing abilities to courts, archbishops and the pope-his focus was on those requests. Clement XIV who according to Johnson was an expert in Ecclesiastical music knighted Mozart into the Order of the Golden Spur when he was only thirteen. It is my impression (yes, I could be mistaken), that he was also composing to support himself, his father and his sister on their extensive travels. So he was composing a great deal with the pleasure of his audience in mind.
> 
> Personally, I do NOT think this is a "sell-out" to the quality of music; in fact, I am extremely grateful to all the composers who have thought that music should be beautiful for the audience! I get annoyed at reading time after time that the primary purpose of art music is to be innovative, without regard for the aesthetic appreciation of the audience. Of course I understand that innovation is important, but in the majority of cases it should not be the type that shocks or rakes the audience over the coals. It's like the Theater of the Absurd; sometimes we need to be made to feel uncomfortable or feel our growing edges, but in greater part there should be beauty and other forms of enjoyment in art music.
> 
> Back to "muscularity." I remember when I was a young piano student and I wanted to perform a Beethoven sonata at an upcoming rehearsal. My teacher told me that a less dramatic piece would better demonstrate the control of my body (power of my muscles), my sensitivity, and my understanding of how to handle the pauses in Mozart's music. Looking back at that, it might have been a kind way of getting me to change my mind, but, then again…. It did make me smile when Johnson said the same thing with regard to why Mozart was a gifted viola player (although not for concerts, because of the length of his arms). Sounding "light" and "delicate" takes muscle and intellectual power.


I agree with you on innovation vs being pleasurable. It's annoying when composer's become pretentious and try force originality.

I agree it takes muscle and intellect to play Mozart, but when I stated Haydn's music is a more muscular Mozart, I meant in the way it sounds, not in what it takes to play the piece.


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## Luchesi

stomanek said:


> Hmmm. Funny you should mention Newman.Your username is close to Mr Newman's hero Luchresi - the "real" composer of the bulk of Mozart's work.
> 
> what wild thoughts? what is it in Mr Newman's threads that interests you - I am all ears.


I'll try to answer you..

I was thinking some curious thoughts about Mozart. I haven't had these thoughts before. They're not good (positive) for listening to his orchestral works.

I said, "You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.."

Reading the posts of the Newman group, I didn't understand why such detours are so frowned upon. So I didn't want to likewise go down the same long road of perhaps being banned temporarily. Because of my background and my career in research I expect I'm quite clueless about these balances. And KenOC might remember about the run in I had with a woman who wanted to 'discuss' Mozart's Requiem. I wanted to understand her, but posters didn't want it to continue. So I'm wary now.


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## Luchesi

JosefinaHW said:


> I just started to listen to Paul Johnson's biography of Mozart because I have been astonished by how many kilobytes have been spent on TC attempting to devalue Mozart's music (and Mozart the man).
> 
> Unless Paul Johnson is grossly in error Mozart was highly conscientious and serious about his music, while at the same time he loved humor of all kinds, including humor IN his music. Yes, he mentions that scatological humor was very common in Mozart's day and from other reading I know that it was popular in Luther's time as well as Bach's. Mozart was also extremely intelligent, not only with regard to music, but with languages: He was almost fluent in English by the time he left England.


Psychologists talk about Mozart's borderline Tourette's Syndrome

A psychoanalytic paper by Mahler and Rangell
published in 1943 was the first to state an organic
substrate for Tourette's syndrome, and considered
these patients to be afflcted with a dysfunction of
motor expression characterized by "incontinence of the
emotions . . . as if the system of expressional motility
were in a state of permanent over-excitation" without
normal control." This concept predated the later
biochemical dopaminergic dysfunction theory. In this
connection, two of Mozart's stunning creative feats
were his wealth of melodic invention and his legendary
ability to compose music in his head.

There is a striking similarity between Mozart, with
music in his mind the whole day long, and Samuel
Johnson, the great English man of letters, with his day
long recitations of literary pieces and pious sayings.
Johnson was probably afflicted with a severe form of
Tourette's syndrome, characterized by severe motor
tics, involuntary vocalizations, compulsive verbal and
motor acts, and repeated personal recitations of long
religious and literary tracts, for which his memory was
legendary.'0 Mozart's similarly legendary musical
memory enabled him to write down whole compositions, 
previously composed in his head, even in the
midst of convivial social occasions. The concept of
"incontinence of the emotions" might well serve as the
connecting link between two of the intellectual giants
of the eighteenth century, both of whom were touched
with aspects of Tourette's syndrome.

This paper was presented at the Society for History of
Medicine, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, in February 1991 .


----------



## Captainnumber36

Luchesi said:


> I'll try to answer you..
> 
> I was thinking some curious thoughts about Mozart. I haven't had these thoughts before. They're not good (positive) for listening to his orchestral works.
> 
> I said, "You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.."
> 
> Reading the posts of the Newman group, I didn't understand why such detours are so frowned upon. So I didn't want to likewise go down the same long road of perhaps being banned temporarily. Because of my background and my career in research I expect I'm quite clueless about these balances. And KenOC might remember about the run in I had with a woman who wanted to 'discuss' Mozart's Requiem. I wanted to understand her, but posters didn't want it to continue. So I'm wary now.


I think as long as you are remaining civil and respectful you have nothing to worry about.


----------



## Captainnumber36

I'm also not trying to put Mozart's music down, I'm just looking for adjectives that describe the composer's music generally.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Captainnumber36 said:


> I agree with you on innovation vs being pleasurable. It's annoying when composer's become pretentious and try force originality.
> 
> I agree it takes muscle and intellect to play Mozart, but when I stated Haydn's music is a more muscular Mozart, I meant in the way it sounds, not in what it takes to play the piece.


I knew that the common understanding of "muscularity" of music in this thread was the way it sounds; it's why I mentioned B's Fifth with a larger and more powerful orchestra and the almost "brutal" motives and Haydn's _Creation. _But, there is something about the word "muscular" and the connotations of power and strength vs. fragile and delicate with connotations of weakness that doesn't sit right with me. I'm not completely sure of all the different things that bother me about it. One thing that springs to mind almost immediately is the image of a butterfly and a lion--an image of two mammals would be better I suppose, but the butterfly is the image that first came to mind. Both are beautiful, complex creatures. I think most people would associate the lion with power, in size and sound. But, the butterfly flies how many thousands of miles. For such a tiny being to fly that far, under difficult conditions and countless dangers, that butterfly has to have incredible strength.

...must step away from computer for a bit....


----------



## Captainnumber36

JosefinaHW said:


> I knew that the common understanding of "muscularity" of music in this thread was the way it sounds; it's why I mentioned B's Fifth with a larger and more powerful orchestra and the almost "brutal" motives and Haydn's _Creation. _But, there is something about the word "muscular" and the connotations of power and strength vs. fragile and delicate with connotations of weakness that doesn't sit right with me. I'm not completely sure of all the different things that bother me about it. One thing that springs to mind almost immediately is the image of a butterfly and a lion--an image of two mammals would be better I suppose, but the butterfly is the image that first came to mind. Both are beautiful, complex creatures. I think most people would associate the lion with power, in size and sound. But, the butterfly flies how many thousands of miles. For such a tiny being to fly that far, under difficult conditions and countless dangers, that butterfly has to have incredible strength.
> 
> ...must step away from computer for a bit....


Mozart has a different kind of strength, I think is what can be interpreted from what you just described about the butterfly and the lion.

I think strength and muscularity are two different concepts though. If we break it down to human physique, a man has a more _muscular_ build and a woman has a more slender build. I see Haydn's music as being more like a man's physique and Mozart's like a woman's. Neither is superior and both have different _strengths_.


----------



## JosefinaHW

By the way, I'm not ignoring you Luchesi, I'm just going in the order of my thoughts. I think you should begin to post your thoughts; I would say those of us who adore music are very well acquainted and comfortable with the deepest emotions--dark, light and blindingly sublime.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Captainnumber36 said:


> Mozart has a different kind of strength, I think is what can be interpreted from what you just described about the butterfly and the lion.
> 
> I think strength and muscularity are two different concepts though. If we break it down to human physique, a man has a more _muscular_ build and a woman has a more slender build. I see Haydn's music as being more like a man's physique and Mozart's like a woman's. Neither is superior and both have different _strengths_.


As of this moment, I agree with what you said above, Captain. I just don't get the impression that everyone writing in this type of thread, X vs. Y, would see the equal strength of the two, either the lion and the butterfly, or Mozart and Beethoven (or Haydn). I agree that there is a strength, frequently sublime, in things that produce certain sounds: military helicopter, volcano, sports car, or a piece of music like Beethoven's Fifth.

But, the emotional and physical impact (they are both connected...) of a few bars of the piano part of a Mozart piano concerto impact me in an equally powerful way. Since, my first post in this thread I've been re-listening to Mozart's piano concertos with an ear for the expression of/his experience of the deepest of human emotions. It's there over and over, not just in the most famous. But I can't imagine someone listening to the second movement of the Twenty-First and not hearing and feeling the beauty that is so beautiful it hurts.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Luchesi said:


> Psychologists talk about Mozart's borderline Tourette's Syndrome
> 
> A psychoanalytic paper by Mahler and Rangell
> published in 1943 was the first to state an organic
> substrate for Tourette's syndrome, and considered
> these patients to be afflcted with a dysfunction of
> motor expression characterized by "incontinence of the
> emotions . . . as if the system of expressional motility
> were in a state of permanent over-excitation" without
> normal control." This concept predated the later
> biochemical dopaminergic dysfunction theory. In this
> connection, two of Mozart's stunning creative feats
> were his wealth of melodic invention and his legendary
> ability to compose music in his head.
> 
> There is a striking similarity between Mozart, with
> music in his mind the whole day long, and Samuel
> Johnson, the great English man of letters, with his day
> long recitations of literary pieces and pious sayings.
> Johnson was probably afflicted with a severe form of
> Tourette's syndrome, characterized by severe motor
> tics, involuntary vocalizations, compulsive verbal and
> motor acts, and repeated personal recitations of long
> religious and literary tracts, for which his memory was
> legendary.'0 Mozart's similarly legendary musical
> memory enabled him to write down whole compositions,
> previously composed in his head, even in the
> midst of convivial social occasions. The concept of
> "incontinence of the emotions" might well serve as the
> connecting link between two of the intellectual giants
> of the eighteenth century, both of whom were touched
> with aspects of Tourette's syndrome.
> 
> This paper was presented at the Society for History of
> Medicine, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, in February 1991 .


Editted (wrong medical condition mentioned)

I have very little knowledge of Tourette's Syndrome: I have met a few people who have it, some with no symptoms visible to me, and some still struggling.

Again, I haven't gotten that far in the Johnson biography, but I know that Mozart was an avid and very good horse back rider. You're not likely to stay on a horse if you don't have a sense of balance or erratic gestures... ?


----------



## JosefinaHW

I'm also very hesitant to believe the accuracy of psychoanalytic, psychiatric, and/or psychological diagnoses from anytime prior to the 1980s. Highly skilled professionals in the "mental" health field still get it wrong today even when they have the opportunity to observe a patient in person.... Also, I understand there was an author or authors who wrote several books about the psychological state of many composers--I don't remember the name(s), but I discovered this when I wanted to find a biography of Anton Bruckner. If this is the same person(s) who wrote about Mozart and Tourette's, I would really have my doubts.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> I'll try to answer you..
> 
> I was thinking some curious thoughts about Mozart. I haven't had these thoughts before. They're not good (positive) for listening to his orchestral works.
> 
> I said, "You're causing me to think some wild thoughts here and I hope I'm not offending anybody.."
> 
> Reading the posts of the Newman group, I didn't understand why *such detours* are so frowned upon. So I didn't want to likewise go down the same long road of perhaps being banned temporarily. Because of my background and my career in research I expect I'm quite clueless about these balances. And KenOC might remember about the run in I had with a woman who wanted to 'discuss' Mozart's Requiem. I wanted to understand her, but posters didn't want it to continue. So I'm wary now.


detour? strange choice of word for what it really is

ie Putting forward a grand conspiracy theory in which dark forces ensured the triumph of the germanic tradition over the Italian? In which it was claimed both Mozart and Haydn used Italian composers to supply them with all the masterpieces currently attributed to them - the former being mere hacks who could barely compose a piece between them?

if you cannot understand why people, not just Haydn and Mozart fans, would frown upon that, you must be in La La Land just like Mr Newman.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Captainnumber36 said:


> I'm also not trying to put Mozart's music down, I'm just looking for adjectives that describe the composer's music generally.


I think that is a futile journey, sorry to say. Mozart's range of expression is so vast -


----------



## Genoveva

Luchesi said:


> Reading the posts of the Newman group, I didn't understand why such *detours* are so frowned upon. .


Newman was banned from this Forum many years ago for his trolling, not for making any "detours".

During his time at this Forum he proposed a number of ludicrous theses concerning Mozart and Haydn not being the true composers of most of the work attributed to them. When he first started out in 2006 he argued that the true composer of Symphony No 41 "Jupiter" was not Mozart but someone called Andrea Luchesi.

If you or anyone else reading this post are new to all this Newman nonsense, you might it helpful to glance at a post I made on this topic last September, which was the last time that Newman's name came up. It's at post number 121 at the thread below:

The genius of Mozart


----------



## Kieran

Genoveva said:


> Newman was banned from this Forum many years ago for his trolling, not for making any "detours".
> 
> During his time at this Forum he proposed a number of ludicrous theses concerning Mozart and Haydn not being the true composers of most of the work attributed to them. When he first started out in 2006 he argued that the true composer of Symphony No 41 "Jupiter" was not Mozart but someone called Andrea Luchesi.
> 
> If you or anyone else reading this post are new to all this Newman nonsense, you might it helpful to glance at a post I made on this topic last September, which was the last time that Newman's name came up. It's at post number 121 at the thread below:
> 
> The genius of Mozart


Weird. Bizarre. Hilarious. Infuriating. WTF did I just read? About 3 pages of "argument" in favour of giving "a nutjob his due, he makes good points, he just ain't got a shred of evidence, but hey, let's all wait til hell freezes over and he might provide some?"

I'm sure a whole thesis could be written on Newman and his views - written by a student shrink studying the imbalanced ego and its crazed worldview...


----------



## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> Newman was banned from this Forum many years ago for his trolling, not for making any "detours".
> 
> During his time at this Forum he proposed a number of ludicrous theses concerning Mozart and Haydn not being the true composers of most of the work attributed to them. When he first started out in 2006 he argued that the true composer of Symphony No 41 "Jupiter" was not Mozart but someone called Andrea Luchesi.
> 
> If you or anyone else reading this post are new to all this Newman nonsense, you might it helpful to glance at a post I made on this topic last September, which was the last time that Newman's name came up. It's at post number 121 at the thread below:
> 
> The genius of Mozart


I note that *goddess yuja wang* who aroused suspicions on that thread vanished without a trace shortly after you posted that summary of RN and his ideas.

Which is why whenever someone brings up Newman and appears to lend some credence to his position - I start to become suspicious that the poster is either Newman himself or an accomplice.


----------



## Enthusiast

mbhaub said:


> As to performers, I started listening to Mozart and Haydn when the big band approach was popular: Bruno Walter, Beecham, Colin David, Bernstein etc. Then onto the HIP phase - Mozart suffers badly I think in this method - his music cannot take non-vibrato in the strings. Haydn gets by somewhat better.


I started the same way (especially Walter and Beecham) and, though I am thrilled with much that the HIP movement has done, tend to agree about much HIP Mozart. But I have more recently enjoyed Norrington (a conductor I have long hated!) in Mozart and am one of those who think Currentzis did us a huge favour with his recordings of the da Ponte operas. I think that, whatever performance approach you go for you need to have a special feel for Mozart and (for me) some great performers from any age don't have it.


----------



## Luchesi

JosefinaHW said:


> By the way, I'm not ignoring you Luchesi, I'm just going in the order of my thoughts. I think you should begin to post your thoughts; I would say those of us who adore music are very well acquainted and comfortable with the deepest emotions--dark, light and blindingly sublime.


Thanks, at my age the order of my thoughts is becoming a jumble. So I have to just press ahead and not worry about it.

When I was young I constantly heard that Mozart was too repetitive and too transparent. I would always say, what do you mean? - he's clever and inventive and the clarity is so refreshing. But the reality of such a loss of appreciation by those friends of mine stayed in the back of my mind. They weren't talking about the repeats in the forms, they were complaining about the figurations which sounded so repetitive to them. But if you listen closely there's reflections everywhere and imitations and referring back. This is the classical style and this is for the audience of the time and this is for the integrity and symmetry of the forms as an intellectual achievement, so it only sounds to be cycling and unvarying to the casual listener.

Do you think there are probably people in this forum who think Mozart is too 'repetitive' or even monotonous? It's tiresome and uninvolving for them.


----------



## Luchesi

JosefinaHW said:


> Editted (wrong medical condition mentioned)
> 
> I have very little knowledge of Tourette's Syndrome: I have met a few people who have it, some with no symptoms visible to me, and some still struggling.
> 
> Again, I haven't gotten that far in the Johnson biography, but I know that Mozart was an avid and very good horse back rider. You're not likely to stay on a horse if you don't have a sense of balance or erratic gestures... ?


Yes, Mozart would only have a slight behavioral affect from this syndrome, proclivities. His brain developed slightly differently when he was very young. It might have more to do with his sensitive nature, with his older sister and the birth order, him being male and the youngest, and the parent's musical activities around the house with few other distractions, as teachers say..


----------



## Luchesi

JosefinaHW said:


> I'm also very hesitant to believe the accuracy of psychoanalytic, psychiatric, and/or psychological diagnoses from anytime prior to the 1980s. Highly skilled professionals in the "mental" health field still get it wrong today even when they have the opportunity to observe a patient in person.... Also, I understand there was an author or authors who wrote several books about the psychological state of many composers--I don't remember the name(s), but I discovered this when I wanted to find a biography of Anton Bruckner. If this is the same person(s) who wrote about Mozart and Tourette's, I would really have my doubts.


Yes I agree completely about psychiatry. Only recently have they found the places in the brain whereby they can scientifically explain things.

I was just reading somewhere how they found the length of an overlap in the temporoparietal junction in the right hemisphere to be an indicator of whether you hear voices or you never hear voices, and what you immediately conclude about them - if you're not schizophrenic.


----------



## Luchesi

stomanek said:


> detour? strange choice of word for what it really is
> 
> ie Putting forward a grand conspiracy theory in which dark forces ensured the triumph of the germanic tradition over the Italian? In which it was claimed both Mozart and Haydn used Italian composers to supply them with all the masterpieces currently attributed to them - the former being mere hacks who could barely compose a piece between them?
> 
> if you cannot understand why people, not just Haydn and Mozart fans, would frown upon that, you must be in La La Land just like Mr Newman.


Yes, we will frown upon such assertions, but just reading these conspiracies can prod me to think about these great composers. What were they really like as people? Does it matter?

Without being an expert we can see the consilience between musical academic disciplines analyzing a sequence of works. Then we only need a few historical facts.


----------



## Luchesi

Genoveva said:


> Newman was banned from this Forum many years ago for his trolling, not for making any "detours".
> 
> During his time at this Forum he proposed a number of ludicrous theses concerning Mozart and Haydn not being the true composers of most of the work attributed to them. When he first started out in 2006 he argued that the true composer of Symphony No 41 "Jupiter" was not Mozart but someone called Andrea Luchesi.
> 
> If you or anyone else reading this post are new to all this Newman nonsense, you might it helpful to glance at a post I made on this topic last September, which was the last time that Newman's name came up. It's at post number 121 at the thread below:
> 
> The genius of Mozart


Thanks, I read your post.

I guess what we've read about the comings and goings of Mozart and Haydn during their trips would have had to be fabricated in great detail.

And how could there be some unknown composers out there who made such achievements? and have remained unknown?


----------



## Genoveva

Luchesi said:


> Thanks, I read your post.
> 
> I guess what we've read about the comings and goings of Mozart and Haydn during their trips would have had to be fabricated in great detail.
> 
> And how could there be some unknown composers out there who made such achievements? and have remained unknown?


If you care to read through the first main thread that Newman started in October 2006 you'll see that his assertions were probed quite carefully, and it became obvious that he had no satisfactory answers to the question about how all the composers he reckoned were the real composers behind the scenes supplying Mozart and Haydn remained unknown.


----------



## Kieran

Luchesi said:


> Thanks, I read your post.
> 
> I guess what we've read about the comings and goings of Mozart and Haydn during their trips would have had to be fabricated in great detail.
> 
> And how could there be some unknown composers out there who made such achievements? and have remained unknown?


Exactly. Having read some of Newman's theories, it seems that these are more about him, than any inquiry into truth. I'm no fan of conspiracy theorists at the best of times, but when something is continually asserted without a shred of proof, I get to wondering, what's this dude _really _on about? Usually the answer is mundane, but irritating...


----------



## Luchesi

Genoveva said:


> If you care to read through the first main thread that Newman started in October 2006 you'll see that his assertions were probed quite carefully, and it became obvious that he had no satisfactory answers to the question about how all the composers he reckoned were the real composers behind the scenes supplying Mozart and Haydn remained unknown.


You or someone else has probably answered him point by point with evidence from letters and/or recognizable trends in musical analysis, but I haven't seen it 
A list like that, to me, would be educational. That's what I'm here for, and it's very worthwhile to read posts in here.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> Yes, we will frown upon such assertions, *but just reading these conspiracies can prod me to think about these great composers*. What were they really like as people? Does it matter?
> 
> Without being an expert we can see the consilience between musical academic disciplines analyzing a sequence of works. Then we only need a few historical facts.


I am surprised you say that. If you want to know what Mozart was like there is no shortage of material - his collected letters for one.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> You or someone else has probably answered him point by point with evidence from letters and/or recognizable trends in musical analysis, *but I haven't seen it *
> A list like that, to me, would be educational. That's what I'm here for, and it's very worthwhile to read posts in here.


You must have seen some of it if you looked at the thread, even 1 page of the thread. Most of it is exposing flaws in Newman's arguments rather than establishing the truth of Mozart's authorship - something that, I understand was offered, a real Mozart scholar invited Newman to look over some Mozart manuscripts, compare his hand with the letters etc and various academic methods of establishing authorship - but he never accepted the invitation just as he never submitted his findings to any musical journal, preferring to gather followers from forums where he hoped he could persuade casual enthusiasts to accept his views.


----------



## Luchesi

stomanek said:


> You must have seen some of it if you looked at the thread, even 1 page of the thread. Most of it is exposing flaws in Newman's arguments rather than establishing the truth of Mozart's authorship - something that, I understand was offered, a real Mozart scholar invited Newman to look over some Mozart manuscripts, compare his hand with the letters etc and various academic methods of establishing authorship - but he never accepted the invitation just as he never submitted his findings to any musical journal, preferring to gather followers from forums where he hoped he could persuade casual enthusiasts to accept his views.


So this cadre of posters didn't know that works could be identified by forensic handwriting analysis. I have to wonder why they would spend so much time on something that could be checked by modern methods.

With a conspiracy in science it's the same sort of thing. If your new science doesn't go anywhere, doesn't predict reliably, and doesn't eventually lead to progress and more science - then why would you spend your time on the conspiracy? For purely personal reasons I guess..


----------



## JosefinaHW

Woodduck said:


> ......I'm not criticizing this thread, by the way.The differences between Mozart and Haydn make a good topic for discussion......


Now having read the background to which Genoveva mentioned, Captain and other members, would you be interested in re-starting the discussion of the differences in Mozart and Haydn's music?


----------



## Captainnumber36

JosefinaHW said:


> Now having read the background to which Genoveva mentioned, Captain and other members, would you be interested in re-starting the discussion of the differences in Mozart and Haydn's music?


I think classifying Haydn, generally speaking, as a more muscular Mozart makes sense. We could always get into more detail on the similarities and differences of Mozart/Haydn.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Captainnumber36 said:


> I think classifying Haydn, generally speaking, as a more muscular Mozart makes sense. We could always get into more detail on the similarities and differences of Mozart/Haydn.


It doesn't matter to me how the discussion is structured. I thought it was interesting how Larkenfield mentioned rhythmic muscularity--when I heard that description I immediately thought of Bond movie music. That is at least part of what makes a piece a good running or driving piece of music,...... What piece or part of a Mozart or Haydn give you that feeling, if they do?


----------



## KenOC

I don't know about this muscular stuff, but I think that, compared with Mozart, Haydn is a bit couth-challenged.


----------



## Captainnumber36

JosefinaHW said:


> It doesn't matter to me how the discussion is structured. I thought it was interesting how Larkenfield mentioned rhythmic muscularity--when I heard that description I immediately thought of Bond movie music. That is at least part of what makes a piece a good running or driving piece of music,...... What piece or part of a Mozart or Haydn give you that feeling, if they do?


I'd say a lot of the peak moments in early Mozart symphonies and just about any of the peaks in a Haydn symphony.


----------



## Captainnumber36

KenOC said:


> I don't know about this muscular stuff, but I think that, compared with Mozart, Haydn is a bit couth-challenged.


I can see that. Mozart is more well mannered in his music.


----------



## Barbebleu

Why on earth is anyone paying attention to anything that Newman ever posted light years ago. He has been debunked by everyone who has a shred of musical knowledge on this forum aeons ago. Dearie me. As every school boy knows Haydn laid the grundrisse and Mozart amplified it. Both have their position in the pantheon of great composers and comparisons are invidious and anathemic.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Originally Posted by *KenOC*  
I don't know about this muscular stuff, but I think that, compared with Mozart, Haydn is a bit couth-challenged. 
I can see that. Mozart is more well mannered in his music.

Ok, I'm taking EdwardBast as my model: Would you both please give us one or a few specific excerpts from their compositions?


----------



## Captainnumber36

Such vigor in all three movements.


----------



## JosefinaHW

We mentioned biographies of Mozart in this and another thread. Last night I read in Schonberg's _The Lives of the Great Composers_ that Mozart was extremely sensitive to loud noises. "His ear was so delicate that loud sounds would make him physically ill." IF this is true, it could be part of the reason that Mozart's music is dynamically less "muscular" than Haydn. Mozart composed for a small orchestra and avoided very loud dynamics. I say "IF this is true" because I was listening to a Great Courses program in which the lecturer said that Mozart used a small orchestra and soft dynamic during keyboard concerti because the keyboard instruments of the day could not produce a loud sound. The same person also said that most/many (I can't remember exactly) of the piano concerti were composed as harpsichord concerti. ....


----------



## Captainnumber36

KenOC said:


> I don't know about this muscular stuff, but I think that, compared with Mozart, Haydn is a bit couth-challenged.


Part of what I love about him, but I love Mozart for his refined nature!


----------



## KenOC

JosefinaHW said:


> Ok, I'm taking EdwardBast as my model: Would you both please give us one or a few specific excerpts from their compositions?


Well, take for example Haydn's famous bassoon flatulence in his 93rd symphony (1791), written for coarse and loutish audiences of tradesmen in England. Mozart, by comparison a model of decorum, would never have written that! Instead, he wrote dulcet and tasteful music such as his ethereal canon _Leck mich im Arsch_ k.231/382c (1782), which was heard only in Viennese salons frequented by the better sort of person.

I rest my case, sir.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Luchesi said:


> So this cadre of posters didn't know that works could be identified by forensic handwriting analysis. I have to wonder why they would spend so much time on something that could be checked by modern methods.
> 
> With a conspiracy in science it's the same sort of thing. If your new science doesn't go anywhere, doesn't predict reliably, and doesn't eventually lead to progress and more science - then why would you spend your time on the conspiracy? For purely personal reasons I guess..


I am afraid that with conspiracy theorists - and I have a close friend who recently became a flat earther and moon hoaxer, planet x - the whole shebang - so I know - whatever evidence you put before them - they will say it's a red herring.


----------



## Genoveva

KenOC said:


> Well, take for example Haydn's famous bassoon flatulence in his 93rd symphony (1791), written for coarse and loutish audiences of tradesmen in England. Mozart, by comparison a model of decorum, would never have written that! Instead, he wrote dulcet and tasteful music such as his ethereal canon *Leck mich im Arsch* k.231/382c (1782), which was heard only in Viennese salons frequented by the better sort of person.
> 
> I rest my case, sir.


This is a family-friendly forum. One should be careful not to say anything that might cause the children to ask their mummies what that man with the funny face and big ears is talking about, innit?


----------



## Woodduck

Mozart luxuriates in the pleasures of the flesh; he spins out melody after melody, keeping us so absorbed in the beauty of invention that when he brings us back to his opening material at the end of a development we wonder how we got there. The mechanics of composition have vanished. Mozart conceals his bones.

Haydn wants us to know how we got there, and where we are at every moment. He exults in the control of musical time like the deist's watchmaker God, and he makes sure we understand and share his delight. Even his famed humor is a playing with time, with our expectation of the logical course of events. Haydn reveals his bones.

I don't know whether Haydn is more muscular than Mozart, but he is definitely more skeletal.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Captainnumber36 said:


> Part of what I love about him, *but I love Mozart for his refined nature*!


Really? he had a vulgar sense of humour, and if you read is letters - you will see that he is no poet nor philosopher. He talks about bodily functions more than he wonders about the beauties of nature or the miracle of life and existence.


----------



## Captainnumber36

stomanek said:


> Really? he had a vulgar sense of humour, and if you read is letters - you will see that he is no poet nor philosopher. He talks about bodily functions more than he wonders about the beauties of nature or the miracle of life and existence.


Musically?
15 Characters.


----------



## Captainnumber36

KenOC said:


> Well, take for example Haydn's famous bassoon flatulence in his 93rd symphony (1791), written for coarse and loutish audiences of tradesmen in England. Mozart, by comparison a model of decorum, would never have written that! Instead, he wrote dulcet and tasteful music such as his ethereal canon _Leck mich im Arsch_ k.231/382c (1782), which was heard only in Viennese salons frequented by the better sort of person.
> 
> I rest my case, sir.


That's hilarious! :lol:
15 Characters.


----------



## Mandryka

stomanek said:


> Really? he had a vulgar sense of humour, and if you read is letters - you will see that he is *no poet *nor philosopher. He talks about bodily functions more than he wonders about the beauties of nature or the miracle of life and existence.


Sounds like Rimbaud and Villon.


----------



## Luchesi

stomanek said:


> I am afraid that with conspiracy theorists - and I have a close friend who recently became a flat earther and moon hoaxer, planet x - the whole shebang - so I know - whatever evidence you put before them - they will say it's a red herring.


Yes, it's sad for him.

Ask him about planetary vorticity which we use every day and is verified every 12 hours.

Ask him about the physics of planetary accretion which tells us that no large body that's bigger than 300 miles in size can remain flat. They all take on a spheroidal shape.

Ask him how fast a distant galaxy must move in order to orbit the Earth every 24 hours and show up in the exact same location in the sky, day after day. The answer is about 700 thousand light years per second for a galaxy that's 10 billion light years away.


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## JosefinaHW

By Ken:
"Well, take for example Haydn's famous bassoon flatulence in his 93rd symphony (1791), written for coarse and loutish audiences of tradesmen in England. Mozart, by comparison a model of decorum, would never have written that! Instead, he wrote dulcet and tasteful music such as his ethereal canon _Leck mich im Arsch_ k.231/382c (1782), which was heard only in Viennese salons frequented by the better sort of person."

By Woodduck:
"Mozart luxuriates in the pleasures of the flesh; he spins out melody after melody, keeping us so absorbed in the beauty of invention that when he brings us back to his opening material at the end of a development we wonder how we got there. The mechanics of composition have vanished. Mozart conceals his bones.

Haydn wants us to know how we got there, and where we are at every moment. He exults in the control of musical time like the deist's watchmaker God, and he makes sure we understand and share his delight. Even his famed humor is a playing with time, with our expectation of the logical course of events. Haydn reveals his bones.

I don't know whether Haydn is more muscular than Mozart, but he is definitely more skeletal."

I love these two posts!!! I love them SO much that I am going to just let them sit here together for awhile, so that I (everyone else?) can just bask in their rays without distraction....


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## hpowders

OP: It's more complicated than that.

Haydn and Mozart were two very different composers. The only similarity for me is their time on planet earth overlapped.

Mozart's music for me can be tiring, due to its oft-labeled "perfection", which leaves me cold much of the time. Beautiful with nothing behind the notes.

Haydn's music always demonstrates its humanity to me-so warm and alive!!

Thank the Lord that Beethoven had the human Haydn as a teacher rather than Mozart!

*Response to Josefina, down below:*

*Josefina-Mozart's music tends to be a bit too perfect. Lacking a wee bit of soul, at times.*

*I prefer the earthier, wittier, more "human", less "perfect" composer, Haydn.*

*I do love Mozart....but I love Haydn much more!!* *I respond to it very favorably.*

*Also, what I may have written months ago in no way reflects how I feel about that topic today!!* *My opinions can change DAILY!!!*


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## PlaySalieri

hpowders said:


> OP: It's more complicated than that.
> 
> Haydn and Mozart were two very different composers. The only similarity for me is their time on planet earth overlapped.
> 
> Mozart's music for me can be tiring, due to its oft-labeled "perfection", which leaves me cold much of the time. Beautiful with nothing behind the notes.
> 
> Haydn's music always demonstrates its humanity to me-so warm and alive!!
> 
> Thank the Lord that Beethoven had the human Haydn as a teacher rather than Mozart!


I like Haydn but cant relate to your comments - Mozart's operas, for example, are notable for their humanity. Compare Fidelio with Le Nozze Di Figaro and you will find that Mozart had all the earthly humanity that Beethoven lacked. Mozart, esp in his concerti middle movements - oozes human emotion.


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## Genoveva

If someone likes Mozart I can't see what they find in Haydn that they don't like, and vice versa. Agreed there are differences in style between the two composers, but for me the differences are a point of virtue as its adds to variety of "classical" era music, and is definitely not something that I would use to try to justify any negative comments about either of these truly great composers.

Overall, I find Haydn's music rather more predictable in terms of where he's moving towards, and Mozart somewhat more reflective and less predictable as to what he may pull out of the bag later.

From his time spent with Haydn, I can see where Beethoven may have got the idea from of incorporating a strong forward momentum in some of his music. Schubert, on the hand, picked up on the Mozartian style of a more wandering approach, and filling his music with a rich variety of moods and textures.

If Mozart hadn't existed I'd place Haydn rather higher in my pecking order of favourites, but Haydn is still highly placed. I'm currently absorbed in my listening of various versions of the _Stabat Mater,_ and Haydn's is among the best in my opinion.


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## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> *If someone likes Mozart I can't see what they find in Haydn that they don't like,* and vice versa. Agreed there are differences in style between the two composers, but for me the differences are a point of virtue as its adds to variety of "classical" era music, and is definitely not something that I would use to try to justify any negative comments about either of these truly great composers.
> 
> Overall, I find Haydn's music rather more predictable in terms of where he's moving towards, and Mozart somewhat more reflective and less predictable as to what he may pull out of the bag later.
> 
> From his time spent with Haydn, I can see where Beethoven may have got the idea from of incorporating a strong forward momentum in some of his music. Schubert, on the hand, picked up on the Mozartian style of a more wandering approach, and filling his music with a rich variety of moods and textures.
> 
> If Mozart hadn't existed I'd place Haydn rather higher in my pecking order of favourites, but Haydn is still highly placed. I'm currently absorbed in my listening of various versions of the _Stabat Mater,_ and Haydn's is among the best in my opinion.


Agreed - though my impression is that there are more Haydn fans who cant listen to Mozart than vice versa, in fact I cant recall any Mozart fan on this board not liking Haydn. If you like classical era music - I dont see how you cant find something in both Haydn and Mozart as they were the best composers of that era by a long way.

There's a certain - yes but Haydn is the connoisseur's choice, ongoing on TC. It is, as it were - an unnecessary line of defence for Haydn fans irked by Mozart's greater fame and reputation and overall exulted adulation and praise, in my view.


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## JosefinaHW

hpowders said:


> OP: It's more complicated than that.
> 
> Haydn and Mozart were two very different composers. The only similarity for me is their time on planet earth overlapped.
> 
> Mozart's music for me can be tiring, due to its oft-labeled "perfection", which leaves me cold much of the time. Beautiful with nothing behind the notes.
> 
> Haydn's music always demonstrates its humanity to me-so warm and alive!!
> 
> Thank the Lord that Beethoven had the human Haydn as a teacher rather than Mozart!


HPowders, I was hoping that you would join this thread, but I expected a very different response. In another thread you and other members praised Mozart very highly for the sensuality of his music. Mozart composed SO much music that I would imagine one could find examples for almost any description. I cannot send you a PM, so would you mind reflecting a bit further on Mozart's music.


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## JosefinaHW

Stomanek, Genoveva, and Other Members. If you don't mind, would you please give some non-opera examples of differences in music of Haydn and Mozart.


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## tdc

stomanek said:


> in fact I cant recall any Mozart fan on this board not liking Haydn.


I'm a big Mozart fan and do not enjoy the music of Haydn, finding it bland and lacking from a harmonic perspective, like eating food without any spices. This is partly why I do not enjoy Beethoven much either as I find his harmonic language so similar to Haydn's. In general I find the Classical era of music the least appealing of all of the eras of Western music, with Mozart being the big exception as he is in my personal top 5 favorite composers. Gluck and Weber do also have some music I enjoy but no where near the extent of Mozart and it is only rare occasions I listen to them.

I do acknowledge that Haydn and Beethoven were great, influential composers, I just do not enjoy their music.


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## Phil loves classical

JosefinaHW said:


> Stomanek, Genoveva, and Other Members. If you don't mind, would you please give some non-opera examples of differences in music of Haydn and Mozart.


The Classical conventions they follow are very similar. It is difficult to describe their differences objectively, for me at least. My impression is Mozart only broke the Haydn mould (or mode) mainly in his last 5 years or so, although there were a few pieces here and there before (his Symphony No. 25 for example). Almost all of his earlier music is very close to Haydn's to my ears. After then Haydn seems to be more methodical and formulaic than Mozart. Mozart seems to take more risks. It may sound like I feel Haydn is a bit boring, but actually no. I think he is still very creative in his melodies, just that he has less surprises in his developments, which makes his little "surprises" more startling, given the context. I believe Mozart's music is more dissonant at times, and his chord progressions are less predictable and drastic, which shifts the mood more suddenly.

For a crude analogy, I think of Haydn as more like John Wayne (at least to his fans), and Mozart like James Cagney.


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## Genoveva

JosefinaHW said:


> Stomanek, Genoveva, and Other Members. If you don't mind, would you please give some non-opera examples of differences in music of Haydn and Mozart.


It's difficult to describe in words the main differences between Mozart and Haydn. It's fairly simple to see why as they're both from the same time period, both produced music of very high quality, and the conventions of "classical era" music in general at the time they were writing did not allow a great deal of leeway in the way the music was to be presented if it was to meet standard expectations.

Nevertheless, certain differences can be observed. The best way to identify differences is by listening carefully to a few pieces and asking yourself what's basically different between them. I'd suggest you listen to a good recording of Mozart's String Quintet K 516. In my opinion it typifies Mozart's brilliance in the chamber music area. It's a four movement piece, and each of them is a treasure, with all manner of rich and contrasting music of incredible ingenuity in the way it all hangs together. It has some delicate dissonances, displaying some very sensitive emotional switches. The third movement in particular is simply one of the most beautiful ever constructed. In listening to the whole work, you are not aware that it's going anywhere in particular as it doesn't follow quite the usual conventions of the day in terms of standard layout.

Contrast this with an almost equally popular work by Haydn, his Quartet No 53 in D major ('The Lark'). It has really gorgeous themes and it's all seemlessly put together, but it tends to move forward like an unfolding story, and doesn't stop to ponder, explore the scene anything like so extensively as the piece by Mozart. It doesn't contain much in the way of dissonances, which personally I like to hear in chamber music.


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## PlaySalieri

I'm not really up to describing the differences to any extent. I think first of all Mozart is a superior melodist - so I always find his main themes more interesting than Haydn - rythmically more inventive, switch of mood happens more - and tonal shifts used to contrast mood, as, for example in many of the piano concertos. 
In the symphones - listening to haydn's London set - he has a template, as it were - and he sticks to it - producing some fine symphonies - Mozart's last 4 - there is obviously no template and he produced 4 great works all as different from each other as Beethoven's best 4. Mozart then - level of invention much higher, bolder. With Haydn each new symphony seems to take over where the previous one left off. Not so with Mozart - its almost like he forgot what came before and has to start afresh - with no point of reference from where to begin.


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## PlaySalieri

Phil loves classical said:


> The Classical conventions they follow are very similar. It is difficult to describe their differences objectively, for me at least. My impression is Mozart only broke the Haydn mould (or mode) mainly in his last 5 years or so, although there were a few pieces here and there before (his Symphony No. 25 for example). Almost all of his earlier music is very close to Haydn's to my ears. After then Haydn seems to be more methodical and formulaic than Mozart. Mozart seems to take more risks. It may sound like I feel Haydn is a bit boring, but actually no. I think he is still very creative in his melodies, just that he has less surprises in his developments, which makes his little "surprises" more startling, given the context. I believe Mozart's music is more dissonant at times, and his chord progressions are less predictable and drastic, which shifts the mood more suddenly.
> 
> For a crude analogy, I think of Haydn as more like John Wayne (at least to his fans), and Mozart like James Cagney.


Mozart modeled a lot of his earlier works on Haydn. But really from the 1st PC onwards he was on his own. The violin concertos are unlike any of Haydn's, for example.


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## Larkenfield

I highly enjoy them both though Mozart is dearer to my heart, while Haydn, delightful too, seems fundamentally more accessible, less concentrated melodically and harmonically, easier to understand, but possessed of great emotional directness and vitality.

Speaking broadly about their differences...

Mozart = the inspired revelation of genius (more refined, bubbling, sparkling, passionate, harmonically complex, soaring, intense and sublime)

Haydn = the inspired genius of craftsmanship (more earthy, spacious, amiable, fundamental, accessible, ingenious, inventive, less complex harmonically, more rhythmically direct and vital, healthy of mind and body)


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## janxharris

mbhaub said:


> Less tidy.
> 
> Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me. There's really very, very little Mozart that I can stand. Haydn though is much more enjoyable to listen to and to play. It's more down to earth and human. But then Mozart wrote the G minor symphony - and it gets no better than that.


I feel pretty much the same regarding Mozart - though I would limit the reverence in the 40 symphony to the first movement.
The Lacrimosa from his requiem is lovely too.

Certainly, Haydn is more muscular than Mozart.


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> Agreed - though my impression is that there are more Haydn fans who cant listen to Mozart than vice versa, in fact I cant recall any Mozart fan on this board not liking Haydn. If you like classical era music - I dont see how you cant find something in both Haydn and Mozart as they were the best composers of that era by a long way.
> 
> There's a certain - yes but Haydn is the connoisseur's choice, ongoing on TC. It is, as it were - an unnecessary line of defence for Haydn fans irked by Mozart's greater fame and reputation and overall exulted adulation and praise, in my view.


According to some poll statistics I collected last year on members' favorite 10 composers, Beethoven was No 1, followed by Bach No 2, Mozart No 3 and Haydn in 9th. Mozart was roughly twice as popular as Haydn based on votes cast. About 90% of the people who selected Haydn also included Mozart in their top 10.

To some extent, it's possible that the existence of Mozart "crowds out" Haydn because some posters may have diversified their selections to include composers from outside this time period, rather than have two quite similar composers in terms of overall style being close together in their listings.

I guess that if Mozart hadn't existed then many of his votes would have gone to Haydn. Whether or not this would be enough to elevate Haydn to 3rd position I do not know, but I reckon it could be close.


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## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> According to some poll statistics I collected last year on members' favorite 10 composers, Beethoven was No 1, followed by Bach No 2, Mozart No 3 and Haydn in 9th. Mozart was roughly twice as popular as Haydn based on votes cast. *About 90% of the people who selected Haydn also included Mozart in their top 10.*
> 
> To some extent, it's possible that the existence of Mozart "crowds out" Haydn because some posters may have diversified their selections to include composers from outside this time period, rather than have two quite similar composers in terms of overall style being close together in their listings.
> 
> I guess that if Mozart hadn't existed then many of his votes would have gone to Haydn. Whether or not this would be enough to elevate Haydn to 3rd position I do not know, but I reckon it could be close.


I would be more interested in where people who chose haydn as no 1 put Mozart and vice versa

also - I have a hunch that people who put Mozart at no 1 put Schubert higher than Beethoven - is it possible to check that?


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## Mal

Genoveva said:


> According to some poll statistics I collected last year on members' favorite 10 composers, Beethoven was No 1, followed by Bach No 2, Mozart No 3 and Haydn in 9th. Mozart was roughly twice as popular as Haydn based on votes cast. About 90% of the people who selected Haydn also included Mozart in their top 10.
> 
> To some extent, it's possible that the existence of Mozart "crowds out" Haydn because some posters may have diversified their selections to include composers from outside this time period, rather than have two quite similar composers in terms of overall style being close together in their listings.


Really? Why doesn't Mozart crowd out Beethoven or vice versa? I'd have said Mozart and Beethoven were my favourites in earlier times, but I was probably put off by encountering badly played Haydn in my younger days (too-early period & draggy big bands...) But the more I'm finding well played Haydn the more he's rising in my estimation. After listening to Ward/NCO/Naxos' take on 26, 35, 49 he might just have made it to the top table.


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## wkasimer

Not to be obnoxious, but I sometimes wonder if Mozart is more popular than Haydn because of "Amadeus".


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## Luchesi

Compare Haydn's late sonata in C






with Mozart's first sonata in C.

Haydn shows us what can be achieved and expressed in the form, while the Mozart is a teaching piece for piano students.


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> I would be more interested in where people who chose haydn as no 1 put Mozart and vice versa
> 
> also - I have a hunch that people who put Mozart at no 1 put Schubert higher than Beethoven - is it possible to check that?


The poll statistics I was referring to were derived from six polls taken over the period from 2009 to 2016. Each poll asked voters to list their favourite composers in rank order. The number of composers asked for ranged from 10 up to 100, depending on the particular poll. The poll for which I became responsible was the last of the six.

The data that I extracted from the six polls was in respect of the top 10 composers that were listed by members. I discarded anything below rank 10 (i.e. 11 and higher). Some members voted in more than one poll. Where this occurred, I took that member's last set of votes. The total number of members (with no duplication) from the aggregated polls was 241.

Based on the above:

1. The number of members who voted for Beethoven in the No 1 slot was 51.

2. The corresponding figures for those who voted for Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Haydn, Schubert in the No 1 slot were 51, 27, 9, 7, 4 respectively.

3. Among the 27 voters who voted for Mozart in the No 1 slot:

•	26 included Beethoven in their top 10, 
•	19 included Schubert in their top 10 
•	15 included Haydn in their top 10.

4. Of those 26 who included Beethoven in their top 10, the average rank for Beethoven by these voters was No 3; for Schubert the average rank was No 5; for Haydn the average position was No 4.

5. Among the 7 voters who voted for Haydn in the No 1 slot, 6 included Mozart in their top 10. Of the 6 who included Mozart, the average rank for Mozart was No 7.


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## larold

Mozart is clearly one of the greatest, if not *the* greatest, of all classical music composers. His comparison to Bach, Beethoven and Haydn belies the fact he did everything in his life in 35 years. To show you what impact that made:

-- Had Bach only lived that long, he'd never have written the St. Matthew Passion, his Cantata BWV 4 (or No. 4) would have been the final cantata, there would be no Double or Triple concerto, no Orchestral Suites, no St. John Passion and no Brandenburg Concertos. It's hard to say what his most famous composition would have been but it is clear he'd have been no better than the fourth-best composer of his time behind Handel, Vivaldi and Telemann.

-- Had Beethoven only lived 35 years he'd never have composed the late quartets or piano sonatas, there would be no 9th symphony (or any symphony after No. 3,) there would be no "Emporer" concerto, no Violin concerto, no Missa Solemnis, and no Wellington's Victory. His greatest works would have been the "Eroica" symphony written 1803 (his final symphony) and his opera "Fidelio" written 1804.

-- Had Haydn only lived 35 years, there would be no Creation or Seasons oratorios, his keyboard sonatas would be finished at No. 37, and his symphonies would have ended No. 78 -- no "Paris," "Solomon" or "London" symphonies. He would probably not be considered the "father" of the string quartet since most of those were written after age 45.

In other words, had all 4 composers only lived 35 years there would be no question Mozart was the greatest titan of classical music by far. All the compositions that define the latter three composers were written after they turned 35 years of age.

Anyone that thinks Mozart prissy should hear the Mass in C Minor or Don Giovanni, especially the scene where the Don goes to Hell. You can also listen to any of the Piano Concertos No. 20 or later and any of the Symphonies Nos. 35-41 to dispel that idea. You should remove this silly idea from your head, anyway. What you think is feminine is actually musical perfection.


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## poconoron

larold said:


> Mozart is clearly one of the greatest, if not *the* greatest, of all classical music composers. His comparison to Bach, Beethoven and Haydn belies the fact he did everything in his life in 35 years. To show you what impact that made:
> 
> -- Had Bach only lived that long, he'd never have written the St. Matthew Passion, his Cantata BWV 4 (or No. 4) would have been the final cantata, there would be no Double or Triple concerto, no Orchestral Suites, no St. John Passion and no Brandenburg Concertos. It's hard to say what his most famous composition would have been but it is clear he'd have been no better than the fourth-best composer of his time behind Handel, Vivaldi and Telemann.
> 
> -- Had Beethoven only lived 35 years he'd never have composed the late quartets or piano sonatas, there would be no 9th symphony (or any symphony after No. 3,) there would be no "Emporer" concerto, no Violin concerto, no Missa Solemnis, and no Wellington's Victory. His greatest works would have been the "Eroica" symphony written 1803 (his final symphony) and his opera "Fidelio" written 1804.
> 
> -- Had Haydn only lived 35 years, there would be no Creation or Seasons oratorios, his keyboard sonatas would be finished at No. 37, and his symphonies would have ended No. 78 -- no "Paris," "Solomon" or "London" symphonies. He would probably not be considered the "father" of the string quartet since most of those were written after age 45.
> 
> In other words, had all 4 composers only lived 35 years there would be no question Mozart was the greatest titan of classical music by far. All the compositions that define the latter three composers were written after they turned 35 years of age.
> 
> Anyone that thinks Mozart prissy should hear the Mass in C Minor or Don Giovanni, especially the scene where the Don goes to Hell. You can also listen to any of the Piano Concertos No. 20 or later and any of the Symphonies Nos. 35-41 to dispel that idea. You should remove this silly idea from your head, anyway. What you think is feminine is actually musical perfection.


What he said....................


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## EdwardBast

I haven't thought about the differences between the two composers for a long time. Above I like the comments of Woodduck in #84 and Genoveva in #93 because these get at, or at least hint at, concrete musical features. Anyway: 

Haydn is more economical or parsimonious in his choice and use of musical material than Mozart. His movements in sonata form were often monothematic and when there were multiple themes they were more likely to be closely related or variants of one another. Mozart tended to have a profusion of different themes and he seemed less compelled to unify them in an obvious way. 

Relations to the Bachs: Haydn is more like CPE Bach, Mozart more like JC.

Haydn was more likely to build movements around formal contrapuntal procedures like canon and fugue, or to use retrograde writing and other arcane devices. This is not to say he was more skilled at this than Mozart — we all know the finale of the Jupiter — just that he seemed to enjoy doing it more. 

Haydn was more experimental, like he was writing for his own edification and the advancement of his skill, rather than to please a fickle audience. For much of his career, after all, he was writing for the same insular audience and he knew what he could get away with with his patrons. Mozart had more pressure minute to minute to satisfy a more general and fickle audience, so was perhaps less likely to "screw around." I think Haydn had more of a penchant for musical jokes in his instrumental music.

Haydn often wrote in a consciously rustic, folk-song like manner (rhythmic, terse, use of drone fifths) whereas Mozart had a more refined, Italianate melodic sense. Mozart was more cosmopolitan. 

I once came to the conclusion that Haydn was freer with his recapitulations than Mozart, but I won't vouch for that now. 

In his early days Haydn was extremely free in his use of asymmetrical phrase structures, more so than Mozart I'd say, but later this reversed, Haydn becoming more square.

Oh yeah, I forgot about muscularity. I hope some of what I wrote bears on this question because I'm not sure what it means.


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## Genoveva

larold said:


> Mozart is clearly one of the greatest, if not *the* greatest, of all classical music composers. His comparison to Bach, Beethoven and Haydn belies the fact he did everything in his life in 35 years. To show you what impact that made:
> 
> etc etc


All perfectly fine and I agree with you say up to a point, but the same thing has often been said of Schubert who died several years younger than Mozart and who achieved an enormous amount in his short life and was getting better and even more productive in his last year.

The question is, though, whether age at death is relevant in deciding a composer's greatness, or whether it should only be based only on what they actually achieved in their lifetimes rather than what they might have achieved based on some hypothetical normalised lifespan. In most job assessments, it is achievement that is normally considered to be of main importance, not potential achievement under a different set of circumstances.

I am inclined to believe that the only sensible basis is to base the assessment on what they actually achieved, regardless of difference in age at death. Only if one wishes to debate which composers had the highest genius level then that's posibly a different matter, and one that has been discussed at length in another thread.

I happen to believe that both Mozart and Schubert score very highly here given the speed at which they were both able to write high quality music, but I can see the other point of view that this may not be comparing like with like. Taking Beethoven, for example, he spent a lot of time taking the classical model to new heights and making various changes that were possibly outside and beyond the classical model altogether, some of which were only taken up a while later. These are important factors that cannot ignored. But it's very easy to become tangled up in a very complex discussion of these issues and there doesn't appear to be any simple way of resolving all the conflicting opinions.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> The poll statistics I was referring to were derived from six polls taken over the period from 2009 to 2016. Each poll asked voters to list their favourite composers in rank order. The number of composers asked for ranged from 10 up to 100, depending on the particular poll. The poll for which I became responsible was the last of the six.
> 
> The data that I extracted from the six polls was in respect of the top 10 composers that were listed by members. I discarded anything below rank 10 (i.e. 11 and higher). Some members voted in more than one poll. Where this occurred, I took that member's last set of votes. The total number of members (with no duplication) from the aggregated polls was 241.
> 
> Based on the above:
> 
> 1. The number of members who voted for Beethoven in the No 1 slot was 51.
> 
> 2. The corresponding figures for those who voted for Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Haydn, Schubert in the No 1 slot were 51, 27, 9, 7, 4 respectively.
> 
> 3. Among the 27 voters who voted for Mozart in the No 1 slot:
> 
> •	26 included Beethoven in their top 10,
> •	19 included Schubert in their top 10
> •	15 included Haydn in their top 10.
> 
> 4. Of those 26 who included Beethoven in their top 10, the average rank for Beethoven by these voters was No 3; for Schubert the average rank was No 5; for Haydn the average position was No 4.
> 
> 5. Among the 7 voters who voted for Haydn in the No 1 slot, 6 included Mozart in their top 10. Of the 6 who included Mozart, the average rank for Mozart was No 7.


Thank you - it must have taken some time to compile those stats.

So my hunch about Mozart fans preferring Schubert to Beethoven is wrong.
But Mozart fans place Haydn higher than Haydn fans place Mozart. But there are fewer Haydn voters putting Haydn at no1 by a factor of 4 - so no real conclusion can be drawn.

But only 1 who put haydn in at no 1 excluded Mozart. (1/7) But 12/27 Mozart fans excluded Haydn from their top 10 (near 50%) - this is probably the most significant stat from above. More Haydn fans rate Mozart than Mozart fans rate Haydn.


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## Captainnumber36

Genoveva said:


> All perfectly fine and I agree with you up to a point, but the same thing has often been said of Schubert who died several years younger than Mozart and who achieved an enormous amount in his short life and was getting better and even more productive in his last year.
> 
> The question is, though, whether age at death is relevant in deciding a composer's greatness, or whether it should only be based only on what they actually achieved in their lifetimes rather than what they might have achieved based on some hypothetical normalised lifespan. In most job assessments, it is achievement that is normally considered to be of main importance, not potential achievement under a different set of circumstances.
> 
> I am inclined to believe that the only sensible basis is to base the assessment on what they actually achieved, regardless of difference in age at death. Only if one wishes to debate which composers had the highest genius level then that's posibly a different matter, and one that has been discussed at length in another thread.
> 
> I happen to believe that both Mozart and Schubert score very highly here given the speed at which they were both able to write high quality music, but I can see the other point of view that this may not be comparing like with like. Taking Beethoven, for example, he spent a lot of time taking the classical model to new heights and making various changes that were possibly outside and beyond the classical model altogether, some of which were only taken up a while later. These are important factors that cannot ignored. But it's very easy to become tangled up in a very complex discussion of these issues and there doesn't appear to be any simple way of resolving all the conflicting opinions.


I agree, we should base it on what they created in their lifetimes.


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## PlaySalieri

wkasimer said:


> Not to be obnoxious, but I sometimes wonder if Mozart is more popular than Haydn because of "Amadeus".


Mozart was more popular than Haydn well before Amadeus.


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## Jacck

Mozart is more popular because of his name. Mozart sounds so cool. But Haydn? Who would like to be named Haydn?


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## Jacck

I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me.
Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.
http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/


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## Captainnumber36

stomanek said:


> Mozart was more popular than Haydn well before Amadeus.


History has just grown to favor Mozart, for many reasons, one of them must be having to do with the music.


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## Captainnumber36

Jacck said:


> I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me.
> Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.
> http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/


I was just going to say, I think Mozart may have progressed more as he aged where Haydn played it safe.


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## TxllxT

Thinking of Haydn I just cannot imagine him composing demonic music that really convinces. Haydn and Don Giovanni are living in different worlds, that never join or overlap. The term 'muscular' I think it might be applied to Haydn's brain being magically gymnastic and elastically refined, whereas with Mozart's brain there is: just spirit. Mozart's spirit most of the time is well-spirited, but sometimes she/he/it may turn evil.


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## jdec

Jacck said:


> I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me.
> Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.
> http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/


Brain	May 8, 2014
"_It is possible to instill appreciation for a composer without diminishing the achievements of others…but since this article was meant to provoke in the style of Glenn Gould, I would like to add some of my own thoughts. The comment^ about Mozart's music being 'muzak' of the 18th century did make me cringe a little bit at the ignorance, but it is a common misconception that some people have. Mozart intended his music to appeal to the connoisseur and novice alike. There are more elements to his music than pleasing melodies, and this becomes evident to those willing to dig a little deeper than their 100 greatest classical hits CDs.
. You mention the inferiority of much of Mozart's symphonies, or "orchestral music," but the fact is that most of his symphonies, the first 30+, were written by the time he was 18. It doesn't seem fair to compare Mozart's juvenalia to a Haydn's mature work. I don't think it's controversial to say that Haydn's late symphonies were in turn influenced by Mozart's last efforts, in a genre that wasn't nearly as important to him. Orchestral music does include Mozart's brilliant piano concertos and a few of his serenades, if I'm not mistaken. Mozart's struggle with his 6 quartets had more to do with trying something entirely different from what Haydn was doing. The counterpoint, subtle chromaticism , dissonance, combining disparate music elements into a cohesive whole(which Schoenberg admired so much) are unlike the quartets Haydn had composed and just as with the symphonies, Haydn learned from Mozart's own example.
Finally, Mozart's total catalogue at a glance only appears so full of second-rate works because Mozart's best are not packaged neatly together as with Haydn's symphonies, quartets, sonatas, etc. which makes them harder to locate for those that are lazy, or turned off by first-impressions of his music and, like many people, unwilling to give up their prejudices. Mozart's best are spread across a wider range of genres than Haydn's because of his lack of a secure position/income and his eagerness to exercise his ability in full, the two piano quartets, for example. What worthwhile pieces Mozart DID manage to compose, in my opinion:

Symphonies: 29,31,33,35,36, and the very best: 38-41
The 7 mature operas and selections from Zaide
Piano concertos 9-27 all of which range from great to masterpieces
6 viola quintets
Coronation Mass, C minor Mass, Requiem, Missa Solemnis in C K.337, Missa Brevis in B flat k. 275, Exsultate Jubilate, and Vesperae Solennes de Confessore K.339
The concert arias(especially for soprano)
The mature violin sonatas
Fantasias for musical clock/organ
10 mature string quartets: the Haydns, Hoffmeister, and Prussians
The quintets for solo instruments: Clarinet, Horn, piano and winds
The oboe quartet and flute quartets
Solo concerti for: Clarinet, horn, oboe, flute, bassoon, flute and harp, and the violin concertos.
The Kegelstatt trio, 3 or 4 of the piano trios
G minor and E-flat major piano quartets(the first masterpieces of this genre)
Gran Partita
Various serenades for winds(k.375, 388)
The "Lodron" serenade k.287
Posthorn serenade
Haffner Serenade
solo piano works(fantasias, rondos, duets, etc)
Divertimento/Trio in e flat K.563
Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola

And those are just off the top of my head, there are more still; but the point is, Mozart wrote all of them in less than half the amount of years than Haydn was composing. And that simply takes more talent, skill, and creativity._"

LL	September 14, 2009	
"_Three examples of how Mozart composed rings around Haydn:

1) His piano concertos. Haydn was simply incapable of writing this kind of thing, and he knew it. There is plausible speculation that Haydn quit writing piano concertos (except perhaps for a couple on commission) because he heard Mozart's later Viennese concertos and realized he was left in the dust along with everyone else.

2) Mozart's operas. Haydn largely quit writing operas about the time Mozart's great Viennese operas became better-known. There is better than plausible evidence to suggest Haydn quit writing operas because he knew he simply didn't have it in him to write a Figaro or a Don Giovanni

3) Mozart's string quartets. The Quartets Mozart dedicated to Haydn are simply full of things Haydn not only never thought of, but would never *have* thought of. Seriously, can you imagine Haydn writing anything that sounds like K. 464? And it's no coincidence that this was one of Beethoven's favorite pieces of any kind. You could even make a pretty convincing case that Beethoven spent the rest of his life trying to write something he thought was as good at K. 464, culminating in Op. 132, with which Beethoven came as close as he could to eclipsing his model.

Which brings me to the point: Haydn and Mozart were fundamentally different people, different artists, and to make some faux-objective claim that Haydn was somehow more talented than Mozart is just misguided._"


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> Thank you - it must have taken some time to compile those stats.
> 
> So my hunch about Mozart fans preferring Schubert to Beethoven is wrong.
> But Mozart fans place Haydn higher than Haydn fans place Mozart. But there are fewer Haydn voters putting Haydn at no1 by a factor of 4 - so no real conclusion can be drawn.
> 
> But only 1 who put haydn in at no 1 excluded Mozart. (1/7) But 12/27 Mozart fans excluded Haydn from their top 10 (near 50%) - this is probably the most significant stat from above. More Haydn fans rate Mozart than Mozart fans rate Haydn.


It did take some time.

It would seem that your hunch was not quite right about Mozart fans preferring Schubert to Beethoven. But it wasn't a bad hunch, and I too thought it was worth a closer look.

Remember that the "Mozart fans", as you refer to them, are strictly defined as those who placed Mozart in the No 1 spot. If lower ranks are included in this definition, say down as far as rank 3, a different set of results would result. Whether or not this would entail any qualitative differences in the results I don't know.

As you say, there was only 1 voter who put Haydn in at no 1 who excluded Mozart from their top 10, as against 12/27 "Mozart fans" who excluded Haydn from their top 10. In percentage terms this implies that more Haydn fans rate Mozart than Mozart fans rate Haydn, but in absolute terms a higher number of Mozart fans (15) like Haydn than Haydn fans like Mozart (6).

I know that it's very difficult for some people to list their favourites in rank order, but if it can done with a decent size sample it does enable richer and more interesting analyses of peoples' preferences than listings based on other criteria.


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## Kieran

jdec said:


> Brain May 8, 2014
> _Symphonies: 29,31,33,35,36, and the very best: 38-41
> The 7 mature operas and selections from Zaide
> Piano concertos 9-27 all of which range from great to masterpieces
> 6 viola quintets
> Coronation Mass, C minor Mass, Requiem, Missa Solemnis in C K.337, Missa Brevis in B flat k. 275, Exsultate Jubilate, and Vesperae Solennes de Confessore K.339
> The concert arias(especially for soprano)
> The mature violin sonatas
> Fantasias for musical clock/organ
> 10 mature string quartets: the Haydns, Hoffmeister, and Prussians
> The quintets for solo instruments: Clarinet, Horn, piano and winds
> The oboe quartet and flute quartets
> Solo concerti for: Clarinet, horn, oboe, flute, bassoon, flute and harp, and the violin concertos.
> The Kegelstatt trio, 3 or 4 of the piano trios
> G minor and E-flat major piano quartets(the first masterpieces of this genre)
> Gran Partita
> Various serenades for winds(k.375, 388)
> The "Lodron" serenade k.287
> Posthorn serenade
> Haffner Serenade
> solo piano works(fantasias, rondos, duets, etc)
> Divertimento/Trio in e flat K.563
> Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola
> 
> _


HC Robbins Landon compiled a similar list for his book, Mozart: The Golden Years, where he lists the amount of masterpieces both Mozart and Haydn gave the world between 1781 and 1791, when Mozart died. It's a ridiculous list, laden down with pure gold booty from both men - but by far the greater number of works in the list are by Mozart. But we all know the effect that Haydn's music had on Mozart, to the extent that often Mozart composed works in the same key as works by Haydn, perhaps as an attempt to measure himself against his great friend, but also to learn, and other composers have done this too, with Mozart. We've seen it with Betthoven, K464 being only one example.

I tend to feel there's more intensity in Mozart's music, than Haydn's. More depth and much more generosity, in the sense of just how bountiful Mozart is with great musical themes, and ideas...


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## Larkenfield

Luchesi said:


> You or someone else has probably answered him point by point with evidence from letters and/or recognizable trends in musical analysis, but I haven't seen it
> A list like that, to me, would be educational. That's what I'm here for, and it's very worthwhile to read posts in here.


Newman's controversial posts can still be found online if one looks. (Click on his name to see them.) I found him a died-in-the-wool hyper-skeptic who thought that Mozart couldn't have possibly written something as magnificent as _The Marriage of Figaro_ and attributed the authorship to someone else. Imagine Mozart at the premiere of his own opera supposedly written anonymously by some other composer and Mozart was merely taking credit for that person's achievement. Newman's posts are full of suppositions of this nature in an attempt to discredit Mozart's genius and often excruciating to read because of his extreme skepticism or the misinterpretation of how Mozart was influenced by other composers.

It's not that everything is known about Mozart or Haydn, but Newman's interpretation of the facts of their lives does not inspire respect for either of them and the unmistakable stamp that they undoubtedly put on their works of genius, because he does not seem to understand the nature of genius and tries to disprove it because he cannot figure out where Mozart was educated or trained, as if Leopold Mozart was never a source of his education.

Newman's basic skepticism starts here: "Where did W.A. Mozart learn composition, harmony and orchestration? From which teacher? At which school or college? The answer is - SILENCE." He never considers Leopold Mozart as his obvious teacher and equivalent to a school or college, though Leopold was constantly correcting Mozart's youthful scores. His book is called The Mozart Myth.

Newman: https://www.talkclassical.com/865-controversy-over-true-musical-27.html#post4798

For those interested in controversies, here's Newman's 4 Part presentation on The Mozart Myth, and listeners can decide for themselves.


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## PlaySalieri

Jacck said:


> I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me.
> Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.
> http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/


Thats a strange article as it seems to prove the opposite

*Mozart wrote a good chunk of the most deeply moving, profoundly poetic, ecstatic and often sad music ever. Of course, regular Vftp readers know that I have a special place in my heart for the Requiem, but think also of the Andante from the Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola, which towers above the rest of that piece, but is so, so, so moving. The 40th Symphony is simply the greatest tragic symphony ever written- certainly the most tragic tragic symphony ever written. When Mozart broke a sweat, he could unleash an astonishing, un-matchable facility- think of the Finale of the Jupiter.

*

he seems to give no solid reasons in favour of Haydn


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## JosefinaHW

I've read the entire thread thus far, but have barely scratched the surface of the listening, or gone back and clicked all my "Likes". But, before this night ends I just HAVE to say that I LOVE THIS FORUM and thank you all VERY MUCH for taking the time to think, reflect, and share your thoughts and reflections with the rest of us!


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## Captainnumber36

JosefinaHW said:


> I've read the entire thread thus far, but have barely scratched the surface of the listening, or gone back and clicked all my "Likes". But, before this night ends I just HAVE to say that I LOVE THIS FORUM and thank you all VERY MUCH for taking the time to think, reflect, and share your thoughts and reflections with the rest of us!


It is a great forum with lots of thinking men and women with the ability to dig deep and provide profound insights. My only gripe is that it can be very slow at times, but I'm getting used to it.


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## PlaySalieri

Larkenfield said:


> Newman's controversial posts can still be found online if one looks. (Click on his name to see them.) I found him a died-in-the-wool hyper-skeptic who thought that Mozart couldn't have possibly written something as magnificent as _The Marriage of Figaro_ and attributed the authorship to someone else. Imagine Mozart at the premiere of his own opera supposedly written anonymously by some other composer and Mozart was merely taking credit for that person's achievement. Newman's posts are full of suppositions of this nature in an attempt to discredit Mozart's genius and often excruciating to read because of his extreme skepticism or the misinterpretation of how Mozart was influenced by other composers.
> 
> It's not that everything is known about Mozart or Haydn, but Newman's interpretation of the facts of their lives does not inspire respect for either of them and the unmistakable stamp that they undoubtedly put on their works of genius, because he does not seem to understand the nature of genius and tries to disprove it because he cannot figure out where Mozart was educated or trained, as if Leopold Mozart was never a source of his education.
> 
> Newman's basic skepticism starts here: "Where did W.A. Mozart learn composition, harmony and orchestration? From which teacher? At which school or college? The answer is - SILENCE." He never considers Leopold Mozart as his obvious teacher and equivalent to a school or college, though Leopold was constantly correcting Mozart's youthful scores. His book is called The Mozart Myth.
> 
> Newman: https://www.talkclassical.com/865-controversy-over-true-musical-27.html#post4798
> 
> For those interested in controversies, here's Newman's 4 Part presentation on The Mozart Myth, and listeners can decide for themselves.


It's odd that Newman seems to neglect the fact Leopold was an accomplished composer, violinist, conductor - his treatise on violin technique is historically important and his musical works, though not important - demonstrate the high level of his craft.

But let's not allow facts to get in the way of a conspiracy theory.


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## KenOC

stomanek said:


> It's odd that Newman seems to neglect the fact Leopold was an accomplished composer, violinist, conductor - his treatise on violin technique is historically important and his musical works, though not important - demonstrate the high level of his craft.
> 
> But let's not allow facts to get in the way of a conspiracy theory.


I have read that Leopold taught young Amadeus quite carefully, using Fux's _Gradus ad Parnassum_ as his primary textbook. Amadeus was said to have always had his dog-eared copy of this valuable treatise with him. Haydn and Beethoven studied from the same source, the former on his own and the latter with both Haydn and Albrechtsberger. It's little wonder that all three excelled in counterpoint and voice leading.


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## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> I haven't thought about the differences between the two composers for a long time. Above I like the comments of Woodduck in #84 and Genoveva in #93 because these get at, or at least hint at, concrete musical features. Anyway:
> 
> Haydn is more economical or parsimonious in his choice and use of musical material than Mozart. His movements in sonata form were often monothematic and when there were multiple themes they were more likely to be closely related or variants of one another. Mozart tended to have a profusion of different themes and he seemed less compelled to unify them in an obvious way.
> 
> Relations to the Bachs: Haydn is more like CPE Bach, Mozart more like JC.
> 
> Haydn was more likely to build movements around formal contrapuntal procedures like canon and fugue, or to use retrograde writing and other arcane devices. This is not to say he was more skilled at this than Mozart - we all know the finale of the Jupiter - just that he seemed to enjoy doing it more.
> 
> Haydn was more experimental, like he was writing for his own edification and the advancement of his skill, rather than to please a fickle audience. For much of his career, after all, he was writing for the same insular audience and he knew what he could get away with with his patrons. Mozart had more pressure minute to minute to satisfy a more general and fickle audience, so was perhaps less likely to "screw around." I think Haydn had more of a penchant for musical jokes in his instrumental music.
> 
> Haydn often wrote in a consciously rustic, folk-song like manner (rhythmic, terse, use of drone fifths) whereas Mozart had a more refined, Italianate melodic sense. Mozart was more cosmopolitan.
> 
> I once came to the conclusion that Haydn was freer with his recapitulations than Mozart, but I won't vouch for that now.
> 
> In his early days Haydn was extremely free in his use of asymmetrical phrase structures, more so than Mozart I'd say, but later this reversed, Haydn becoming more square.
> 
> Oh yeah, I forgot about muscularity. I hope some of what I wrote bears on this question because I'm not sure what it means.


I'm not trying to be tyrannical or disrespectful, but I would prefer to hear people discuss and provide examples illustrating EdwardBast's thoughts. Particularly because I know very little about CPE or JC Bach's music, I'd like to hear more about these differences and similarities.

But, again, I respect the decision of other members.


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## JosefinaHW

KenOC said:


> I have read that Leopold taught young _*Amadeus*_ quite carefully, using Fux's _Gradus ad Parnassum_ as his primary textbook. Amadeus was said to have always had his dog-eared copy of this valuable treatise with him. Haydn and Beethoven studied from the same source, the former on his own and the latter with both Haydn and Albrechtsberger. It's little wonder that all three excelled in counterpoint and voice leading.


I have read contradictory things about the exact form of Wolfgang's name. One source, says Theophilus, and that this name and form of the name was in respect of his godfather. Another source says that the exact form was Gottlieb (my favorite). Then of course there is the Latin form that Wolfgang supposedly preferred later in his life.

Anyone, know what was actually on his baptismal certificate and what he preferred earlier in life?


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## KenOC

JosefinaHW said:


> Anyone, know what was actually on his baptismal certificate and what he preferred earlier in life?


Baptized as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. I believe Theophilus has the same meaning as Amadeus and Gottlieb, which is lover of God. Maybe somebody can confirm this, or not.


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## Genoveva

Just for the record, and mainly for stomanek's benefit who asked for the calculations, I have re-checked the results reported in post #109 and there are some very minor revisions to some ranks that don't affect the main results:

1. The number of members who voted for Beethoven in the No 1 slot was 51.

2. The corresponding figures for those who voted for Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Haydn, Schubert in the No 1 slot were 51, 27, 9, 7, 4 respectively.

3. Among the 27 voters who voted for Mozart in the No 1 slot:

• 26 included Beethoven in their top 10,
• 19 included Schubert in their top 10
• 15 included Haydn in their top 10.

4. Of those 26 who included Beethoven in their top 10, the average rank for Beethoven by these voters was No 4; for Schubert the average rank was No 5; for Haydn the average position was No 7.

5. Among the 7 voters who voted for Haydn in the No 1 slot, 6 included Mozart in their top 10. Of the 6 who included Mozart, the average rank for Mozart was No 4.


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## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> Just for the record, and mainly for stomanek's benefit who asked for the calculations, I have re-checked the results reported in post #109 and there are some very minor revisions to some ranks that don't affect the main results:
> 
> 1. The number of members who voted for Beethoven in the No 1 slot was 51.
> 
> 2. The corresponding figures for those who voted for Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Haydn, Schubert in the No 1 slot were 51, 27, 9, 7, 4 respectively.
> 
> 3. Among the 27 voters who voted for Mozart in the No 1 slot:
> 
> • 26 included Beethoven in their top 10,
> • 19 included Schubert in their top 10
> • 15 included Haydn in their top 10.
> 
> 4. Of those 26 who included Beethoven in their top 10, the average rank for Beethoven by these voters was No 4; for Schubert the average rank was No 5; for Haydn the average position was No 7.
> 
> 5. Among the 7 voters who voted for Haydn in the No 1 slot, 6 included Mozart in their top 10. Of the 6 who included Mozart, the average rank for Mozart was No 4.


Thank you for your work.
using a scoring system 10 for top spot, 9 for 2nd etc etc. How do the scores pan out for the top 3?

Just wondering - I am surprised that Mozart only attracts 27 votes for no 1 while Beethoven and Bach both attract 51 apiece.

I assume these figures should be readily available as you would have based your final top 10 on this scoring system. Mozart may have attracted more 2nd place votes than the other 2 which would reduce what I think is quite a big gap. This is something that could well lead us down into another debate - well trodden already - but I wouldn't mind seeing the weightings.


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## larold

<<I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me. Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.>>

This is certainly an opinion, not fact, regardless of the source. I can cite at least two reasons this is not true: they are called Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro. Opera is the most difficult of classical music art forms to create and to retain its relevance over time. Haydn's operas are, in the main, forgotten. These two from Mozart are in virtually everyone's list of top 5. His other famous operas are very great, also.


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## EdwardBast

larold said:


> <<I've said it here before, but I'm not sure everyone heard me. Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart.>>
> 
> This is certainly an opinion, not fact, regardless of the source. I can cite at least two reasons this is not true: they are called Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro. *Opera is the most difficult of classical music art forms to create and to retain its relevance over time*. Haydn's operas are, in the main, forgotten. These two from Mozart are in virtually everyone's list of top 5. His other famous operas are very great, also.


Not sure what basis there is for this claim. Settings of famous dramas with a long shelf life by the world's best known writers have an excellent chance of survival and continued performance, even when the resulting operas are mediocre travesties of the plays on which they are based. Just ask Verdi, who had the assistance of Shakespeare, Hugo, Schiller et alia. Moreover, the work is shared among a group of collaborators and, of course, having a text to set and a plot to follow solves many structural problems that instrumental composers actually have to think about . Granted, there is an enormous amount of busy work getting an opera scored and the parts made, but that's why God created copyists.


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## jdec

EdwardBast said:


> *Not sure what basis there is for this claim*. Settings of famous dramas with a long shelf life by the world's best known writers have an excellent chance of survival and continued performance, even when the resulting operas are mediocre travesties of the plays on which they are based. Just ask Verdi, who had the assistance of Shakespeare, Hugo, Schiller et alia. Moreover, the work is shared among a group of collaborators and, of course, having a text to set and a plot to follow solves many structural problems that instrumental composers actually have to think about . Granted, there is an enormous amount of busy work getting an opera scored and the parts made, but that's why God created copyists.


If only you could ask Beethoven....


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## Woodduck

The extraordinary number of operas written and successfully staged across the centuries seems to me to cast doubt on the idea that opera is inherently a greater challenge to compose than other forms of music. That idea certainly isn't proved by Haydn's lack of success in the genre relative to a few masterpieces by Mozart. Mozart himself wrote many operas which are rarely performed.

Opera does pose certain challenges of its own. Opera isn't a musical form, strictly speaking, but a dramatic form to which musical structures have to be adapted. The specifically musical approach to presenting an absorbing theatrical narrative over the length of an opera has varied with changes in musical styles, especially with the evolution of the "numbers" opera into the "through-composed" score. As long as operatic music was structured mainly as a series of set pieces expressing single emotions or ideas, as it generally was during the Baroque, Classical, and early Romantic periods, the major challenge was to make those pieces satisfying in themselves, while creating enough musical variety and effective enough pacing to ensure a sense of forward motion. Given a libretto that provided a reasonably engaging dramatic framework - or even lacking one, if a composer was imaginative enough - writing an effective opera was largely a matter of writing an effective sequence of arias and ensembles. 

Incredible numbers of musical works for the stage (operas, opera-ballets, operas comiques, singspiels, etc.) were written during the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries; just to name the most important composers, a cursory search reveals that Monteverdi wrote at least 10, Cavalli over 30, Handel 42, Vivaldi 94 (according to him; around 50 have been identified), Scarlatti 45, Lully and Rameau large numbers (I can't find exact numbers), Gluck 49, Hasse over 60, Jommelli over 60, Paisiello over 80, Cimarosa over 80, Salieri 37, Haydn 15, Mozart 22, Cherubini 36, Mehul 32, Spontini 22, Auber 48, Rossini 39, and Donizetti almost 70. 

Many of these were thoroughly able composers in various musical forms (I've lately enjoyed piano music and string quartets by Donizetti), but they were better known in their time for opera. The numbers don't suggest that opera was more difficult to write than other music. Neither does the absence of most of these works from the contemporary stage suggest that they aren't worth hearing or seeing; there are reasons besides lack of artistic quality why theatrical works of past eras are rarely produced today. Few would dispute that Mozart's handful of popular operas are among the greatest works for the musical stage, but occasional productions and growing numbers of recordings suggest that there are many buried treasures from his and other eras.


----------



## Kieran

Woodduck said:


> The extraordinary number of operas written and successfully staged across the centuries seems to me to cast doubt on the idea that opera is inherently a greater challenge to compose than other forms of music. That idea certainly isn't proved by Haydn's lack of success in the genre relative to a few masterpieces by Mozart. Mozart himself wrote many operas which are rarely performed.
> 
> Opera does pose certain challenges of its own. Opera isn't a musical form, strictly speaking, but a dramatic form to which musical structures have to be adapted. The specifically musical approach to presenting an absorbing theatrical narrative over the length of an opera has varied with changes in musical styles, especially with the evolution of the "numbers" opera into the "through-composed" score. As long as operatic music was structured mainly as a series of set pieces expressing single emotions or ideas, as it generally was during the Baroque, Classical, and early Romantic periods, the major challenge was to make those pieces satisfying in themselves, while creating enough musical variety and effective enough pacing to ensure a sense of forward motion. Given a libretto that provided a reasonably engaging dramatic framework - or even lacking one, if a composer was imaginative enough - writing an effective opera was largely a matter of writing an effective sequence of arias and ensembles.
> 
> Incredible numbers of musical works for the stage (operas, opera-ballets, operas comiques, singspiels, etc.) were written during the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries; just to name the most important composers, a cursory search reveals that Monteverdi wrote at least 10, Cavalli over 30, Handel 42, Vivaldi 94 (according to him; around 50 have been identified), Scarlatti 45, Lully and Rameau large numbers (I can't find exact numbers), Gluck 49, Hasse over 60, Jommelli over 60, Paisiello over 80, Cimarosa over 80, Salieri 37, Haydn 15, Mozart 22, Cherubini 36, Mehul 32, Spontini 22, Auber 48, Rossini 39, and Donizetti almost 70.
> 
> Many of these were thoroughly able composers in various musical forms (I've lately enjoyed piano music and string quartets by Donizetti), but they were better known in their time for opera. The numbers don't suggest that opera was more difficult to write than other music. Neither does the absence of most of these works from the contemporary stage suggest that they aren't worth hearing or seeing; there are reasons besides lack of artistic quality why theatrical works of past eras are rarely produced today. Few would dispute that Mozart's handful of popular operas are among the greatest works for the musical stage, but occasional productions and growing numbers of recordings suggest that there are many buried treasures from his and other eras.


There are, but doubtless none like Mozarts.

And I always thought "a few" to be a small number. 7 imperishable masterpieces in ten years is maybe "a few" more than "a few..."


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> Thank you for your work.
> using a scoring system 10 for top spot, 9 for 2nd etc etc. How do the scores pan out for the top 3?
> 
> Just wondering - I am surprised that Mozart only attracts 27 votes for no 1 while Beethoven and Bach both attract 51 apiece.
> 
> I assume these figures should be readily available as you would have based your final top 10 on this scoring system. Mozart may have attracted more 2nd place votes than the other 2 which would reduce what I think is quite a big gap. This is something that could well lead us down into another debate - well trodden already - but I wouldn't mind seeing the weightings.


The rankings below are based on no weighting according to the position each composer was placed in by each member in their their top 10 lists, i.e. the exact placement is irrelevant. The value of 100 is ascribed to the top composer, and the other values are indexed to a base of 100.

Rank Composer	 Index

1	.	Beethoven	(	100	)
2	.	Bach J S	(	92	)
3	.	Mozart	(	87	)
4	.	Brahms	(	69	)
5	.	Schubert	(	63	)
6	.	Mahler	(	49	)
7	.	Wagner	(	44	)
7	.	Tchaikovsky	(	44	)
9	.	Haydn	(	43	)
10	.	Shostakovich	(	33	)

The rankings below are based, as you suggested, on a scoring system of 10 for top spot, 9 for 2nd, down to 1 for the 10th position.

Rank Composer Index

1	.	Beethoven (	100	)
2	.	Bach J S (	90	)
3	.	Mozart (	74	)
4	.	Brahms (	48	)
5	.	Schubert (	40	)
6	.	Mahler (	34	)
8	.	Wagner (	31	)
7	.	Haydn, J (	31	)
9	.	Tchaikovsky (	27	)
10	.	Sibelius (	22	)

As will be seen, if weighting is applied the gap between Beethoven and Bach widens slightly, but the gap between Bach and Mozart widens even further. This results from the greater consistency of high scores achieved by Beethoven and (less so) Bach than by Mozart.

As a consequence, the composers from 4 to 10 are squeezed out to some extent, and achieve fewer points individually and in total with weighting applied than with no weighting.

The weighting system you proposed seems to involve a very severe curtailment of "liking" as one goes down the preference order, but it does illustrate what happens with weighting applied, as the same general effect is obtained regardless of the gradient of decline.

There is also a re-ordering of composers at the lower end of the top 10, which is to be expected as those in the 8-13 range get slightly shuffled around with weighting applied.

It should be stressed that the rankings given above, especially those below the top 3, are to be taken with a pinch of salt, as the specific ranks are not "statistically significant" according to the standard tests. This means that the indidividual ranks for some of the lower placed composers could be out by several places either way. The problem becomes ever greater the further one goes down the lists into the teens and beyond.

As explained previously, all these poll statistics are based on the entire set of data obtained from six separate polls carried out over the period from 2009 to 2016. If the same analysis is carried out only in respect of the most recent poll carried out in 2016, there were 23 members out of 83 in total who placed Bach in first position. The same number placed Beethoven in first position. Only 6 members placed Mozart in first position. The top 3 ranks are Bach (1), Beethoven (2), Mozart (3), and it makes no difference to these positions whether or not weighting is applied.

These various historical polls aside, I do not know whether any of the "game" polls that have taken place over the past year or so may be relevant in terms of shedding any further light on composer preference rankings as indicated by the membership here. I rather doubt it as these game type polls do not seem to involve large enough samples, but I may be wrong as I have not examined any of them.


----------



## JosefinaHW

KenOC said:


> Baptized as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. I believe Theophilus has the same meaning as Amadeus and Gottlieb, which is lover of God. Maybe somebody can confirm this, or not.


Ken, I knew that they all mean the same thing, but I wasn't sure what was officially the given form. Thanks for that info.


----------



## Guest

mbhaub said:


> Less tidy.
> 
> Mozart is too refined, too gentile for me. There's really very, very little Mozart that I can stand. Haydn though is much more enjoyable to listen to and to play. It's more down to earth and human. But then Mozart wrote the G minor symphony - and it gets no better than that.


I love the Haydn as you can hear his development through the course of his works. Sadly for Mozart he never lived beyond 35 and I think this fact meant that his works never really 'matured' in the same way that other great composers did. Yes, a real tragedy for him and the world. With Haydn there's innovation, humour and increasing complexity in his works as time went on. I adore his works from the last decade or so of his life. One of my all-time faves!!


----------



## Woodduck

Christabel said:


> I love the Haydn as you can hear his development through the course of his works. Sadly for Mozart he never lived beyond 35 and I think this fact meant that his works never really 'matured' in the same way that other great composers did. Yes, a real tragedy for him and the world. With Haydn there's innovation, humour and increasing complexity in his works as time went on. I adore his works from the last decade or so of his life. One of my all-time faves!!


When you start playing the piano at 3 and composing at 5, you can be a pretty "mature" composer by 35. Everything you say about Haydn was true of Mozart.


----------



## Guest

Woodduck said:


> When you start playing the piano at 3 and composing at 5, you can be a pretty "mature" composer by 35. Everything you say about Haydn was true of Mozart.


That is a matter of opinion, entirely. And 'mature' has nothing to do with how long somebody has been composing.


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## KenOC

jdec said:


> If only you could ask Beethoven....


Probably irrelevant but may be interesting to opera fans. The AMZ reported on the first performance of Fidelio by saying: "He who has followed the path of the development of Beethoven's otherwise undoubted talent with interest and calm objectivity had to hope for something quite different of this work than what was presented. Beethoven has often sacrificed the beautiful for the sake of the new and peculiar. Therefore, one should above all have expected peculiarity, novelty and a certain originality in this, his first theatrical product. But precisely these qualities are what are found the least." I think this is a fair criticism.

It continues with more specifics, calling the infatuation of the jailer's daughter with Leonora "a commonplace episode" and criticizing the singers: "Dem. Milder, in spite of her beautiful voice, does not have enough affect and life for the role of Fidelio, and Demmer was almost always flat."

The AMZ was more pleased with the revival of the work in shortened form a few months later: "Beethoven has brought his opera Fidelio back to the stage with many changes and cuts. An entire act was lost in the process, but the work has gained by it and has also been better received."


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## PlaySalieri

Christabel said:


> I love the Haydn as you can hear his development through the course of his works. Sadly for Mozart he never lived beyond 35 and I think this fact meant that his works never really 'matured' in the same way that other great composers did. Yes, a real tragedy for him and the world. With Haydn there's innovation, humour and increasing complexity in his works as time went on. I adore his works from the last decade or so of his life. One of my all-time faves!!


As you say its a matter of opinion - but i dont find the depth of Mozart's most profound works such as the g minor quintet, or the great operas (eg finale of le nozze) present to the same degree in any of Haydn's compositions. There is more to music than humour! But if humour is your thing - I can point to many fine examples in Mozart - try the horn concertos for one.


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## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> The rankings below are based on no weighting according to the position each composer was placed in by each member in their their top 10 lists, i.e. the exact placement is irrelevant. The value of 100 is ascribed to the top composer, and the other values are indexed to a base of 100.
> 
> Rank Composer	 Index
> 
> 1	.	Beethoven	(	100	)
> 2	.	Bach J S	(	92	)
> 3	.	Mozart	(	87	)
> 4	.	Brahms	(	69	)
> 5	.	Schubert	(	63	)
> 6	.	Mahler	(	49	)
> 7	.	Wagner	(	44	)
> 7	.	Tchaikovsky	(	44	)
> 9	.	Haydn	(	43	)
> 10	.	Shostakovich	(	33	)
> 
> The rankings below are based, as you suggested, on a scoring system of 10 for top spot, 9 for 2nd, down to 1 for the 10th position.
> 
> Rank Composer Index
> 
> 1	.	Beethoven (	100	)
> 2	.	Bach J S (	90	)
> 3	.	Mozart (	74	)
> 4	.	Brahms (	48	)
> 5	.	Schubert (	40	)
> 6	.	Mahler (	34	)
> 8	.	Wagner (	31	)
> 7	.	Haydn, J (	31	)
> 9	.	Tchaikovsky (	27	)
> 10	.	Sibelius (	22	)
> 
> As will be seen, if weighting is applied the gap between Beethoven and Bach widens slightly, but the gap between Bach and Mozart widens even further. This results from the greater consistency of high scores achieved by Beethoven and (less so) Bach than by Mozart.
> 
> As a consequence, the composers from 4 to 10 are squeezed out to some extent, and achieve fewer points individually and in total with weighting applied than with no weighting.
> 
> The weighting system you proposed seems to involve a very severe curtailment of "liking" as one goes down the preference order, but it does illustrate what happens with weighting applied, as the same general effect is obtained regardless of the gradient of decline.
> 
> There is also a re-ordering of composers at the lower end of the top 10, which is to be expected as those in the 8-13 range get slightly shuffled around with weighting applied.
> 
> It should be stressed that the rankings given above, especially those below the top 3, are to be taken with a pinch of salt, as the specific ranks are not "statistically significant" according to the standard tests. This means that the indidividual ranks for some of the lower placed composers could be out by several places either way. The problem becomes ever greater the further one goes down the lists into the teens and beyond.
> 
> As explained previously, all these poll statistics are based on the entire set of data obtained from six separate polls carried out over the period from 2009 to 2016. If the same analysis is carried out only in respect of the most recent poll carried out in 2016, there were 23 members out of 83 in total who placed Bach in first position. The same number placed Beethoven in first position. Only 6 members placed Mozart in first position. The top 3 ranks are Bach (1), Beethoven (2), Mozart (3), and it makes no difference to these positions whether or not weighting is applied.
> 
> These various historical polls aside, I do not know whether any of the "game" polls that have taken place over the past year or so may be relevant in terms of shedding any further light on composer preference rankings as indicated by the membership here. I rather doubt it as these game type polls do not seem to involve large enough samples, but I may be wrong as I have not examined any of them.


The weighted table looks more reasonable - as high positions are taken into account not just the top slot. Still - the sample size is small overall but it is some indication of TC member preferences. Thank you for all the work you have done.


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## PlaySalieri

It may interest you that Classic FM have a survey of live music concerts (UK) and found in 2015 the most popular composers:

http://www.classicfm.com/music-news/latest-news/bachtrack-poll-2015/

Mozart, Beethoven and Bach take the top 3 - with Haydn at no 7

not too different from the TC poll.


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## KenOC

From the now-defunct Amazon forum:

1 - Beethoven
2 - Bach
3 - Mozart
4 - Haydn
5 - Mahler
6 - Schubert
7 - Brahms
8 - Stravinsky
9 - Handel
10 - Tchaikovsky


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## Bulldog

Genoveva said:


> These various historical polls aside, I do not know whether any of the "game" polls that have taken place over the past year or so may be relevant in terms of shedding any further light on composer preference rankings as indicated by the membership here. I rather doubt it as these game type polls do not seem to involve large enough samples, but I may be wrong as I have not examined any of them.


I know a little about the games, and they would not shed any light for your purposes. The samples are too small, and unexpected outcomes are common.


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## Kieran

Christabel said:


> I love the Haydn as you can hear his development through the course of his works. Sadly for Mozart he never lived beyond 35 and I think this fact meant that his works never really 'matured' in the same way that other great composers did. Yes, a real tragedy for him and the world. With Haydn there's innovation, humour and increasing complexity in his works as time went on. I adore his works from the last decade or so of his life. One of my all-time faves!!


Although I'm sensing you don't find it a real tragedy, and are just clutching at straws to attack mozart with, I wonder if you can tell us what you mean by "mature", in this regard. You seem obsessed with finding different ways to be so wrong about Mozart. There are simple things you can do to finally get his music...


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## Larkenfield

Listen. Haydn is one of my favorites and there is something warm and wonderful about his later works that were born of his experience and maturity as well as talent. But Haydn could have lived for 100 years and never had the skill or maturity to write the thrilling, magnificent counterpoint of five themes found in the Finale of Mozart's Jupiter Symphony-or Haydn would have done it. Let's give credit where credit is due and weigh this whole idea of the fruits of maturity with other factors, such as genius starting from the age of five and not Haydn as a relatively late bloomer as far as being a composer was concerned. In terms of musical achievements, Mozart had about a 15 year headstart on Haydn within their respective lifetimes.

Mozart studied others through his lifetime to develop and mature his genius and, incidentally, requested fugues written by Haydn sent to him to appreciate and study. But Haydn, as great as he was, never pulled off the feat that Mozart miraculously achieved in that symphony-perhaps one of the greatest achievements in all of music.

Both composers had a different style, and sometimes listeners will mistake Mozart's freshness, sparkle and brilliance of style for a lack of maturity when he was so far beyond the capabilities of others that it's ridiculous. Neither one really deserves to be pitted against each other because they were friends. But even Haydn could not help but speak of Mozart's depth of feeling in his famous quote:

"If only I could impress Mozart's inimitable works on the soul of every friend of music, and the souls of high personages in particular, as deeply, with the same musical understanding and with the same deep feeling, as I understand and feel them, the nations would vie with each other to possess such a jewel." Both wonderful composers!


----------



## Genoveva

Christabel said:


> I love the Haydn as you can hear his development through the course of his works. Sadly for Mozart he never lived beyond 35 and I think this fact meant that his works never really 'matured' in the same way that other great composers did. Yes, a real tragedy for him and the world. With Haydn there's innovation, humour and increasing complexity in his works as time went on. I adore his works from the last decade or so of his life. One of my all-time faves!!


This sounds like faint praise if I ever saw it.

It seems to suggest that age 35 is too young for any composer to have written "mature" works. What about Schubert who clearly wrote several mature sounding works at a very much younger age than that, as he died aged 31? And what about Beethoven's achievements up to age 35, not to mention several other great composers who had written a good deal of great music by age 35. No doubt Mozart would have produced more great works if he had not died at age 35, but how many is a matter of speculation. In any case, Mozart had written more "great" works in his short life than than Haydn did, according to popular opinion in terms of favourite works.

What you write also implies that Haydn continued to "mature" in terms of compositions throughout his entire composing career. That's debateable. Haydn's achievements made music sound very different from the late baroque and more sophisticated than that from the galante style. He was not just a major innovator but produced a large number of works across all the main genres, some of which were of high quality. He was also a friend and mentor of Mozart, as well a tutor to Beethoven. He was, by all accounts, a very affable, devoted, courteous and well-liked man.

However, after he died, whilst general respect and admiration for Haydn continued into later parts of the 19th C, this was more by way of a back-looking appreciation of his life in general, rather than in terms of the heights to which he took the classical style, or in terms of his late innovations. Rather, in regard to the latter aspects, there was not a particularly high regard for him by music writers in the 19th C.

For example, Robert Schumann, who had a very high reputation as a music journalist and commentator of the new scene emerging in the late 1830s and 1940's, often spoke of his weariness with Haydn in that he believed that Haydn ran out of new ideas quite early and that his legacy had little relevance for the new styles that were coming in when he (Schumann) was writing.

Hanslick, who was writing a short while later than Schumann, had a similar high regard for Haydn, i.e. praise for his inventions and achievements in developing and refining new forms. But having paid due lip service, said that Haydn wrote too much stuff and therefore could not possibly have invested in any of those 100+ symphonies and all else a richness of individuality that we associate with the likes of Beethoven or Mozart. He even went so far as to say that he regarded some of Haydn's later works were "boring" by way of comparison with what the later classical composers were producing in their final years.

Writers from the other side of the debate in the 19th C, from the New German School and the Wagnerians, were hardly more appreciative of Haydn. Hans von Bulow, like most other critics, praised Haydn as a rule maker and precursor, but did not believe that he took the classical style to the same heights as Mozart and Beethoven. Wagner himself, when writing on these issues, said he was impressed by and very appreciative of Haydn, especially in regard to his treatment of rythmic dance melody, but he reserved major praise for Beethoven as the innovator who took music to a completely new level. Brahms also was not greatly influenced by Haydn, but much more so by Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert.

In general, across most or all 19th C writers, there was a feeling that Haydn's music failed to be as soul-inspiring as that by composers like Bach, Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert. That's not to say that Haydn's work fell into any kind of disrepute or widespread unpopularity in the 19th C. Some it remained very popular, like _The Seasons_ and _The Creation_, but it was placed behind the works of others, especially Beethoven's in public performances and general popularity.

In the 20th C, Haydn has enjoyed something of a revival of interest, rather like Handel and Schubert, but he still remains well behind Mozart in the popularity stakes by a fairly big margin. I too like Haydn a great deal. He has always been in my top 10. I think that in some styles he more often suits what I wish to listen to than some of the other "great" composers. But he is not in the same league as Beethoven, Mozart, Bach. These are the supreme masters of classical music.


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## Guest

I was speaking about Mozart, not Schubert - whose late masterworks were of a different order of magnitude. Had he lived he would have possibly equalled - even surpassed - Beethoven. Popularity isn't an indicator of greatness; complexity, innovation, originality, high order thinking - these, inter alia, are the skills of genius. Haydn was a great genius, IMO, but his operas fizzed like a damp squib. Same for Schubert. The reasons are complex. But not being able to write opera is no bar to genius; Beethoven only wrote one and it annoys me!!


----------



## Kieran

Larkenfield said:


> But even Haydn could not help but speak of Mozart's depth of feeling in his famous quote:
> 
> "If only I could impress Mozart's inimitable works on the soul of every friend of music, and the souls of high personages in particular, as deeply, with the same musical understanding and with the same deep feeling, as I understand and feel them, the nations would vie with each other to possess such a jewel." Both wonderful composers!


I'm glad you gave us Haydn's own words on Mozart, followed by your own observation that they're both wonderful composers. Lately, there have been so many threads wondering negatively about Wolfie, I'd begun to wonder if I was reading the unfilmed script to a romcom, "20 Different Ways I Hate You!"

And it's sequel: "21 Different Ways I'd Hate You If You Really Existed."

Randy Newman wrote his music (if I understood this Newman bloke correct); Beethoven's sonatas are great - but especially so because Mozart's were so light and lousy and this absolutely must be said; Mozart was only sublime if we agree on what each word in the sentence means; Haydn was greater because he wore a macho blue wig, while Wolfie preferred powdered pink; everything Mozart composed was tainted by his being a child who couldn't sleep unless all the candles in the house were blazing, all night long. And his favourite teddy bear was beside him.

Okay, I'm exaggerating but you get the gist. I think the Romantics queered the pitch for Mozart in a way, with their wrong-minded view of the artist, and their fake-news stories of his life, and character. And since then, the battle has been joined to restore his moral reputation, and to shed a different light on both his character, and his music. To maybe bring to some people the idea that they shouldn't look at every composer strictly to compare them negatively with their idol, and also, maybe suggest that though the music is up for grabs, it's also there as a testimony to what genius can do, and for this, Mozart might deserve some credit. Just some, maybe.

Oh, and that he did exist, he's not a figment of a screenwriters imagination, and that he even composed his own music, funny enough!

And his fellow great composers praised him.


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## Mal

Larkenfield said:


> Listen. Haydn is one of my favorites and there is something warm and wonderful about his later works that were born of his experience and maturity as well as talent.


Not just his later works, many of his early works are warm and wonderful as well. Is he ever less than experienced and mature, even in his earliest works? His symphonies 6, 7, 8 were written when he was 29.



> ... genius starting from the age of five and not Haydn as a relatively late bloomer as far as being a composer was concerned. In terms of musical achievements, Mozart had about a 15 year headstart on Haydn within their respective lifetimes.


Haydn's musical family recognised he was something special at age 6, and sent him away for training by experts - not in composition, but to sing choir and play instruments. Isn't this recognising genius at an early age? And doesn't this seem a more sensible music education than Mozart's hot-housing? Who teaches their six year old to compose today, with an expectation of immediate publication, and drags them round Europe performing like a trick pony? Also, Mozart's early symphonies are generally not considered to be great works, certainly not compared to Haydn 6, 7, 8. Mozart was very immature when he composed his 6,7,8, and his father probably had a hand in many of them.



> Mozart studied others through his lifetime to develop and mature his genius and, incidentally, requested fugues written by Haydn sent to him to appreciate and study. But Haydn, as great as he was, never pulled off the feat that Mozart miraculously achieved in that symphony-perhaps one of the greatest achievements in all of music.


Well you can't expect Haydn to do everything. Newton never pulled off the theory of relativity, but is Einstein greater than him because of this? Anyway, this is art not science. Ultimately it is a subjective experience, if an experienced listener prefers Haydn then he prefers Haydn, you can't argue against that. Myself? I need more experience before calling it... or maybe I like both equally...


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## Kieran

Christabel said:


> complexity, innovation, originality, high order thinking - these, inter alia, are the skills of genius.


Hey! You just paid Mozart a compliment! Good for you...


----------



## Mal

Genoveva said:


> It seems to suggest that age 35 is too young for any composer to have written "mature" works. What about Schubert who clearly wrote several mature sounding works at a very much younger age than that, as he died aged 31? And what about Beethoven's achievements up to age 35, not to mention several other great composers who had written a good deal of great music by age 35.




Some of Mozart's early symphonies are considered great works by serious critics, Rob Cowan starts with no. 25 in his "1000 greatest list". Mozart composed it at 17.



> However, after he died, whilst general respect and admiration for Haydn continued into later parts of the 19th C, this was more by way of a back-looking appreciation of his life in general, rather than in terms of the heights to which he took the classical style, or in terms of his late innovations. Rather, in regard to the latter aspects, there was not a particularly high regard for him by music writers in the 19th C.


This seems to me rather like the early twentieth century critics and writers on Dickens. They suggested he was too sentimental, old fashioned, bereft of advanced techniques ("stream of consciousness" etc.) By now, this estimate of Dickens has been rejected, and he has to be considered, simply, one of the truly great novelist, not be held in lower estimation than Joyce or Proust.



> For example, Robert Schumann, who had a very high reputation as a music journalist and commentator of the new scene emerging in the late 1830s and 1940's, often spoke of his weariness with Haydn in that he believed that Haydn ran out of new ideas quite early and that his legacy had little relevance for the new styles that were coming in when he (Schumann) was writing.


Tolstoy put down Shakespeare, Orwell put down Dickens. Never trust the great artist on other great artists!



> Hanslick, who was writing a short while later than Schumann, had a similar high regard for Haydn, i.e. praise for his inventions and achievements in developing and refining new forms. But having paid due lip service, said that Haydn wrote too much stuff and therefore could not possibly have invested in any of those 100+ symphonies and all else a richness of individuality that we associate with the likes of Beethoven or Mozart. He even went so far as to say that he regarded some of Haydn's later works were "boring" by way of comparison with what the later classical composers were producing in their final years.


This is like wondering how Dickens could write 14 great novels, according to Harold Bloom, and Tolstoy only two. Deciding that many of Dickens' novels must be inferior because "it's not humanly possible" would be to show a lack of imagination, and great ignorance.



> In the 20th C, Haydn has enjoyed something of a revival of interest, rather like Handel and Schubert, but he still remains well behind Mozart in the popularity stakes by a fairly big margin. I too like Haydn a great deal. He has always been in my top 10. I think that in some styles he more often suits what I wish to listen to than some of the other "great" composers. But he is not in the same league as Beethoven, Mozart, Bach. These are the supreme masters of classical music.


There are some strong critics who disagree with you:

"Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart."

http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/

Mozart did struggle, particularly with a set of six string quartets he dedicated to ... Haydn. "He sweated blood over them," Woods says... "They're so beautifully wrought because he thought Haydn was the greatest composer alive, including himself."


----------



## Larkenfield

Yes, bravo, Christabel.


----------



## Genoveva

Mal said:


> ....
> 
> There are some strong critics who disagree with you:
> 
> "Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart."


I have only snipped the above extract, but you appear to have misinterpreted quite a lot of what I wrote.

The first part of my previous post was to question the assumption that, in dying at age 35, Mozart did not have sufficient time in which to write many of "mature" works, as implied by a previous poster. Mozart obviously wrote many works that could be described as "mature" in the sense of being great. Great composers (or great artists generally) don't necessarily need to live to a ripe old age in order to write "mature" works.

The other things I wrote about were expressly about the opinions of some leading music critics/composers of the 19th C concerning Haydn's heritage. It was not meant to be an exhaustive tome on the subject, including all authors in both 19th and 20th C, covering all shades of opinion. The authors I mentioned all much admired Haydn and his achievements. However, the essential point I was hoping to convey, which you seem to have missed altogether, is that according to these critics there wasn't a lot in Haydn that helped them move music forward that hadn't been developed even further by Beethoven and, to possibly to lesser extent, by Mozart and Schubert.

In fact, if you believe otherwise - that Haydn did leave a strong legacy over and above Beethoven's - that later composers were able to develop further, perhaps you could iteminise them as I'd be interested to get your view on this.

You also appear to have missed, or possibly misunderstood again, another point that I made which was that in the 20th C Haydn there was a revival of interest in his work. I thought I had made this quite clear. I dare say it's possible that 20th C composers may have found something in Haydn that was worth exploring further, but I didn't touch on this subject.

In general, I was not trying to put Haydn down, but simply trying to set out the way he has tended to be regarded according to my reading of the situation, which is that he is rightly considered to be a great composer but was not such a great composer as Mozart. Now this is obviously a matter of opinion, and not a concrete, indisputable fact. However, this opionion is normally confirmed in poll after poll, and in other ways that one can reasonably think of to assess this matter.


----------



## EdwardBast

Christabel said:


> That is a matter of opinion, entirely. And 'mature' has nothing to do with how long somebody has been composing.


Huh? When one is talking about maturity as a composer, how long one has been composing is probably the most important factor.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Mal said:


> Some of Mozart's early symphonies are considered great works by serious critics, Rob Cowan starts with no. 25 in his "1000 greatest list". Mozart composed it at 17.
> 
> This seems to me rather like the early twentieth century critics and writers on Dickens. They suggested he was too sentimental, old fashioned, bereft of advanced techniques ("stream of consciousness" etc.) By now, this estimate of Dickens has been rejected, and he has to be considered, simply, one of the truly great novelist, not be held in lower estimation than Joyce or Proust.
> 
> Tolstoy put down Shakespeare, Orwell put down Dickens. Never trust the great artist on other great artists!
> 
> This is like wondering how Dickens could write 14 great novels, according to Harold Bloom, and Tolstoy only two. Deciding that many of Dickens' novels must be inferior because "it's not humanly possible" would be to show a lack of imagination, and great ignorance.
> 
> *There are some strong critics who disagree with you:*
> 
> "Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart."
> 
> http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/
> 
> Mozart did struggle, particularly with a set of six string quartets he dedicated to ... Haydn. "He sweated blood over them," Woods says... "They're so beautifully wrought because he thought Haydn was the greatest composer alive, including himself."


That article? Has nothing of any substance in it - except - in fact - praise for some of Mozart's best works.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Christabel said:


> I was speaking about Mozart, not Schubert - whose late masterworks were of a different order of magnitude. *Had he lived he would have possibly equalled - even surpassed - Beethoven.* Popularity isn't an indicator of greatness; complexity, innovation, originality, high order thinking - these, inter alia, are the skills of genius. Haydn was a great genius, IMO, but his operas fizzed like a damp squib. Same for Schubert. The reasons are complex. But not being able to write opera is no bar to genius; Beethoven only wrote one and it annoys me!!


that implies something many dont agree with.

Mozart surpassed Beethoven in opera, piano concerto, at least - and maybe more though not the symphony - upon which Beethoven's reputation as the greatest composer of all time is generally supported.


----------



## jdec

Mal said:


> *There are some strong critics* who disagree with you:
> 
> "Haydn was a more creative, more talented and more skilled composer than Mozart."
> 
> http://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/


"Some"? Who? (you only made reference to one)


----------



## Woodduck

stomanek said:


> that implies something many dont agree with.
> 
> Mozart surpassed Beethoven in opera, piano concerto, at least - and maybe more though not *the symphony - upon which Beethoven's reputation as the greatest composer of all time is generally supported.*


Only the symphony? Not the string quartet and the piano sonata? Perhaps the violin sonata? The cello sonata? The violin concerto? If we must speak of who surpassed whom in what (God forgive me)...


----------



## jdec

Mal said:


> Tolstoy put down Shakespeare, Orwell put down Dickens. Never trust the great artist on other great artists!


And how many and which truly great artists have put down Mozart? (and 'truly great' doesn't mean Maria Callas to me )


----------



## Kieran

Woodduck said:


> Only the symphony? Not the string quartet and the piano sonata? Perhaps the violin sonata? The cello sonata? If we must speak of who surpassed whom in what (God forgive me)...


I'll show you mine, if you show me yours, that kinda thing? :lol:

Bring it on, of course - but we could be here a while....

EDIT: interestingly, we've reached the stage where I've forgotten which thread I'm responding to, and I see that this is the Haydn >> Mozart thread, and not the thread I thought it was, which was the Bethoven v Mozart thread (AKA Alien v Predator VIII), and certainly not the Beethoven Sonata Thread, which was opened solely with the strange purpose of having a pop at Wolfie.

Still, at least I didn't mistake it for any of the Newman threads...


----------



## jdec

Woodduck said:


> Only the symphony? Not the* string quartet* and the piano sonata? Perhaps the violin sonata? The cello sonata? *The violin concerto*? If we must speak of who surpassed whom in what (God forgive me)...


Which violin concerti did Beethoven compose at the age between 17 and 20 that surpass Mozart's? (that would be a fair comparison)

Which string quartets (and Masses) did Beethoven compose younger than 35 that surpass Mozart's?


----------



## WildThing

jdec said:


> Which violin concerti did Beethoven compose at the age between 17 and 20 that surpass Mozart's? (that would be a fair comparison)


Why would that be a fair comparison? Composers grow and mature at different rates and at different ages. I don't see that age has any relevance in discussing the quality of two composer's works, other than as an interesting aside.


----------



## Woodduck

jdec said:


> Which violin concerti did Beethoven compose at the age between 17 and 20? (that would be a fair comparison)
> 
> Which string quartets (and Masses) did Beethoven compose younger than 35 that surpass Mozart's?


Context, context. I was responding to a specific remark of stomanek's, and even highlighted the part I was responding to: "Mozart surpassed Beethoven in opera, piano concerto, at least - and maybe more though not *the symphony - upon which Beethoven's reputation as the greatest composer of all time is generally supported.*

The point is that Beethoven's reputation for greatness does _not_ depend on his symphonies. Nor does Mozart's depend on his age. No one disputes that Mozart was a super-prodigy. So what? All we have now is the music. I don't care if little Wolfie burst into "Fin ch'han dal vino" when the doctor slapped him on the buttocks.


----------



## Kieran

Woodduck said:


> Context, context. I was responding to a specific remark of stomanek's, and even highlighted the part I was responding to: "Mozart surpassed Beethoven in opera, piano concerto, at least - and maybe more though not *the symphony - upon which Beethoven's reputation as the greatest composer of all time is generally supported.*
> 
> The point is that Beethoven's reputation for greatness does _not_ depend on his symphonies. Nor does Mozart's depend on his age. No one disputes that Mozart was a super-prodigy. So what? All we have now is the music. I don't care if little Wolfie burst into "Fin ch'han dal vino" when the doctor slapped him on the buttocks.


It was actually when his mama handed him his first baby bottle. She handed him the wrong bottle, let's leave it at that.

"All we have now is the music." Lucky us. And if that were only true. We also have strong opinions which seem perennially to express a need to pit these two gents against each other. I don't mind that - in fact I enjoy it, so long as it's pleasant and polite. But I can't help but think that when we wrangle like this, we do both composers a disservice.

And yeah, I know this is still the Haydn thread, and we're all still referring to Luigi v Wolfie...


----------



## jdec

WildThing said:


> Why would that be a fair comparison? Composers grow and mature at different rates and at different ages. I don't see that age has any relevance in discussing the quality of two composer's works, other than as an interesting aside.


You are right. And age wouldn't matter either if we analyzed who produced the best 1st symphony between Beethoven (25) and Mozart (8). A very sound comparison that would be.


----------



## WildThing

jdec said:


> You are right. And age wouldn't matter either if we analyzed who produced the best 1st symphony between Beethoven (25) and Mozart (8). A very sound comparison that would be.


You're right, it wouldn't.


----------



## jdec

WildThing said:


> You're right, it wouldn't.


Sure. And the conclusion that Beethoven is a "superior" composer of "first symphonies" than Mozart would be a smart one too.


----------



## Kieran

jdec said:


> You are right. And age wouldn't matter either if we analyzed who produced the best 1st symphony between Beethoven (25) and Mozart (8). A very sound comparison that would be.


Age is actually a fairly natural and normal place for comparisons to take place. If we all agree that comparisons are - if maybe not exactly "odious" - somewhat difficult to make in some cases, then pick your starting point and go from there. Do we scoop all works up and weigh 'em? That's a good one too. But there's no real problem in the game that is "making-comparisons" to compare what people were like, or were doing, at the same ages throughout their lives.


----------



## WildThing

jdec said:


> Sure. And the conclusion that Beethoven is a "superior" composer of "first symphonies" than Mozart would be a smart one too.


It would simply be true, smart or not.


----------



## Woodduck

Kieran said:


> It was actually when his mama handed him his first baby bottle. She handed him the wrong bottle, let's leave it at that.
> 
> "All we have now is the music." Lucky us. And if that were only true. We also have strong opinions which seem perennially to express a need to pit these two gents against each other. I don't mind that - in fact I enjoy it, so long as it's pleasant and polite. But I can't help but think that *when we wrangle like this*, we do both composers a disservice.
> 
> And yeah, I know this is still the Haydn thread, and *we're all still referring to Luigi v Wolfie*...


We? i didn't move the conversation onto Beethoven, and I'm not wrangling, merely pointing out an unjustified remark. Of, course, if people want to take a parenthetical observation that someone may have written more noteworthy piano sonatas than their favorite child prodigy as an invitation to wrangle, we can't stop them.


----------



## jdec

WildThing said:


> It would simply be true, smart or not.


And if the prize for the winner was, let's say a scholarship, Beethoven would have won it "fairly".


----------



## Woodduck

Kieran said:


> Age is actually a fairly natural and normal place for comparisons to take place. If we all agree that comparisons are - if maybe not exactly "odious" - somewhat difficult to make in some cases, then pick your starting point and go from there. Do we scoop all works up and weigh 'em? That's a good one too. But there's no real problem in the game that is "making-comparisons" to compare what people were like, or were doing, at the same ages throughout their lives.


Discussing a composer's age may be natural and normal, but it answers a different question. If the question is "who wrote a better first symphony," the answer is found only by listening to the symphonies. In this case the answer is so obvious that the question shouldn't even be asked.


----------



## WildThing

jdec said:


> And if the prize for the winner was, let's say a scholarship, Beethoven would have won it "fairly".


This is obviously not about fairness, just about trying to use any criteria one can come up with to claim their favorite composer is better.

No thanks. Bye y'all.


----------



## Kieran

Woodduck said:


> Discussing a composer's age may be natural and normal, but it answers a different question. If the question is "who wrote a better first symphony," the answer is found only by listening to the symphonies. In this case the answer is so obvious that the question shouldn't even be asked.


Obviously. And if we ask, "who wrote the best symphony in the under-10 age group?" the answer is different. Context is everything. If we found a satisfactory way of comparing, then it would be so much more straight-forward, but in fact, to ask, okay, Mozart died young, so can we look at both composers at age 35, and compare them then?, well, this is a valid way of comparing them, too. Just as valid as any other, in fact, if there's a valid way of comparing these two (and again, I don't mean haydn :lol: )...


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## KenOC

If we ask "who wrote the best symphony in the 40+ age group," Brahms easily aces Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Schubert. No contest! They were such slackers...


----------



## jdec

KenOC said:


> If we ask "who wrote the best symphony in the 40+ age group," Brahms easily aces Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Schubert. No contest!


Not according to a survey done to 151 living conductors :

Top 10 symphonies

1. Beethoven Symphony No 3 (1803)
2. Beethoven Symphony No 9 (1824)
*3. Mozart Symphony No 41 (1788)*
4. Mahler Symphony No 9 (1909)
5. Mahler Symphony No 2 (1894 rev 1903)
*6. Brahms Symphony No 4 (1885)*
7. Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique (1830)
8. Brahms Symphony No 1 (1876)
9. Tchaikovsky Symphony No 6 (1893)
10. Mahler Symphony No 3 (1896)

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.th...oica-greatest-symphony-vote-bbc-mozart-mahler


----------



## jdec

Wait, you are right, Mozart did not pass the age of 40!


----------



## Captainnumber36

KenOC said:


> If we ask "who wrote the best symphony in the 40+ age group," Brahms easily aces Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Schubert. No contest! They were such slackers...


lol! haha .


----------



## Genoveva

I said in some thread recently (like Kieron I'm not sure which) that the age at death of a composer is not relevant in assessing their greatness. It's their overall achievements that matter, otherwise we would finish up with futile discussions like those above, which are obviously meant on jest.

Mozart had the advantage of being brought up in a musical family. If, instead, his father had been a lumberjack in Siberia he might not have been quite such the child prodigy that he was, as the opportunity to excel in music would have been hampered somewhat.

The job of deciding who the best composers were given their actual life circumstances is difficult enough. If one tried to re-work the results on the basis of some normalised set of conditions it would be a hopelessly impossible job. They can't be "handicapped" like a bunch of horses in some horse race.


----------



## Guest

jdec said:


> Not according to a survey done to 151 living conductors :
> 
> Top 10 symphonies
> 
> 1. Beethoven Symphony No 3 (1803)
> 2. Beethoven Symphony No 9 (1824)
> *3. Mozart Symphony No 41 (1788)*
> 4. Mahler Symphony No 9 (1909)
> 5. Mahler Symphony No 2 (1894 rev 1903)
> *6. Brahms Symphony No 4 (1885)*
> 7. Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique (1830)
> 8. Brahms Symphony No 1 (1876)
> 9. Tchaikovsky Symphony No 6 (1893)
> 10. Mahler Symphony No 3 (1896)
> 
> https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.th...oica-greatest-symphony-vote-bbc-mozart-mahler


You have to write 41 symphonies to be included in the list? OK, just checking.


----------



## Kieran

Christabel said:


> You have to write 41 symphonies to be included in the list? OK, just checking.


Well, he could have written just 3 by the same age, but would that be as good?


----------



## Kieran

Genoveva said:


> I said in some thread recently (like Kieron I'm not sure which) that the age at death of a composer is not relevant in assessing their greatness. It's their overall achievements that matter, otherwise we would finish up with futile discussions like those above, which are obviously meant on jest.
> 
> Mozart had the advantage of being brought up in a musical family. If, instead, his father had been a lumberjack in Siberia he might not have been quite such the child prodigy that he was, as the opportunity to excel in music would have been hampered somewhat.


He'd have been the worlds greatest child prodigy lumberjack, instead. :lol:

See, since the game of comparison is still only a game, and as Wild Thing said above, usually the rules are slanted so our fave boy wins, why not have Wolfie fans get a cheap win by asking to keep the comparison to an age where they were both active? Why finish at Beethoven's death, and not Mozart's, etc? It would be too easy, of course, which is why Luigi fans say, let's compare the whole body of work, pit a man who had his fill 3 seasons against a man who had only one, etc.

I see logic in both - and don't mind either. My own view would be still unaffected. But there's now several threads with the aim of challenging Mozart's reputation. Including the Trojan horse thread about Beethoven's sonatas. These are good, because they also raise the issue of just how great he was, and how great other composers were (btw, are we still in the Haydn thread? :lol: ) but while these discussions go on, it's fair and okay that we draw attention to his uniqueness by making comparisons from a different angle...


----------



## PlaySalieri

Woodduck said:


> Only the symphony? Not the string quartet and the piano sonata? Perhaps the violin sonata? The cello sonata? The violin concerto? If we must speak of who surpassed whom in what (God forgive me)...


Yes indeed my dear Wooduck

you must admit that if you subtract Mozart's operas (his greatest legacy in my view) his reputation in history would barely suffer.

But take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke. The moonlight, the kreutzer and spring sonatas, even the mighty violin concerto - are "minor" works compared to the incomparable and revolutionary symphonies.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> I said in some thread recently (like Kieron I'm not sure which) that the age at death of a composer is not relevant in assessing their greatness. It's their overall achievements that matter, otherwise we would finish up with futile discussions like those above, which are obviously meant on jest.
> 
> Mozart had the advantage of being brought up in a musical family. * If, instead, his father had been a lumberjack in Siberia he might not have been quite such the child prodigy that he was, as the opportunity to excel in music would have been hampered somewhat. *
> 
> The job of deciding who the best composers were given their actual life circumstances is difficult enough. If one tried to re-work the results on the basis of some normalised set of conditions it would be a hopelessly impossible job. They can't be "handicapped" like a bunch of horses in some horse race.


That is of course true. And Mozart wasnt the only child getting a musical education from musical parents - there were thousands of others and are thousands today.

It baffles me why none, more or less, of those thousands of prodigies composed anything of any note except Mozart. There are plenty of kids today who can do more than he could do at 5-7. But nobody in history who could match him at age 12+, with the except perhaps of Mendelssohn.


----------



## jdec

Christabel said:


> You have to write 41 symphonies to be included in the list? OK, just checking.


Nope. Haydn composed more than 100 and was not included. Leif Segerstam composed over 300 symphonies and was not inlcuded either.


----------



## Genoveva

Kieran said:


> He'd have been the worlds greatest child prodigy lumberjack, instead. :lol:
> 
> See, since the game of comparison is still only a game, and as Wild Thing said above, usually the rules are slanted so our fave boy wins, why not have Wolfie fans get a cheap win by asking to keep the comparison to an age where they were both active? Why finish at Beethoven's death, and not Mozart's, etc? It would be too easy, of course, which is why Luigi fans say, let's compare the whole body of work, pit a man who had his fill 3 seasons against a man who had only one, etc.
> 
> I see logic in both - and don't mind either. My own view would be still unaffected. But there's now several threads with the aim of challenging Mozart's reputation. Including the Trojan horse thread about Beethoven's sonatas. These are good, because they also raise the issue of just how great he was, and how great other composers were (btw, are we still in the Haydn thread? :lol: ) but while these discussions go on, it's fair and okay that we draw attention to his uniqueness by making comparisons from a different angle...


I reckon these Beethoven and Haydn fan-boys, including a couple of possible closet-beethoven/haydn-fan-bays, may have acquired the message by now that a few of us are onto them.

The "Trojan horse" thread you refer to was a give-away from the start. One would need to be almost brain-dead not to have sussed that one out. It almost had bells and whistles on it.


----------



## Guest

jdec said:


> Nope. Haydn composed more than 100 and was not included. Leif Segerstam composed over 300 symphonies and was not inlcuded either.


You took my comment a little too literally!! But I was making a point, however obtusely.
Haydn's symphonies are not really amongst the very best ever written, though I think they're superb and enjoyable all the same. They aren't really in the same league as his "Creation" or those late masses. They are in a class of their own.


----------



## Guest

Genoveva said:


> I reckon these Beethoven and Haydn fan-boys, including a couple of possible closet-beethoven/haydn-fan-bays, may have acquired the message by now that a few of us are onto them.
> 
> The "Trojan horse" thread you refer to was a give-away from the start. One would need to be almost brain-dead not to have sussed that one out. It almost had bells and whistles on it.


You need to stand guard at your 'gate', but we don't have to. That gate protects itself.


----------



## Woodduck

stomanek said:


> Yes indeed my dear Wooduck
> 
> you must admit that if you subtract Mozart's operas (his greatest legacy in my view) his reputation in history would barely suffer.
> 
> But take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke. The moonlight, the kreutzer and spring sonatas, even the mighty violin concerto - are "minor" works compared to the incomparable and revolutionary symphonies.


What a joker...I hope.

Perhaps the magic is simply lost on you.


----------



## Kieran

Woodduck said:


> What a joker...I hope.
> 
> Perhaps the magic is simply lost on you.


Perhaps you haven't understood what he said? Or is it impertinent to ask this?


----------



## Kieran

Christabel said:


> You need to stand guard at your 'gate', but we don't have to. That gate protects itself.


Jaypers! :lol:

The metaphors are getting mixed up! Are we still discussing the Trojan horse thread? Is that what the gate...eh...protects itself? Why protect itself?


----------



## Captainnumber36

So....Haydn is a muscular Mozart, right?

:lol:


----------



## Kieran

Captainnumber36 said:


> So....Haydn is a muscular Mozart, right?
> 
> :lol:


We've been delaying the moment when we would agree with you :lol:


----------



## Woodduck

Kieran said:


> Perhaps you haven't understood what he said? Or is it impertinent to ask this?


He said: "Take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke. The moonlight, the kreutzer and spring sonatas, even the mighty violin concerto - are 'minor' works compared to the incomparable and revolutionary symphonies."

The meaning is perfectly clear, isn't it? Either it's a joke, or he has no comprehension of the scope of Beethoven's achievement. The former is the more charitable interpretation.


----------



## EdwardBast

Kieran said:


> Obviously. And if we ask, "who wrote the best symphony in the under-10 age group?" the answer is different. Context is everything. If we found a satisfactory way of comparing, then it would be so much more straight-forward, but in fact, to ask, okay, Mozart died young, so can we look at both composers at age 35, and compare them then?, *well, this is a valid way of comparing them, too. Just as valid as any other, in fact, if there's a valid way of comparing these two* (and again, I don't mean haydn :lol: )...


No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. We have the music. The rest is blather.


----------



## Woodduck

EdwardBast said:


> No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. We have the music. The rest is blather.


I was going to say something like that, but was stopped by my pathological horror of being disagreeable.


----------



## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. We have the music. The rest is blather.


Childish?!! Really a bit strong, don't you think?

This type of speculation and creative use of the imagination is fun. Adults do it all over this forum very frequently. Okay, it MAY ? not belong as the majority of an article in an academic journal, but....

I really don't have any desire to say X is the greatest composer, etc., etc... BUT, when you read the following, copied from Post 110, it REALLY is extraordinary:

"Had Bach only lived that long, he'd never have written the St. Matthew Passion, his Cantata BWV 4 (or No. 4) would have been the final cantata, there would be no Double or Triple concerto, no Orchestral Suites, no St. John Passion and no Brandenburg Concertos. It's hard to say what his most famous composition would have been but it is clear he'd have been no better than the fourth-best composer of his time behind Handel, Vivaldi and Telemann.

-- Had Beethoven only lived 35 years he'd never have composed the late quartets or piano sonatas, there would be no 9th symphony (or any symphony after No. 3,) there would be no "Emporer" concerto, no Violin concerto, no Missa Solemnis, and no Wellington's Victory. His greatest works would have been the "Eroica" symphony written 1803 (his final symphony) and his opera "Fidelio" written 1804.

-- Had Haydn only lived 35 years, there would be no Creation or Seasons oratorios, his keyboard sonatas would be finished at No. 37, and his symphonies would have ended No. 78 -- no "Paris," "Solomon" or "London" symphonies. He would probably not be considered the "father" of the string quartet since most of those were written after age 45."

That is seriously stunning!

Also, if by childlike one mean's a joyous wonder at the beauty and marvels of the universe, we should all be more childlike more of the time.


----------



## jdec

EdwardBast said:


> No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. *We have the music*. The rest is blather.


Of course. Music that tells us that Mozart was superior than Beethoven in some musical genres, while Beethoven was superior in others. (Mozart achieved more in a shorter life span though.  )


----------



## PlaySalieri

Woodduck said:


> He said: "Take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke. The moonlight, the kreutzer and spring sonatas, even the mighty violin concerto - are 'minor' works compared to the incomparable and revolutionary symphonies."
> 
> The meaning is perfectly clear, isn't it? Either it's a joke, or he has no comprehension of the scope of Beethoven's achievement. The former is the more charitable interpretation.


I have stated on this board the Beethoven's VC is the greatest VC ever composed - bear that in mind.

I think you miss the essence of what I am saying.

Beethoven's rep among classical fans rests primarily on his symphonies

do you disagree with that?


----------



## Woodduck

stomanek said:


> I have stated on this board the Beethoven's VC is the greatest VC ever composed - bear that in mind.
> 
> I think you miss the essence of what I am saying.
> 
> Beethoven's rep among classical fans rests primarily on his symphonies
> 
> do you disagree with that?


Yes, I definitely disagree.

Perhaps it comes down to who you think his fans are, but the perception that Beethoven is considered great mainly for a few of his symphonies can only be held by people who don't know much about his music, or classical music in general. Everyone has heard "da da da daaaaaah!" Are these the fans we're talking about? Do these casual fans get to decide a composer's status? Does Wagner's reputation rest on a handful of preludes to operas? Does Tchaikovsky's rest on the "Nutcracker Suite" and "Swan Lake"? Does Mozart's rest on the "Jupiter" symphony, "Ave verum corpus," "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" and "Twinkle, twinkle little star"? If you think Beethoven's reputation rests mainly on his symphonies, why do you think Mozart's rests on any greater representation of his achievements? More generally, how do you know what anyone's reputation rests on?

Those who have seriously listened to Beethoven - or even musically sensitive people who've only heard a few chamber works and sonatas - are pretty quick to realize that there is much more to him than a few magnificent symphonies. I knew I was in the presence of something unparalleled as a high school student hearing his string quartets and "Archduke Trio" for the very first time. In fact, I thought the "Helige Dankgesang" from his Op. 132 was the most transcendental thing I'd ever heard, and I'd heard a lot of music. I guarantee you that I'm not a rare exception among people who know appreciate Beethoven's work. I can state without a doubt that even if Beethoven had written no symphonies he would still be ranked as one of the greatest of composers on the basis of, at the very least, his extraordinary piano and chamber music.

Your statement, "But take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke," is really quite silly and nothing more than a cheap shot at Beethoven. These "Composer A vs. Composer B" discussions easily degenerate into this sort of thing.


----------



## Kieran

EdwardBast said:


> No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. We have the music. The rest is blather.


Comparisons are blather. That's the point. Where have they gotten us? Absolutely nowhere. And so if we're going to persist with blathering, who's to say what's childish, and what's wiser? Anonymous blokes on the internet?

Compare Mozart at 35, and Beethoven at 35.

This is not a childish proposition. It's an exercise in comparison. So is, "compare Mozart's symphonies with Beethoven's symphonies." They're just different avenues of discussion. "Compare Mozart's music with Beethoven's music." It's not rocket salad to understand this...


----------



## Kieran

JosefinaHW said:


> Childish?!! Really a bit strong, don't you think?
> 
> This type of speculation and creative use of the imagination is fun. Adults do it all over this forum very frequently. Okay, it MAY ? not belong as the majority of an article in an academic journal, but....
> 
> I really don't have any desire to say X is the greatest composer, etc., etc... BUT, when you read the following, copied from Post 110, it REALLY is extraordinary:
> 
> "Had Bach only lived that long, he'd never have written the St. Matthew Passion, his Cantata BWV 4 (or No. 4) would have been the final cantata, there would be no Double or Triple concerto, no Orchestral Suites, no St. John Passion and no Brandenburg Concertos. It's hard to say what his most famous composition would have been but it is clear he'd have been no better than the fourth-best composer of his time behind Handel, Vivaldi and Telemann.
> 
> -- Had Beethoven only lived 35 years he'd never have composed the late quartets or piano sonatas, there would be no 9th symphony (or any symphony after No. 3,) there would be no "Emporer" concerto, no Violin concerto, no Missa Solemnis, and no Wellington's Victory. His greatest works would have been the "Eroica" symphony written 1803 (his final symphony) and his opera "Fidelio" written 1804.
> 
> -- Had Haydn only lived 35 years, there would be no Creation or Seasons oratorios, his keyboard sonatas would be finished at No. 37, and his symphonies would have ended No. 78 -- no "Paris," "Solomon" or "London" symphonies. He would probably not be considered the "father" of the string quartet since most of those were written after age 45."
> 
> That is seriously stunning!
> 
> Also, if by childlike one mean's a joyous wonder at the beauty and marvels of the universe, we should all be more childlike more of the time.


That's a great example of things, Josefina. I don't think Mr. Bast was paying attention to what he was replying to. It's got nothing to do with what could have been, it's about putting composers and their outputs into clear perspective. When we look at what Mozart achieved in so short sa span, we can't help but be awed into relative insignificance. I cited elsewhere a list that HC Robbins Landon made at the beginning of his book, Mozart, The Golden Years, where he shows the amount of masterpieces Mozart and Haydn created in the space of the last ten years of Mozart's life. *Mozart averaged more than one great masterpiece per month for the last ten years of his life.* And while some were short, like the Ave Verum Corpus, most of them were complex works with many movements, across many genres, and of course, operas which last for hours.

_*More than one a month - for ten years! 
*_
Writing at the speed of light, he brought every genre he touched ahead with him, giving us new types, new combinations, and adding dimensions to concertos and operas that nobody else had imagined. Innovator, indeed. Complexities handled with great facility, transcendent music made accessible. And all this while coping with the vagaries of life, as we all do.

What you're saying - and what I'm saying - is, let's compare, but first, let's make sure we appreciate what it is we're dealing with here...


----------



## PlaySalieri

Woodduck said:


> Yes, I definitely disagree.
> 
> Perhaps it comes down to who you think his fans are, but the perception that Beethoven is considered great mainly for a few of his symphonies can only be held by people who don't know much about his music, or classical music in general. Everyone has heard "da da da daaaaaah!" Are these the fans we're talking about? Do these casual fans get to decide a composer's status? Does Wagner's reputation rest on a handful of preludes to operas? Does Tchaikovsky's rest on the "Nutcracker Suite" and "Swan Lake"? Does Mozart's rest on the "Jupiter" symphony, "Ave verum corpus," "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" and "Twinkle, twinkle little star"? If you think Beethoven's reputation rests mainly on his symphonies, why do you think Mozart's rests on any greater representation of his achievements? More generally, how do you know what anyone's reputation rests on?
> 
> Those who have seriously listened to Beethoven - or even musically sensitive people who've only heard a few chamber works and sonatas - are pretty quick to realize that there is much more to him than a few magnificent symphonies. I knew I was in the presence of something unparalleled as a high school student hearing his string quartets and "Archduke Trio" for the very first time. In fact, I thought the "Helige Dankgesang" from his Op. 132 was the most transcendental thing I'd ever heard, and I'd heard a lot of music. I guarantee you that I'm not a rare exception among people who know appreciate Beethoven's work. I can state without a doubt that even if Beethoven had written no symphonies he would still be ranked as one of the greatest of composers on the basis of, at the very least, his extraordinary piano and chamber music.
> 
> Your statement, "But take away Beethoven's eroica, sy 5, the pastoral and 7 and no 9 - and the whole magic of Beethoven will vanish in a wisp of smoke," is really quite silly and nothing more than a cheap shot at Beethoven. These "Composer A vs. Composer B" discussions easily degenerate into this sort of thing.


OK - I agree with most of what you say. I take back the whisp of smoke comment. I thought it was a nice little image for what it was if only it had been true and could not resist.

In fact I prefer Beethoven's non symphonic output myself.

I was rather thinking of the polls I have seen over the years on TC and my impression is that people seemed to talk about how Beethoven advanced music through his amazing symphonies - there was little talk about his other achievements. I still think that even among TC members and the classical music world as a whole - Beethoven's symphonies are regarded as his primary achievement and perhaps the most common reason for listeners putting him ahead of Mozart in various polls. They dont stop to think about Mozart's operatic supremacy but obviously opera is less popular than orchestral music so that is not surprising. It would take some investigation to prove these hunches of course.


----------



## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> OK - I agree with most of what you say. I take back the whisp of smoke comment. I thought it was a nice little image for what it was if only it had been true and could not resist.
> 
> In fact I prefer Beethoven's non symphonic output myself.
> 
> I was rather thinking of the polls I have seen over the years on TC and my impression is that people seemed to talk about how Beethoven advanced music through his amazing symphonies - there was little talk about his other achievements. I still think that even among TC members and the classical music world as a whole - Beethoven's symphonies are regarded as his primary achievement and perhaps the most common reason for listeners putting him ahead of Mozart in various polls. They dont stop to think about Mozart's operatic supremacy but obviously opera is less popular than orchestral music so that is not surprising. It would take some investigation to prove these hunches of course.


For a further discussion of these matters, please see my post # 281 in the Beethoven v. Mozart thread.


----------



## Kieran

Hi Genoveva,

I went looking for your post, but post #281 is a post by me...


----------



## Mal

Fischer stresses Haydn's humanity: "It's not holy music, it's like you and me; it's very human and shows very normal feelings. More so than Beethoven. I feel better as a person and better in my life when I play Haydn. All art is about searching for answers about what happens after death. Haydn is the one who says, 'I don't have the answer, but it's good, so who cares?'"


----------



## Mal

jdec said:


> ... a survey done to 151 living conductors :
> 
> Top 10 symphonies
> 
> 1. Beethoven Symphony No 3 (1803)
> 2. Beethoven Symphony No 9 (1824)
> *3. Mozart Symphony No 41 (1788)*
> ...


There's a more comprehensive analysis of that poll.


__
https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/4xpiyb

Only one Haydn symphony, and in the bottom "2 votes" section, but he did as well as Vaughan Williams and Nielsen, and his 94 is in some pretty good company:

2 votes:

-Schubert 8

-Mozart 29

-Haydn 94

-Dvorak 7

-Bruckner 5

-Strauss Alpine Symphony

-Tchaikovsky 5

-Nielsen 4

-Stravinsky Symphony in 3 Movements

-Bartok Concerto for Orchestra

-Vaughan Williams 4

OK, Haydn didn't produce many tall peaks. But wouldn't he top the list of "most really good symphonies". The symphonic equivalent of the English Lake District?


----------



## Genoveva

Kieran said:


> Hi Genoveva,
> 
> I went looking for your post, but post #281 is a post by me...


Oops! I should have said 305.


----------



## Captainnumber36

Why did this become a Mozart vs Beethoven thread?


----------



## Kieran

Captainnumber36 said:


> Why did this become a Mozart vs Beethoven thread?


They all end up there eventually, it seems....


----------



## jdec

Captainnumber36 said:


> Why did this become a Mozart vs Beethoven thread?


My vote goes to post #155 as the detonator of this , which implied that Mozart was kind of "inferior" to Beethoven ("_Had he [Mozart] lived *he would have possibly equalled* - even surpassed - Beethoven._").


----------



## JosefinaHW

Kieran said:


> That's a great example of things, Josefina. I don't think Mr. Bast was paying attention to what he was replying to...


I think that EdwardBast was paying attention and I would agree that if one were trying to defend an argument for who was the greater composer what they MIGHT have done had they lived longer is not an OBJECTIVE criteria. Mozart might have had a major nervous breakdown or adrenal collapse when he was 35 and then might have been so cognitively impaired or so fatigued that he could not compose again. He seems to have been INTENSE! and might not physically have been able to sustain that amazing earlier composition rate. It would seem that mid- to late thirties can be a major breaking point (why??? I don't know. Is that REALLY middle age? I sure would like to know. I'm typing this with one finger on a tiny little iPad and don't know how to copy and paste, so I will continue below.


----------



## JosefinaHW

I was hoping that EdwardBast would join this conversation because he very frequently provides very specific musical examples. I just think "childish" indicates a person who won't allow or doesn't VALUE enough the emotional and LESS objective or "prove-able" side of music and discussion about music. 

I requoted that time comparison and certainly had in my mind your earlier quote, Kieran, because it is flabergasting. As you said, it just makes you stop, drop everything, and say "We are dealing with someone exceptional".


----------



## JosefinaHW

Lastly, I know I am not knowledgeable enough to vote in a large scale poll, etc., but I find it very hard to believe that any composer who starting learning music en utero or had Bach as a father and Beethoven as an older brother would necessarily achieve the same number of masterpieces as Mozart. We OBJECTIVELY cannot project into the future but we can't project into the PAST either. But, it is fun to think and talk about.


----------



## KenOC

So let's see Wolfgang the Wimp match this!


----------



## Captainnumber36

KenOC said:


> So let's see Wolfgang the Wimp match this!


lol !


----------



## KenOC

Here's Mozart for comparison...


----------



## PlaySalieri

Just coming back to the differences between Mozart and Haydn.

Listening to some mozart piano concertos yesterday - it struck me how the mood of the pieces keep fluctuating - joy and light are often qualified by hints of melancholy and longing. The range of moods Mozart was capable of expressing is just mind boggling - and of course the way he uses this colour. I think this is a major attraction in his music. Christabel wrongly said Mozart's music is transparent - it is not. 
So Haydn lacks this "alive" quality - the sense that a piece of music is almost like a living organism - these fluctuating thoughts, reflections and emotions.


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## Larkenfield

Stravinsky before and after Beethoven's Große Fuge. 








(Click pic to enlarge)


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## Kieran

JosefinaHW said:


> I think that EdwardBast was paying attention and I would agree that if one were trying to defend an argument for who was the greater composer what they MIGHT have done had they lived longer is not an OBJECTIVE criteria. Mozart might have had a major nervous breakdown or adrenal collapse when he was 35 and then might have been so cognitively impaired or so fatigued that he could not compose again. He seems to have been INTENSE! and might not physically have been able to sustain that amazing earlier composition rate. It would seem that mid- to late thirties can be a major breaking point (why??? I don't know. Is that REALLY middle age? I sure would like to know. I'm typing this with one finger on a tiny little iPad and don't know how to copy and paste, so I will continue below.


This is true, but the reason why I wondered if Mr. Bast had read what he was replying to was because nobody had suggested that we compare them based upon what Mozart might have composed had he lived. I would have agreed with him, if anyone had said that.

It's great to fantasise about such things but the truth is, we'll never know, and you've laid out a scenario above that's possible also. In the "what if" stakes my view tends to be, we should be glad Mozart lived as long as he did, because many times in his young life he was sick almost to death, including just before he wrote Cosi, if I remember right. What if he died then, and we didn't get the last 3 operas, the final concertos and quintets, etc. That's a thought that would sober up anyone...


----------



## Kieran

KenOC said:


> Here's Mozart for comparison...


Bloody typical. Comparing the infant Wolfie with fully grown men. If he'd wore his powdered blue wig in that picture he'd look tougher...


----------



## Genoveva

Captainnumber36 said:


> Why did this become a Mozart vs Beethoven thread?


I don't know for sure but would hazard a guess that it may have something to do with Mozart v. Beethoven being possibly a more interesting topic for discussion than Mozart/Haydn in many peoples' eyes. The former pair are more evenly matched in terms of popular appeal, and the difference in their styles are more clearly defined with greater scope for their relative merits to be argued over.

Not that I own up to any attempt on my part to move this discussion to Mozart v. Beethoven. My only references to Beethoven have been incidental. In fact, I deiberately posted something in the other thread on this topic yesterday by way of follow-up to an emerging discussion comparing the relative popularity of works by Mozart and Beethoven according to the TC polls.


----------



## Phil loves classical

Captainnumber36 said:


> Why did this become a Mozart vs Beethoven thread?


People like to speculate on a more irrelevant comparison, duh


----------



## JosefinaHW

stomanek said:


> Just coming back to the differences between Mozart and Haydn.
> 
> Listening to some mozart piano concertos yesterday - it struck me how the mood of the pieces keep fluctuating - joy and light are often qualified by hints of melancholy and longing. The range of moods Mozart was capable of expressing is just mind boggling - and of course the way he uses this colour. I think this is a major attraction in his music. Christabel wrongly said Mozart's music is transparent - it is not.
> So Haydn lacks this "alive" quality - the sense that a piece of music is almost like a living organism - these fluctuating thoughts, reflections and emotions.


I hear fluctuating moods in the piano cti/, too. I am glad that this thread has invited us to go back to music we haven't listened to in a very long time. But the rhythmic muscularity or driving foreword momentum that was identified have made me hear it immediately in many of Haydn's works. I understand that you are using "living" in a different sense above, Stomanek, but that motion in Haydn's music is an outstanding characteristic that makes me hear the "life" in it. Of course there is wonderous expression of different moods in The Creation.


----------



## JosefinaHW

My apologies for bringing up Beethoven too much in this thread, Captain. I frequently get lost in my own thoughts rather than stay with the specifics of an OP.


----------



## Bulldog

stomanek said:


> So Haydn lacks this "alive" quality - the sense that a piece of music is almost like a living organism - these fluctuating thoughts, reflections and emotions.


I don't feel Haydn's music lacks that quality at all. His wonderful dialogue sounds most alive to my ears, as if I'm a witness to a conversation.


----------



## EdwardBast

JosefinaHW said:


> I was hoping that EdwardBast would join this conversation because he very frequently provides very specific musical examples. I just think "childish" indicates a person who won't allow or doesn't VALUE enough the emotional and LESS objective or "prove-able" side of music and discussion about music.
> 
> I requoted that time comparison and certainly had in my mind your earlier quote, Kieran, because it is flabergasting. As you said, it just makes you stop, drop everything, and say "We are dealing with someone exceptional".


I joined the discussion to write a little about the differences between Haydn's and Mozart's style (#112). I thought it might be relevant to a discussion of musical "muscularity," whatever that is. Then, for no good reason, the discussion turned into the umpteenth harangue about who's greater, Mozart or Beethoven. If anyone was actually discussing "the emotional and LESS objective or "prove-able" side of music," whatever that is, I might find that interesting. I'll let you know when I see it.


----------



## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> I joined the discussion to write a little about the differences between Haydn's and Mozart's style (#112). I thought it might be relevant to a discussion of musical "muscularity," whatever that is. Then, for no good reason, the discussion turned into the umpteenth harangue about who's greater, Mozart or Beethoven. If anyone was actually discussing "the emotional and LESS objective or "prove-able" side of music," whatever that is, I might find that interesting. I'll let you know when I see it.


I thought I understood that you joined the discussion to write about the differences between the music of Haydn and Mozart. That is why I joined the discussion. I am confused. I don't know if I ever really cared about "muscularity" in particular; what interested me were any and all differences in their music, in order to learn about their music not which is better. So I suppose I digressed from the OP from the beginning? I thought you provided examples of differences in general. That's what I wanted to learn.

I am not assuming anything right now. I really didn't mean it as a personal attack and I apologize if it sounded that way, but what exactly were you calling childish? I thought you meant a value judgement of Mozart's greatness as a composer because had he lived longer he would have composed at the same rate and same rate of quality and he therefore would have surpassed Bach, Haydn and Beethoven. Rightly or wrongly I thought you were saying that such speculation is childish.


----------



## JosefinaHW

Now having OP clearly in front of my mind, I do not think "muscular" is good term to use to describe the difference in the music of Haydn or Mozart. I say this first because the term is too ambiguous. If it means masculine vs feminine than I also don't think of it as a good descripter; I don't think about music as masculine vs feminine; I think of very little if anything in those either or terms.


----------



## PlaySalieri

JosefinaHW said:


> I thought I understood that you joined the discussion to write about the differences between the music of Haydn and Mozart. That is why I joined the discussion. I am confused. I don't know if I ever really cared about "muscularity" in particular; what interested me were any and all differences in their music, in order to learn about their music not which is better. So I suppose I digressed from the OP from the beginning? I thought you provided examples of differences in general. That's what I wanted to learn.
> 
> I am not assuming anything right now. I really didn't mean it as a personal attack and I apologize if it sounded that way, but what exactly were you calling childish? I thought you meant a value judgement of Mozart's greatness as a composer because had he lived longer *he would have composed at the same rate and same rate of quality and he therefore would have surpassed Bach, Haydn and Beethoven.* Rightly or wrongly I thought you were saying that such speculation is childish.


Mozart composed more music than all three - so he already surpassed them. No need for speculation.


----------



## JosefinaHW

stomanek said:


> Mozart composed more music than all three - so he already surpassed them. No need for speculation.


What did you think EdwardBast was calling "childish"?


----------



## PlaySalieri

JosefinaHW said:


> What did you think EdwardBast was calling "childish"?


I suspect like Wooduck - he does not want to see his heroe's no 1 position undermined by statistical analysis and well reasoned argument.

So any further debate on the hottest topic this board has ever seen - must be childish.


----------



## Blancrocher

A lot of pianists have made interesting if often poetic comparisons of Haydn and Mozart. I enjoyed this one from Alfred Brendel, who talks about Haydn't piano sonatas being exploratory and adventurous by comparison with Mozart's more classical compositions; he also says they are conceived for the instrument in a way that Mozart's, which recall wind divertimenti or orchestral sounds, are not.


----------



## JosefinaHW

stomanek said:


> I suspect like Wooduck - he does not want to see his heroe's no 1 position undermined by statistical analysis and well reasoned argument.
> 
> So any further debate on the hottest topic this board has ever seen - must be childish.


Please don't go there, Stomanek. I really am confused about what was being described as childish.


----------



## Kieran

JosefinaHW said:


> What did you think EdwardBast was calling "childish"?


He was misrepresenting what I had said in this post, and concluded from this that I was being childish.



EdwardBast said:


> No, this isn't a valid or meaningful way to compare composers who have been dead for 200 years. All the coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments about what Mozart might have done in some other region of the multiverse where he didn't die are childish. We have the music. The rest is blather.


I'm sure he's since reread my post and understood the difference. I've made similar mistakes in the past myself, it can easy happen...


----------



## Woodduck

stomanek said:


> I suspect like Wooduck - he does not want to see his heroe's no 1 position undermined by statistical analysis and well reasoned argument.
> 
> So any further debate on the hottest topic this board has ever seen - must be childish.


I'm absolutely certain that neither EdwardBast nor I have any fear of being undermined by statistics, arguments, or anything else.

Maybe you can provide a well-reasoned argument showing that compilations of popularity lists tell us anything valuable about a composer's music.


----------



## Genoveva

Woodduck said:


> I'm absolutely certain that neither EdwardBast nor I have any fear of being undermined by statistics, arguments, or anything else.


If so, there would appear to be no point trying to discuss anything with either of you, if you are both completely resilient to any form of argument.


----------



## Captainnumber36

Genoveva said:


> If so, there would appear to be no point trying to discuss anything with either of you, if you are both completely resilient to any form of argument.


No one is completely objective, but we can get pretty darn close the more evolved we become.


----------



## Genoveva

Captainnumber36 said:


> No one is completely objective, but we can get pretty darn close the more evolved we become.


I'm not sure what you mean by "evolved", as it doesn't appear to link with my post which you quoted.

The post of mine to which you refer was querying the value of having discussions with people on matters where possible disagreement may arise if one side declares in advance that they have no _"... fear of being undermined by statistics, arguments, or anything else. "_

I can possibly understand why statistical arguments by themselves may not be persuasive to some, but the "_anything else_" bit is a bit strong.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> I'm not sure what you mean by "evolved", as it doesn't appear to link with my post which you quoted.
> 
> The post of mine to which you refer was querying the value of having discussions with people on matters where possible disagreement may arise if one side declares in advance that they have no _"... fear of being undermined by statistics, arguments, or anything else. "_
> 
> I can possibly understand why statistical arguments by themselves may not be persuasive to some, but the "_anything else_" bit is a bit strong.


perhaps Wooduck meant he is not afraid of being proven wrong - whatever the method.


----------



## PlaySalieri

Blancrocher said:


> A lot of pianists have made interesting if often poetic comparisons of Haydn and Mozart. I enjoyed this one from Alfred Brendel, who talks about Haydn't piano sonatas being exploratory and adventurous by comparison with Mozart's more classical compositions; he also says they are conceived for the instrument in a way that Mozart's, which recall wind divertimenti or orchestral sounds, are not.


I did listen to Brendel in that short piece which is principally focused on Mozart and not Haydn.

"Mozart's piano sonatas are generally underrated"

agreed.


----------



## EdwardBast

JosefinaHW said:


> I thought you meant a value judgement of Mozart's greatness as a composer because had he lived longer he would have composed at the same rate and same rate of quality and he therefore would have surpassed Bach, Haydn and Beethoven. Rightly or wrongly I thought you were saying that such speculation is childish.


The speculation isn't childish. But as a strategy to argue who was greater (which argument I have repeatedly held to be silly in any case) it is lame. If you are arguing it, IMO, you have already lost the argument on the merits of the music.


----------



## EdwardBast

stomanek said:


> I suspect like Wooduck - he does not want to see his heroe's no 1 position undermined by statistical analysis and well reasoned argument.
> 
> So any further debate on the hottest topic this board has ever seen - must be childish.


You haven't been paying careful attention to or have simply failed to understand my contributions to this and similar threads. For the umpteenth time, I think arguing who is greater in cases where composers are separated by a generation or more and by a sea-change in musical aesthetics, is meaningless. Hence, when people make such arguments, especially in a thread where it is off topic, I am inclined to debunk them. Since you like Mozart, when I endeavor to debunk your arguments you assume it is because I don't like Mozart or feel a need to champion Beethoven. Neither is the case.


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## MarkW

Well, since the contrapositive (Mozart -- a wimpy Haydn) -- doesn't seen to be true, your original statement is probably untrue.


----------



## Kieran

EdwardBast said:


> The speculation isn't childish. But as a strategy to argue who was greater (which argument I have repeatedly held to be silly in any case) it is lame. If you are arguing it, IMO, you have already lost the argument on the merits of the music.


It's interesting. I think you're still not paying attention. Firstly, nobody is saying that we shouldn't compare Mozart and Beethoven based on the merits of the music. I'd welcome it, as I said. Also, nobody is saying we should compare them based upon "coulda-woulda-shoulda arguments". this wasn't on the table at all.

My point was - as expressed several times - that if we're to play the game of comparisons between the two, why not also compare them at aged 35, just o see how they stack up? Why not? It's as valid a comparison as any, since any way we do this will have its critics, and not only that, will fail to churn out a set of rules we'd all agree on. And even further, as you rightly say, this argument would be "silly in any case."

But a free for all comparison? I think that would be enjoyable to. It'd also give Beethoven a better shot at scraping a draw! :lol:

I'm teasing here, by the way, before pedant cops leap in, bully clubs flailing...


----------



## Blancrocher

If instead of comparing them at the age of 35, we were to do so at the age of 5, I'd be willing to declare Mozart the decisive winner.


----------



## Kieran

Blancrocher said:


> If instead of comparing them at the age of 35, we were to do so at the age of 5, I'd be willing to declare Mozart the decisive winner.


He'd be decisive at 35 too.


----------



## poconoron

While I have stayed out of this discussion so far, I must admit that it is quite bemusing to observe from afar both EdwardBlast and Wooduck "oh so gently, tip-toe through the tulips" in their attempts to remain as lofty, objective arbiters of the truth, as they see it. This, when it is blatantly obvious that they favor "their guy" - but don't really quite want to just come out and admit it. 

Come on guys................... out of the closet please!!! :wave::wave::wave:


----------



## Genoveva

poconoron said:


> While I have stayed out of this discussion so far, I must admit that it is quite bemusing to observe from afar both EdwardBlast and Wooduck "oh so gently, tip-toe through the tulips" in their attempts to remain as lofty, objective arbiters of the truth, as they see it. This, when it is blatantly obvious that they favor "their guy" - but don't really quite want to just come out and admit it.
> 
> Come on guys................... out of the closet please!!! :wave::wave::wave:


I'm in shock ... I can hardly believe it .... lost for words ... what? ... cough, splutter ... you mean these guys favour their guy over Mozart? .... well, you could knock me down with a feather ... I had never guessed ... silly me!

(sotto voce: it's been obvious for ages).


----------



## EdwardBast

poconoron said:


> While I have stayed out of this discussion so far, I must admit that it is quite bemusing to observe from afar both EdwardBlast and Wooduck "oh so gently, tip-toe through the tulips" in their attempts to remain as lofty, objective arbiters of the truth, as they see it. This, when it is blatantly obvious that they favor "their guy" - but don't really quite want to just come out and admit it.
> 
> Come on guys................... out of the closet please!!! :wave::wave::wave:


Haydn or Mozart? (See thread title) Which one is my guy?


----------



## Phil loves classical

Way i see it is Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven all had their moments and their place in History. Who had more, who was more consistent is not important. It is only one Era in Music anyway.


----------



## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> Haydn or Mozart? (See thread title) Which one is my guy?


I would say Haydn, no question about it.

CPE Bach and Beethoven are also your "guys", as well as many Russian composers - the foremost being Shostakovich.

Beethoven is your number 1. Bruckner is possibly your least favorite tonal composer.


----------



## Captainnumber36

While Mozart did indeed represent lots of different moods, does Haydn's work tend to have a firmer nature about it? More bold?


----------



## EdwardBast

tdc said:


> I would say Haydn, no question about it.
> 
> CPE Bach and Beethoven are also your "guys", as well as many Russian composers - the foremost being Shostakovich.
> 
> Beethoven is your number 1. Bruckner is possibly your least favorite tonal composer.


That's pretty good ^ ^ ^, but I like Haydn and Mozart about equally. I don't have a number one. If the choice was between hearing a performance of any of the mature Mozart piano concertos and nearly any Haydn symphony, I would usually opt to hear the Mozart. Same with Mozart late symphonies versus Haydn. The only exception I might make is for a few of the Haydn Sturm and Drang works. As a musicologist I find Haydn more interesting, but that doesn't have that much to do with my listening preferences.

Beethoven is my favorite composer of the early nineteenth century. Among the Russians, I like Prokofiev at least as much as Shostakovich, and more of my listening is to 20thc music than to anything earlier. Your impressions based on my TC posting likely diverge from my tastes as a listener because I often post with my musicologist hat on.

Re Bruckner: Alas, that might be true. Of late I have been listening to all of his symphonies (far from the first time) multiple times. I find 2, 3, and 6 less objectionable than the others. Despite my efforts at appreciation, I often find myself laughing in derision and singing along in a mocking tone as he pounds some dumb motive into my head over and over and over. Sorry.


----------



## PlaySalieri

EdwardBast said:


> That's pretty good ^ ^ ^, but I like Haydn and Mozart about equally. I don't have a number one. If the choice was between hearing a performance of any of the mature Mozart piano concertos and nearly any Haydn symphony, I would usually opt to hear the Mozart. Same with Mozart late symphonies versus Haydn. The only exception I might make is for a few of the Haydn Sturm and Drang works. As a musicologist I find Haydn more interesting, but that doesn't have that much to do with my listening preferences.
> 
> Beethoven is my favorite composer of the early nineteenth century. Among the Russians, I like Prokofiev at least as much as Shostakovich, and more of my listening is to 20thc music than to anything earlier. Your impressions based on my TC posting likely diverge from my tastes as a listener because I often post with my musicologist hat on.
> 
> Re Bruckner: Alas, that might be true. Of late I have been listening to all of his symphonies (far from the first time) multiple times. I find 2, 3, and 6 less objectionable than the others. Despite my efforts at appreciation, *I often find myself laughing in derision and singing along in a mocking tone as he pounds some dumb motive into my head over and over and over. *Sorry.


I wish I had so much listening time available I could afford to listen to and scoff at music I dont much like. Who knows though - one day perhaps I will be framed in some horrid crime - and be sent to solitary confinement at her majesties pleasure - with an MP3 player and 100,000 hours of western classical music. Now that is a destiny worth hoping for.

BTW I didnt know you were a musicologist - I do indeed believe you probably are as such while at the same time disbelieving Christabel's similar claim. May I ask if you are in a professional capacity? (ie in a paid position in this field)


----------



## Captainnumber36

stomanek said:


> I wish I had some much listening time available I could afford to listen to and scoff at music I dont much like. Who knows though - one day perhaps I will be framed in some horrid crime - and be sent to solitary confinement at her majesties pleasure - with an MP3 player and 100,000 hours of western classical music. Now that is a destiny worth hoping for.


:lol: hahaha !


----------



## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> Re Bruckner: Despite my efforts at appreciation,_* I often find myself laughing in derision and singing along in a mocking tone as he pounds*_ some dumb motive into my head over and over and over. Sorry.


Your courageously honest remark provides me with the opportunity to raise a question about an idea that has been growing for awhile now. I've been wondering if some/many people don't like certain pieces of music because they feel manipulated by the music or the composer. I'm not sure if most people are even conscious of that, but you seem to be very conscious of this with Bruckner. Am I understanding you correctly? Do you think this is in fact common with many people?


----------



## Woodduck

poconoron said:


> While I have stayed out of this discussion so far, I must admit that it is quite bemusing to observe from afar both EdwardBlast and Wooduck "oh so gently, tip-toe through the tulips" in their attempts to remain as lofty, objective arbiters of the truth, as they see it. This, when it is blatantly obvious that they favor "their guy" - but don't really quite want to just come out and admit it.
> 
> Come on guys................... out of the closet please!!! :wave::wave::wave:


Tiptoe? Tulips? Lofty arbiters? Admit? 

Jeez. All you have to do is ask.

I personally like Beethoven more than Haydn, and Haydn slightly more than Mozart. I wasn't aware that I was trying not to admit anything, but - gosh 'n' golly! Thanks for helping me clear the air. I feel so much better now.

Please note that I've never said that Beethoven was a greater composer than Mozart. There I remain "lofty and objective," and admit that I'm not qualified to make such a judgment. I find competitions in art basically distasteful, and attempts to subject qualitatively different things to a common standard of measurement a waste of time and rather silly.


----------



## poconoron

Thank you, guys...... appreciate your candor and good spiriitedness. That clears the air a bit..... for me anyway. It's nice to know what all of our (not so hidden) biases are, coming into these _oh-so weighty _discussions..........

Of course none of us is really qualified to determine who is the "greatest" composer - it's a bit tougher than determining quantitatively who is most prolific in, let's say homeruns, on the baseball field. All we can really do is state our individual preferences and delineate why we have those preferences. I have always stated Mozart as my number 1, followed closely by Beethoven - and then Haydn and others.

For me Mozart is first because of his staggering achievements in all walks and genres of music- and done in so short a time. For me, his mature compositional career really began in his late teens - most everything prior to that was child-like experimentation and discovering who he was as a composer. So what we really have is roughly _17 years or so_ to achieve what he achieved. Contrast that with the many decades other composers had at their mature compositional peaks. It's no wonder he has received all the accolades that I and others have presented on TC from musicians, other composers and the like through the ages.

And yes, I do consider Haydn to be a more muscular Mozart in many respects............his music is much more _rustic_ in nature to my ears.


----------



## EdwardBast

stomanek said:


> I wish I had so much listening time available I could afford to listen to and scoff at music I dont much like. Who knows though - one day perhaps I will be framed in some horrid crime - and be sent to solitary confinement at her majesties pleasure - with an MP3 player and 100,000 hours of western classical music. Now that is a destiny worth hoping for.
> 
> BTW I didnt know you were a musicologist - I do indeed believe you probably are as such while at the same time disbelieving Christabel's similar claim. May I ask if you are in a professional capacity? (ie in a paid position in this field)


Who said scoff? The laughing is a reflex, like sneezing. The point is that I keep trying to like Bruckner because so many reasonable people seem to like him. It just hasn't happened yet.

I am a doctor of musicology, have taught at colleges and universities, worked in the libraries of major orchestras, written program notes for professional ensembles and orchestras, published and sold musical arrangements, and published articles in musicology, music theory, and aesthetics (on the music of Beethoven, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, King Crimson and others). I'm still doing library work, publishing and composing.


----------



## EdwardBast

JosefinaHW said:


> Your courageously honest remark provides me with the opportunity to raise a question about an idea that has been growing for awhile now. I've been wondering if some/many people don't like certain pieces of music because they feel manipulated by the music or the composer. I'm not sure if most people are even conscious of that, but you seem to be very conscious of this with Bruckner. Am I understanding you correctly? Do you think this is in fact common with many people?


When expressive behavior in everyday life seems unmotivated, out of proportion to a situation, or inconsistent with long-standing patterns, we can have doubts about its sincerity and suspect we are being manipulated, even when we can't quite articulate the basis of our suspicion. On the other hand, perfectly sincere people are sometimes misjudged because they are inarticulate or otherwise having trouble expressing their feelings. The same critical faculties that come into play in everyday life seem to be extrapolated, often too glibly, to judging expression in music. When, for example, a musical climax seems unmotivated, poorly prepared, or out of proportion, we might feel intuitively that the expressed emotion feels insincere and overblown. But what does this mean in the musical case? Does it mean the same thing as in everyday life, that the composer is pretending to feel something s/he doesn't really feel? Such a conclusion rests on the questionable assumption that music expresses the inner life of its composers, rather than the feelings of fictional personae residing in the music but separate from the composer, who creates them in the same way a novelist creates fictional characters. In short, does it mean the composer is insincere, that the fictional personae the composer creates are insincere, or is it just a matter of poor technique?

My opinion is that structure and expressive content are so intimately entwined in 19thc and later music that poor technique and command of musical structure tends to manifest itself as insincerity or manipulation, especially to untrained listeners. Musically trained listeners, I suspect, are more likely to just hear technical miscalculation. When I listen to Bruckner, for example, I don't hear insincerity of expression or manipulation, I hear, rightly or wrongly, a composer whose technique just isn't up to the challenges he set himself. I just don't think he was a very good composer. Or maybe I just find the musical personae he creates overblown, annoying and inarticulate?  Is it the same thing? Maybe. Not sure.


----------



## PlaySalieri

EdwardBast said:


> Who said scoff? The laughing is a reflex, like sneezing. *The point is that I keep trying to like Bruckner because so many reasonable people seem to like him. *It just hasn't happened yet.
> 
> I am a doctor of musicology, have taught at colleges and universities, worked in the libraries of major orchestras, written program notes for professional ensembles and orchestras, published and sold musical arrangements, and published articles in musicology, music theory, and aesthetics (on the music of Beethoven, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, King Crimson and others). I'm still doing library work, publishing and composing.


OK - the fact that you are a doctor of musicology does not make you immune to irrational listening behaviour I see.

I wonder how you define "reasonable people" and can you explain how these characteristics and them liking Bruckner mean that you should like Bruckner too.

Do you think that all "reasonable people" should be sympathetic to the same music?


----------



## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> When expressive behavior in everyday life seems unmotivated, out of proportion to a situation, or inconsistent with long-standing patterns, we can have doubts about its sincerity and suspect we are being manipulated, even when we can't quite articulate the basis of our suspicion. On the other hand, perfectly sincere people are sometimes misjudged because they are inarticulate or otherwise having trouble expressing their feelings. The same critical faculties that come into play in everyday life seem to be extrapolated, often too glibly, to judging expression in music. When, for example, a musical climax seems unmotivated, poorly prepared, or out of proportion, we might feel intuitively that the expressed emotion feels insincere and overblown. But what does this mean in the musical case? Does it mean the same thing as in everyday life, that the composer is pretending to feel something s/he doesn't really feel? Such a conclusion rests on the questionable assumption that music expresses the inner life of its composers, rather than the feelings of fictional personae residing in the music but separate from the composer, who creates them in the same way a novelist creates fictional characters. In short, does it mean the composer is insincere, that the fictional personae the composer creates are insincere, or is it just a matter of poor technique?
> 
> My opinion is that structure and expressive content are so intimately entwined in 19thc and later music that poor technique and command of musical structure tends to manifest itself as insincerity or manipulation, especially to untrained listeners. Musically trained listeners, I suspect, are more likely to just hear technical miscalculation. When I listen to Bruckner, for example, I don't hear insincerity of expression or manipulation, I hear, rightly or wrongly, a composer whose technique just isn't up to the challenges he set himself. I just don't think he was a very good composer. Or maybe I just find the musical personae he creates overblown, annoying and inarticulate?  Is it the same thing? Maybe. Not sure.


@EdwardBast Thank you very much for taking the time to respond to my question. Your response were very interesting and from a completely different point of view than I was thinking. Raises many other questions, leaves many still unanswered, but this thread isn't the place for all that. Again, many thanks.


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## hpowders

Haydn seemed not to take himself too seriously. His music reflects that. Full of musical jokes and witty, uncanny rhythms. So darn clever! When Haydn usually composes in a minor key, he doesn't stay there more than a few bars before the music modulates to the major. Haydn, like his music, was extroverted-he gave Royalty what they wanted to listen to. Knew how to play the "Royalty game". Died rich and was the most famous composer in Europe, overshadowing Mozart.

Mozart's music? More serious. "Deeper" than Haydn's. Not so many musical jokes. Took himself very seriously. Couldn't play "the Royalty game". Died in poverty as a result. However, Mozart was arguably the greatest melodist who ever lived.

I love them both, but tend to lean more in Haydn's direction. The latter's music sounds more "human" to me.


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## PlaySalieri

hpowders said:


> Haydn seemed not to take himself too seriously. His music reflects that. Full of musical jokes and witty, uncanny rhythms. So darn clever! When Haydn usually composes in a minor key, he doesn't stay there more than a few bars before the music modulates to the major. Haydn, like his music, was extroverted-he gave Royalty what they wanted to listen to. Knew how to play the "Royalty game". Died rich and was the most famous composer in Europe, overshadowing Mozart.
> 
> Mozart's music? More serious. "Deeper" than Haydn's. Not so many musical jokes. Took himself very seriously. Couldn't play "the Royalty game". Died in poverty as a result. However, Mozart was arguably the greatest melodist who ever lived.
> 
> I love them both, but tend to lean more in Haydn's direction. The latter's music sounds more "human" to me.


Mozart happened to live at a time, in the 1780s - when all the major musical posts at court were filled - and people tended to stay in a job for life. he was in fact waiting for some old duffer to die, I think an organist - a lucrative position that would have given him the security he needed. Unfortunately he died before the old duffer at the organ.

Think about how he mad his living outside of tuition with his subscription concerts - each concert needed 1 or 2 new piano concertos and another work. Imagine if todays composers had to do 1 concert each 3 months and present 3 new works to make ends meet.


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## Kieran

One thing I’ll say with Haydn and Mozart - I don’t ever sense pretentiousness or pompousness in their music - that’s an aspect of egoism that came with later composers. And of course, both of them knew how to write music that could alternately be witty, and then more dramatic. Mozart’s Da Ponte operas contain some absolute gems of witty ambiguity, which at the same time sounds gloriously sumptuous...


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## EdwardBast

stomanek said:


> OK - the fact that you are a doctor of musicology does not make you immune to irrational listening behaviour I see.
> 
> I wonder how you define "reasonable people" and can you explain how these characteristics and them liking Bruckner mean that you should like Bruckner too.
> 
> Do you think that all "reasonable people" should be sympathetic to the same music?


No amount of training makes one immune to irrational listening behavior!

I don't believe I need to like Bruckner. But I feel like I should know his music well as part of my continuing education.

No, people will be sympathetic to music based on all sorts of differing life experiences and intangible factors. I think that is as it should be.


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## Mal

stomanek said:


> Mozart happened to live at a time, in the 1780s - when all the major musical posts at court were filled... 1 or 2 new piano concertos and another work. Imagine if todays composers had to do 1 concert each 3 months and present 3 new works to make ends meet.


I thought it was now accepted that he made plenty of money.

"For centuries he has been portrayed as an impoverished genius, who wrote begging letters to his mates and ended up in a pauper's grave. But far from being hard up, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lived a solidly upper-crust life and was among the top earners in eighteenth century Vienna... Sometimes he had heavy debts too. It must have been through gaming... Although legend has it that he was buried in a pauper's grave, the reality was that he was interred in a regular communal grave in accordance with contemporary practice."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/apr/05/arts.music

He made 1000 florins for one concert when a labourer made 25 florins a year!


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## JosefinaHW

EdwardBast said:


> No amount of training makes one immune to irrational listening behavior!
> 
> I don't believe I need to like Bruckner. But I feel like I should know his music well as part of my continuing education.
> 
> No, people will be sympathetic to music based on all sorts of differing life experiences and intangible factors. I think that is as it should be.


Thank you for making this so clear!


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## PlaySalieri

Mal said:


> I thought it was now accepted that he made plenty of money.
> 
> "For centuries he has been portrayed as an impoverished genius, who wrote begging letters to his mates and ended up in a pauper's grave. But far from being hard up, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lived a solidly upper-crust life and was among the top earners in eighteenth century Vienna... Sometimes he had heavy debts too. It must have been through gaming... Although legend has it that he was buried in a pauper's grave, the reality was that he was interred in a regular communal grave in accordance with contemporary practice."
> 
> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/apr/05/arts.music
> 
> He made 1000 florins for one concert when a labourer made 25 florins a year!


His earnings were inconsistent. While his subscription concerts were popular he did well - but he also lived beyond his means in an elite apartment. So during the lean years when he should have been living carefully, he was living in a suite of rooms in the top area of Vienna - not for long though - he had to move to cheaper accommodation several times.

By the last 2 years he was writing begging letters to his mason friends and he left Constanze penniless at his death. She did however raise significant funds by selling various manuscripts etc and benefiting from tribute concerts in her favour.


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## Genoveva

I agree with stomanek. 

I understand that Mozart earned a lot of money at various times in his career but also built up considerable debts, probably due to his medical problems and living a lavish life-style. Some stories suggest he gambled and lost some money, but I have no idea about that. 

I understand that after his death his wife was left almost penniless but due to the popularity of his works she was able to arrange some money-earning concerts that helped secure her and children's futures. Constanze did a great deal to keep the memory of her deceased husband's music alive in the face of some decline in the general popularity of music of that broad in the early part of the 19th C.

The suggestion that Mozart was buried in a "paupers" grave is not right. He was buried somewhere outside the city limits in a "common" grave as required by the rules of the time concerning non-aristocratic deaths. He was too well regarded to have been buried in some place like a paupers' grave. Also, I gather that big fancy funerals were not common in at that time outside royal circles.


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## PlaySalieri

Just as a footnote re how Constanze lived and coped after Mozart's death

Jane Glover's book "Mozart's Women" gives a superb account.


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## Genoveva

stomanek said:


> Just as a footnote re how Constanze lived and coped after Mozart's death
> 
> Jane Glover's book "Mozart's Women" gives a superb account.


I haven't looked at Jane Glover's book, but I suspect it's good.

The book on this subject that I have read, though quite quickly, was by Agnes Selby: _Constanze, Mozart's Beloved_

Agnes Selby was a Jewish Holocaust survivor, born in Slovakia. She moved to Australia shortly after the end of World War 2. Apart from her book on Constanze Mozart, she was a well known contributor on the now defunct _Mozart Forum_, which is where I first encountered her as a young Mozart fan. She also contributed regularly to another classical music forum (I won't mention its name) of which I was also a member for a short time. I recall several very interesting posts and short articles by Agnes on various aspects of W A Mozart and Constanze, and I also learned quite a lot on that forum generally about classical music. Some of its members (including Agnes Selby) used their real names..

I understand that Agnes Selby died in 2016.


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## PlaySalieri

Genoveva said:


> I haven't looked at Jane Glover's book, but I suspect it's good.
> 
> The book on this subject that I have read, though quite quickly, was by Agnes Selby: _Constanze, Mozart's Beloved_
> 
> Agnes Selby was a Jewish Holocaust survivor, born in Slovakia. She moved to Australia shortly after the end of World War 2. Apart from her book on Constanze Mozart, she was a well known contributor on the now defunct _Mozart Forum_, which is where I first encountered her as a young Mozart fan. She also contributed regularly to another classical music forum (I won't mention its name) of which I was also a member for a short time. I recall several very interesting posts and short articles by Agnes on various aspects of W A Mozart and Constanze, and I also learned quite a lot on that forum generally about classical music. Some of its members (including Agnes Selby) used their real names..
> 
> I understand that Agnes Selby died in 2016.


Thanks - I will see if I can get a copy. Constanze Mozart is a huge topic and I dont think her significance in Mozart's life is properly appreciated by many.


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## hammeredklavier

-------------------------------------


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## consuono

> I don't get the fuss about this Joseph guy to be honest.


Mozart made quite a fuss about him too. Apparently he got it.


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> Mozart made quite a fuss about him too. Apparently he got it.


It's true that in instances like K.590/iv (the use of rustic rhythms is said to have something to do with J. Haydn's Op.55 No.1), K.464/iv (monothematicism), and K.491 (J. Haydn symphony No.78 in C minor), the influence of J. Haydn is apparent. But all the stories about J. Haydn inventing and being "the father of everything", and "creating a sensation across Europe" in the late 18th century are quite "overblown" to be honest.[1] And all the facts about Mozart's influence on J. Haydn are woefully neglected today.[2] I also think the agnus dei of J. Haydn's Missa sancti Nicolai (his 6th mass), which he revised in 1802 also takes ideas from the chromatic expressions of the Et incarnatus est / crucifixus of Mozart's K.317 (1779), since this sort of expression doesn't appear in any of Joseph's works prior to mid-1780s.
I think Mozart's attitude toward Joseph was in fact more "respect" rather than "admiration"- he would take some ideas from hearing Joseph's music performed, but would not actually get himself score of Joseph's music to study. Whereas with Michael, -Mozart asked his father in a letter to "send him copies of the latest fugues, symphonies Michael wrote" (look at K.291). It was this sort of stuff Mozart was more interested in:




 (compare the use of the winds with that of Mozart K.550/i)




 (also listen to the passage at 16:45)
rather than:


hammeredklavier said:


> a symphony Joseph wrote in 1785 :
> 
> 
> 
> (17:32~17:54). Joseph was in his "maturity", he should have moved away from doing this sort of thing (spamming the motif with chords ad-nauseam). But he didn't.


[1]:


hammeredklavier said:


> Michael Haydn wrote his string quintet MH189 in 1773, in Salzburg - 1 year before Joseph (who was already working as a kapellmeister for the Esterhazies) published his Sun quartets (Op.20).
> This impassioned passage (
> 
> 
> 
> ) of the slow movement from Michael's MH189 seems to anticipate
> Mozart's K.551 (
> 
> 
> 
> ).
> Also look at;
> Michael Haydn string quintet in G, MH 189 (1773) : [ 0:49 ~ 1:06 ]
> Mozart string quartet in E flat, K.428 (1783) : [ 0:49 ~ 1:14 ]
> Some treatment of chromaticism in the minuet (
> 
> 
> 
> ) and phrases in the finale also remind me of Mozart.
> Also look at these sections from MH189 (
> 
> 
> 
> )
> and Mozart K.533 (
> 
> 
> 
> )





hammeredklavier said:


> Btw, in Post #144, I was also pointing out that people tend to give a bit to much credit to Joseph for his invention of "formulas and ideas" (while neglecting his contemporaries like his younger brother).
> Listen to Michael's string quintets, MH187, MH189, MH367, MH411, MH412, especially ones he wrote before the publication (1774) of Joseph's Op.20 quartets - MH187, MH189 (1773). I find many elements in Michael's quintets people tend to give only Joseph's Op.20 credit for.
> Also notice the similarities in the openings of Michael's G major, MH189 and Mozart's K.387, and the finales of Michael's 23rd symphony (MH 287) and Mozart's K.387.
> Maybe Mozart intended to outdo Joseph in some moments like the finales of K.464 (monothematicism) and K.590 (phrasing and rhythm), but I still think Michael was just as big a source of inspiration for him as Joseph, if not more. With the C major, MH187, I find the interplay of upper strings in the slow movement and the chromatic fun in the finale memorable.
> http://mrc.hanyang.ac.kr/wp-content/jspm/20/jspm_2006_20_10.pdf#page=4
> "Mozart wrote to his father on 29 March 1783 about the musical gatherings in the apartments of Baron van Swieten: "we love to amuse ourselves with all kind of masters, ancient and modern." So music was the main object of the other of the composers Mozart and his colleagues studied in these sessions is mentioned in the Mozart correspondence by name: Johann Ernst Eberlin, for instance, or Georg Friedrich Handel, or J.S. Bach and his sons Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel, or *Michael Haydn*."


[2]: 


hammeredklavier said:


> "... it is interesting that, having influenced Haydn, Bach (CPE) later allowed himself to be influenced by the younger composer, just as Haydn later influenced and was influenced by Mozart. ..."
> 
> compare the string figures in measure 9 of Confitebor tibi domine from Mozart Vesperae solennes de confessore (1780)
> with those of Gloria from Haydn Schöpfungsmesse (1801)
> ---
> Mozart Symphony No. 25 in G Minor, K. 183: I. Allegro con brio (1773)
> Mozart Missa longa K.262 - "mortuorum" (1775)
> J. Haydn - Hob XXII:12 - Mass in B flat major "Theresienmesse" - agnus dei (1799)
> ---
> Mozart Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, K. 550: II. Andante (1788)
> Erblicke hier, betörter Mensch from Haydn oratorio Die Jahreszeiten (1801)
> ---
> Adagio introduction from Mozart: String Quartet No.19 In C, K.465 - "Dissonance" (1785)
> Die Vorstellung des Chaos from Haydn oratorio Die Schöpfung (1798)
> ( "... Yet he remained a bit flummoxed by this opening, saying only "if Mozart wrote it he must have meant it." This from the composer who, later on, would make a musical depiction of Chaos resolved into blinding C Major light in The Creation. ..." )
> ---
> the way the first movements open:
> Mozart - String Quartet No. 15 in D minor K. 421 (1783)
> Haydn - String Quartet Op. 76, No. 2 in D minor 'Quinten' (1797)
> ---
> Agnus Dei from Mozart Krönungsmesse (1779)
> Agnus Dei from Haydn Harmoniemesse (1802)
> Adagio from symphony No.98 (1792)


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## consuono

No, hammeredklavier. I love Mozart, but the fact is that without his father, Haydn and J. C. Bach Mozart would've been speechless. It wasn't a case of music wallowing around in mediocrities like Haydn until a singularity like Mozart came along.


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## Animal the Drummer

No, he wouldn't have. While Haydn was a great composer in his own right, something to which Mozart himself would have attested, Mozart's unique genius would have found its voice one way or the other.


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## consuono

Animal the Drummer said:


> No, he wouldn't have. While Haydn was a great composer in his own right, something to which Mozart himself would have attested, Mozart's unique genius would have found its voice one way or the other.


So Mozart would've come up with Haydnesque or J. C. Bachian forms and approaches all on his own whether those composers had existed or not. That's ridiculous. Even J. S. Bach was a synthesis of his influences, and so was Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, whoever.

Anyway "he would've found his voice all on his own" is an unprovable statement. It's like saying Einstein would've come up with his theories even without Euclid, Newton or Leibniz.


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## Animal the Drummer

If those composers hadn't been there he would have assimilated other precedents instead. They were not "singularities", to coin a phrase, any more than he was.


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## consuono

Animal the Drummer said:


> If those composers hadn't been there he would have assimilated other precedents instead. They were not "singularities" any more than he was.


But it wouldn't have been the same in any case. The fact is "Mozart" is an amalgam of his influences filtered through his own genius, one of the biggest influences being Haydn. And I didn't say Haydn or anybody else was a singularity.


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> So Mozart would've come up with Haydnesque or J. C. Bachian forms and approaches all on his own whether those composers had existed or not. That's ridiculous. Even J. S. Bach was a synthesis of his influences, and so was Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, whoever.
> Anyway "he would've found his voice all on his own" is an unprovable statement. It's like saying Einstein would've come up with his theories even without Euclid, Newton or Leibniz.


I acknowledge all the influences, it's just that in the case of J. Haydn, the actual value of his work and its historical significance are way too exaggerated honestly. There's no real "anguish" in J. Haydn's music. (I rate him lower than even Carl Philipp Emanuel in this regard.) Only some instances of "laments". And whenever he tries to express "anguish", it only sounds "cringeworthy" and "awkward". His emotional scope is narrow - it's almost like listening to J.G. Naumann, in this regard.
Just compare him with his younger brother: 












There's no reason all of Joseph's baryton trios should be recorded (even though it's so hard to find a baryton player today), while his own younger brother's 20 litanies still languish in obscurity.



hammeredklavier said:


> ( 6:32 ~ 7:45 )
> This is way too much. The guy apparently has found something good for a melody. He clings to it with all his might, trying to arouse emotion in the listener with it. Way too artificial (almost sickening, imv).





hammeredklavier said:


> For example, look at his ways to set the text "suscipe deprecationem" (which I think is the "emotional center" of the Gloria) to music in these cases, Joseph is, imv, clearly being a typical, uninspired kapellmeister:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To me, they're like something an uninspired kapellmeister who was "obliged to churn out" would have written. It just seems to me he can't think of something better, so he just keeps clinging to that melodic phrase "F-D-B(b)" and then bland chords to make his argument. (It seems rather unimaginative to me.) Compare them with, for example:


I also think that Beethoven later in his life realized the merit of Michael over Joseph: 




"Most revealing in this respect are the passages in Berlioz's criticism that compare Mozart to Haydn. For Berlioz, Haydn is manifestly beneath the level of the 'Great Masters'. He is treated as 'outdated' and someone whose 'boring … phrases … have tired rather than interested the public'. In his earlier critiques he takes care to stress the difference between the two: after commenting on Haydn's obsolete style he speaks of Mozart as 'full of passion and gloominess'. But later he tends to amalgamate the two into one entity, embodying all those features of scholarly Classicism that the Romantic spirit of Berlioz had sworn to overcome and to surpass." <
View attachment 130858
>



hammeredklavier said:


> [2]: "Michael's influence on Romanticism is also reflected in the writings of E. T. A. Hoffmann, who praised Michael's sacred music above that of older brother Joseph's. Franz Schubert is known to have visited the grave of Michael Haydn in order to gain inspiration for writing sacred music. After one of these visits, Schubert wrote in a letter to his brother the following epitaph:
> "I thought to myself, 'May thy pure and peaceful spirit hover around me, dear Haydn! If I can ever become like thee, peaceful and guileless, in all matters none on earth has such deep reverence for thee as I have.' (Sad tears fell from my eyes. . . .)""
> 
> "Franz Schubert followed the model of this setting when he wrote his Deutsche Messe."


----------



## Mandryka

Maybe looking for anguish is a c19 thing, and in my book unnecessary anyway. There’s no anguish, only laments, in Froberger or Marais or Sweelinck or Scheidt, there’s no anguish in Ockeghem or Dufay or Abelard or Machaut, and there’s no anguish in Webern or Lachenmann or Stockhausen. Is there anguish in Debussy? It’s a bit much to dismiss composers as second rate because they don’t do anguish. 

I don’t listen to Haydn, but if I remember right, in some places there is a sort of menace, an unpredictability which verges on the threatening, the way that some people find clowns threatening. I know that this is often smoothed out, but not always. I vaguely remember that van Beinum brought this out, as did Deszo Ranki, and Trio 1790. When I used to listen to this sort of music I valued that more than what I found in Mozart, though I must say now I much prefer to have Mozart’s music around, he’s one of the few composers who worked between 1750 and 1950 that I still find rewarding to hear.


----------



## consuono

> There's no real "anguish" in J. Haydn's music.


I don't think there's much of that in Mozart either, or in any other composer of the Classical era. They didn't really "do" anguish. There'll be a sad phrase and shortly thereafter "but on a lighter note..."


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> I don't think there's much of that in Mozart either, or in any other composer of the Classical era. They didn't really "do" anguish. There'll be a sad phrase and shortly thereafter "but on a lighter note..."


Sure, it's a matter of subjective opinion to some extent. (It's also a valid opinion to think that, for example, Bruckner is just good film music ) But it's an objective fact, in J. Haydn, there's nothing like:


hammeredklavier said:


> "What then is "Romantic"? How far back should its beginnings, in music, be pushed? To 1793, when a review of a new work by "Citizen Méhul" described him as a Romantic? Or further - to year 1780-81, the year of Mozart's Idomeneo, a work whose use of orchestral colour for structural and psychological purposes anticipates nineteenth-century Romantic opera?" <Berlioz: The Making of an Artist 1803-1832 , By David Cairns , P. 193>
> [ 8:00 ~ 12:00 ]
> [ 26:00 ~ 32:30 ]
> [ 1:23:30 ~ 1:28:30 ]
> [ 1:44:30 ~ 1:50:00 ]
> [ 2:01:00 ~ 2:06:00 ]
> [ 2:21:30 ~ 2:27:30 ]


----------



## consuono

> Ok. It's a matter of subjective opinion to some extent. (It's also a valid opinion to think that, for example, Bruckner is just good film music ) But it's an objective fact, in J. Haydn, there's nothing like:


Opera wasn't Haydn's thing. I'd still never mistake Idomeneo for something from the Romantic era. Just as some people try to say the Mozart's 40th symphony is crushingly tragic or something. I don't feel that it is. A lot of the "tormented, anguished Mozart" stuff I think just stems from the fact that he died so young.


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> Opera wasn't Haydn's thing. I'd still never mistake Idomeneo for something from the Romantic era. Just as some people try to say the Mozart's 40th symphony is crushingly tragic or something. I don't feel that it is. A lot of the "tormented, anguished Mozart" stuff I think just stems from the fact that he died so young.


compare for example:





with









and again: 


hammeredklavier said:


> For example, look at his ways to set the text "suscipe deprecationem" (which I think is the "emotional center" of the Gloria) to music in these cases, Joseph is, imv, clearly being a typical, uninspired kapellmeister:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To me, they're like something an uninspired kapellmeister who was "obliged to churn out" would have written. It just seems to me he can't think of something better, so he just keeps clinging to that melodic phrase "F-D-B(b)" and then bland chords to make his argument. (It seems rather unimaginative to me.) Compare them with, for example:


----------



## consuono

^ 41 seconds into that Thamos selection and it's in e flat major. That ain't exactly "anguished".


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> I don't think there's much of that in Mozart either, or in any other composer of the Classical era. They didn't really "do" anguish. There'll be a sad phrase and shortly thereafter "but on a lighter note..."


Why do you listen to J. Haydn, then? Why not listen to P. Wranitzky instead, for example, if they're all the same to you?


----------



## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> Why do you listen to J. Haydn, then? ...


Because I like Haydn's music. Is it all supposed to be a wallow in "anguish"?


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> ^ 41 seconds into that Thamos selection and it's in e flat major. That ain't exactly "anguished".


Of course there are sections of contrast. Listen to sections like 











J. Haydn doesn't do this. Look at the Seven last words of Christ, for example. (It's all just feels "dragged-out" in terms of part-writing, -the same sort of feelings you get when you go through his mind-numbing cycles of 100+ symphonies, 60+ string quartets)


----------



## consuono

^ Maybe we should now compare Mozart with Bach when it comes to part-writing. Most large bodies of work are going to be rather uneven. We listen mostly to Mozart's last 6 or so symphonies, and let's not discuss the piano sonatas. The piano concertos as a group though do display consistent excellence and beauty imo as long as they're not played on that wretched fortepiano.


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> ^ Maybe we should now compare Mozart with Bach when it comes to part-writing. Most large bodies of work are going to be rather uneven. We listen mostly to Mozart's last 6 or so symphonies,


I told you about Mozart's earlier symphonies in another thread: 
https://www.talkclassical.com/64807-most-overrated-underrated-symphonies-9.html#post2025074











consuono said:


> let's not discuss the piano sonatas.


Why not? It's another area J. Haydn gets "amazing".
https://www.talkclassical.com/70228-does-get-any-better-3.html#post2034062



hammeredklavier said:


> Robert Levin Mozart Lecture Part 1: The Slow Movements and The Human Formula
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "I think what one notices the most about these is how different they are. There isn't a formula for a Mozart slow movement, he would say "but there's no formula for human beings".


http://mrc.hanyang.ac.kr/wp-content/jspm/20/jspm_2006_20_10.pdf#page=4
"Mozart wrote to his father on 29 March 1783 about the musical gatherings in the apartments of Baron van Swieten: "we love to amuse ourselves with all kind of masters, ancient and modern." So music was the main object of the other of the composers Mozart and his colleagues studied in these sessions is mentioned in the Mozart correspondence by name: Johann Ernst Eberlin, for instance, or Georg Friedrich Handel, or J.S. Bach and his sons Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel, or Michael Haydn."
^If J. Haydn was so good, why isn't his name in this list?


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> ^ Maybe we should now compare Mozart with Bach when it comes to part-writing.







No, J.S. Bach isn't "overrated". I prefer to discuss 
W.A. Mozart vs. J. Haydn 
M. Haydn vs. J. Haydn 
C.P.E. Bach vs. J. Haydn


----------



## Mandryka

Here's a Haydn performance which finds some anguish


----------



## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> No, J.S. Bach isn't "overrated". I prefer to discuss
> W.A. Mozart vs. J. Haydn
> M. Haydn vs. J. Haydn
> C.P.E. Bach vs. J. Haydn


Why the vendetta against Haydn? :lol:


----------



## hammeredklavier

hammeredklavier said:


> It was this sort of stuff Mozart was more interested in:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (compare the use of the winds with that of Mozart K.550/i)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (also listen to the passage at 16:45)


Just how meaningful is this in the history of symphonic music:





compared to 



 ?



hammeredklavier said:


> (17:32~17:54). Joseph was in his "maturity", he should have moved away from doing this sort of thing (spamming the motif with chords ad-nauseam). But he didn't.


I honestly think J. Haydn was a good composer, but the "J. Haydn cultism" going on in the classical music communities today isn't normal. It does nothing but harm to his contemporaries, to his very own younger brother especially. I don't think Joseph himself would have wanted that.



Phil loves classical said:


> I believe Haydn was unsurpassed in his masses, by Mozart or Beethoven, or heck, anyone else.


"Joseph regarded his brother's music highly, to the point of feeling Michael's religious works were superior to his own" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Haydn


----------



## consuono

> I honestly think J. Haydn was a good composer, but the "J. Haydn cultism" going on in the classical music communities today isn't normal.


Oh, come on. There's much more of a Mozart "cult" than a Haydn one. "Play this Mozart to your infant and he/she will be a super-genius!!!!"


----------



## Ethereality

hammeredklavier said:


> Just how meaningful is this in the history of symphonic music:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> compared to
> 
> 
> 
> ?
> 
> I honestly think J. Haydn was a good composer, but the "J. Haydn cultism" going on in the classical music communities today isn't normal.


For me, this picks at details that are fairly easy for either composer to write. Nothing remarkable in basic theory: It's really the first symphony above that finally addresses the big picture of composition, a more difficult mental concept of larger form proceeding from one to the next, an interrelation of _expressions_ and _archetypes_. These are things people dont find difficult to hear however, naturally intuitive to first listeners who pick up a CD. Haydn's vertical theory sounds geared towards a more lasting narrative, people anticipate more, and yet provides _some_ contrast throughout, perhaps fooling listeners in complexity even.

I don't consider your own point anywhat invalid however. People just need more context as you continue your argument.


----------



## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist

consuono said:


> Oh, come on. There's much more of a Mozart "cult" than a Haydn one. "Play this Mozart to your infant and he/she will be a super-genius!!!!"


But it's true bro. Can confirm. Heard Eine-Kleine Nachtmusik once at age 1, am super-genius. Checkmate atheists.


----------



## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> Oh, come on. There's much more of a Mozart "cult" than a Haydn one. "Play this Mozart to your infant and he/she will be a super-genius!!!!"


I'm talking about "ratings" by "serious listeners of classical music". Among these, there are actually people who, when they're told J. Haydn doesn't really deserve the titles "the father of the string quartet" or the "father of the symphony" (at least not to the extent Mozart does "the father of the piano concerto"), react in the way theists would when they're told God doesn't exist (for example). They refuse to accept that Joseph lacked in certain important aspects compared to his own brother.


----------



## consuono

> J. Haydn doesn't really deserve the titles "the father of the string quartet" or the "father of the symphony" (at least not to the extent Mozart does "the father of the piano concerto")


Hate to say this, but I think that title might go to J. C. Bach or even his father.


----------



## hammeredklavier

hammeredklavier said:


> I honestly think J. Haydn was a good composer, but the "J. Haydn cultism" going on in the classical music communities today isn't normal.


*Haydn- more talented than Mozart*
by Kenneth Woods | Jun 1, 2009
https://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/
"In fact, I have yet to come across a single join between phrases or a single harmonic event or a single rhetorical corner in mature Haydn that unfolds in a predictable way. For all that he creates the strongest sense of expectation of any composer who ever lived, he never seems to simply give us what we expect. Simple alternations of 4-square antecedent and consequent phrases are rarer than a hungry fox in a hen house.
On the other hand, for all we hear of Mozart's divine spark, there are huge stretches of his music that are formulaic and four-square, especially in the orchestral music. For all the wonder that unfolds from it, the opening of the Jupiter Symphony is quite boilerplate. And Mozart did need to sketch- his most perfect works, like the "Haydn" quartets and the Requiem were meticulously sketched. For all that we think of him in terms of elegance and infinite facility, there is plenty of Mozart that is clunkier, more predictable and more formulaic than anything Haydn would ever write."


Alydon said:


> Michael Haydn will never equal his more famous brother





wkasimer said:


> Not to be obnoxious, but I sometimes wonder if Mozart is more popular than Haydn because of "Amadeus".


----------



## hammeredklavier

Joseph's variations (such as the slow movements from the kaiser string quartet and the surprise symphony) are styled a lot like: 0:00~2:00




or 



.
he just repeats the theme ad-nauseam, with different accompaniments. I've never been impressed by the late F minor piano variations either.

Whereas Mozart varies his ingeniously (K.334/ii, K.456/iii, K.421/iv, K.491/iii).

Also take a look at:


----------



## Mandryka

Drumroll. Sauschneider.


----------



## SONNET CLV

*Haydn: A Muscular Mozart*

No surprise here.









That's definitely Haydn.


----------



## Captainnumber36

SONNET CLV said:


> *Haydn: A Muscular Mozart*
> 
> No surprise here.
> 
> View attachment 152870
> 
> 
> That's definitely Haydn.


What an exquisite representation of the great composer! Fine work, friend!


----------



## Captainnumber36

hammeredklavier said:


> *Haydn- more talented than Mozart*
> by Kenneth Woods | Jun 1, 2009
> https://kennethwoods.net/blog1/2009/06/01/haydn-more-talented-than-mozart/
> "In fact, I have yet to come across a single join between phrases or a single harmonic event or a single rhetorical corner in mature Haydn that unfolds in a predictable way. For all that he creates the strongest sense of expectation of any composer who ever lived, he never seems to simply give us what we expect. Simple alternations of 4-square antecedent and consequent phrases are rarer than a hungry fox in a hen house.
> On the other hand, for all we hear of Mozart's divine spark, there are huge stretches of his music that are formulaic and four-square, especially in the orchestral music. For all the wonder that unfolds from it, the opening of the Jupiter Symphony is quite boilerplate. And Mozart did need to sketch- his most perfect works, like the "Haydn" quartets and the Requiem were meticulously sketched. For all that we think of him in terms of elegance and infinite facility, there is plenty of Mozart that is clunkier, more predictable and more formulaic than anything Haydn would ever write."


That's an interesting take.


----------



## fbjim

Captainnumber36 said:


> That's an interesting take.


i think it's generally right though, Haydn loves tossing in unexpected developments or surprises (and i don't mean the "surprise" symphony) which can sometimes be clunky but are always at least interesting - for some reason Haydn and not Mozart sometimes gets the "it all sounds the same" tag though.

also is someone really arguing that Mozart didn't think Haydn was a great composer because uh


----------



## Animal the Drummer

Captainnumber36 said:


> That's an interesting take.


Interesting, but an expression of personal preference masquerading as a supposedly objective assessment. The idea that, in all Haydn's mature _oeuvre_, every last turning point is unpredictable is as overcooked as any of the more hagiographic tributes paid to Mozart here or elsewhere. Ditto the equivalence Woods draws between unpredictability and talent. Different does not automatically equal better.


----------



## Mandryka

Animal the Drummer said:


> Interesting, but an expression of personal preference masquerading as a supposedly objective assessment. The idea that, in all Haydn's mature _oeuvre_, every last turning point is unpredictable is as overcooked as any of the more hagiographic tributes paid to Mozart here or elsewhere. Ditto the equivalence Woods draws between unpredictability and talent. Different does not automatically equal better.


My impression is that his earlier music is less predictable than his later music.


----------



## hammeredklavier

Of course Joseph was a "master of bassoon farts", in a way his brother Michael and Mozart never were. In terms of depth of harmony though, the chromaticism of divertimento K.334 shreds all Joseph Haydn to pieces.
I'm wondering how much of Michael Haydn people here have listened to. The darker sections of the slow movements Michael's string quintet in G (1773) and symphony No.40 in F (1789) are more idiomatically similar to those of Mozart's 25th, 26th, 41th symphonies than anything in Joseph Haydn. And as I said, Mozart was far more interested in studying Michael's music (again, look at K.291, and "Mozart's 37th symphony") than Joseph's. And I probably don't need to explains the relations between Michael and Mozart's requiems.


----------



## Mandryka

hammeredklavier said:


> Of course Joseph was a "master of bassoon farts", in a way his brother Michael and Mozart never were. In terms of depth of harmony though, the chromaticism of divertimento K.334 shreds all Joseph Haydn to pieces.
> I'm wondering how much of Michael Haydn people here have listened to Michael's music. The darker sections of the slow movements Michael's string quintet in G (1773) and symphony No.40 in F (1789) are more idiomatically similar to those of Mozart's 25th, 26th, 41th symphonies. And as I said, Mozart was far more interested in studying Michael's music (again, look at K.291, and "Mozart's 37th symphony") than Joseph's. And I probably don't need to explains the relations between Michael and Mozart's requiems.


What do you think of op 50? For example the chromaticism in the F sharp minor! F Sharp fking minor! And the double variations. And the extraordinary final movement, what a way to end.

We should have one of those battle of the Titans - Mozart/Haydn vs Haydn op 50! Or <your favourite Mozart variations> versus op 50/4/ii. Or K 551/iv versus Op 50/4/iv.


----------



## SONNET CLV

Captainnumber36 said:


> What an exquisite representation of the great composer! Fine work, friend!


I do wonder ... how far into the cheek could Claude Debussy put his tongue?

Nonetheless, thank you for the comment.


----------



## Bulldog

I don''t find either Haydn or Mozart to be particularly muscular. However, I do consider Mozart's music more delicate.


----------



## consuono

Animal the Drummer said:


> Interesting, but an expression of personal preference masquerading as a supposedly objective assessment. The idea that, in all Haydn's mature _oeuvre_, every last turning point is unpredictable is as overcooked as any of the more hagiographic tributes paid to Mozart here or elsewhere. Ditto the equivalence Woods draws between unpredictability and talent. Different does not automatically equal better.


It's actually like hammeredklavier's anti-Haydn comments. "Let's see, what negative aspect can I accentuate to make my guy look better?" Both of them frequently rely on Classical-era clichés, just as Bach frequently relied on Baroque-era ones and just as Beethoven is sometimes banal. I love all the above though.

The main difference between Haydn and Mozart for me is Mozart's overall chromaticism and greater emotional range.


----------



## hammeredklavier

Mandryka said:


> My impression is that his earlier music is less predictable than his later music.



















^even early Mozart (1770~1775) doesn't get as static as this.

One thing about Joseph is that even in the compositions he wrote at 40, such as the excessively-praised Op.20 set of string quartets, you find "banalities", which are quite surprising for a composer of his renown, -the sort you wouldn't find in the 40-year old Michael. 




 (13:24 and 14:34)




 (5:32 and 7:15)




This is what puts me off about Joseph a little. Maybe something went wrong in his development and growth as a composer. Maybe to some extent, it hampered him all his life, -maybe it's why he sounds the way I described in [post #291] all his life. Or maybe it's just his musical temperament, I don't know for sure. Try going through their works from their 30s up to 40. (Such as Joseph's stabat mater, Michael's requiem, etc). I don't really feel "chill" in Joseph's use of harmony - he just can't express "passion" with as much fluidity and dynamism as Michael. 



I don't get why it's always Joseph's name that gets mentioned alongside Mozart's. Why not Gluck (whom Berlioz and Wagner admired far more than Joseph), for example?


----------



## Bulldog

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't get why it's always Joseph's name that gets mentioned alongside Mozart's. Why not Gluck (whom Berlioz and Wagner admired far more than Joseph), for example?


Because both Gluck and Michael (good composers) were 2nd rate compared to Joseph.


----------



## hammeredklavier

Bulldog said:


> Because both Gluck and Michael (good composers) were 2nd rate compared to Joseph.


Why? Simply because Joseph is much more popular, and our school teachers, textbooks have always told us "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart"? 
There are like 7~8 concertos of C.P.E. Bach that I think has more musical substance than Joseph's. And his Hamburg symphonies are more consistent in quality than Joseph's.
It seems that for J. Haydn, things didn't come "naturally". I occasionally get an impression that he's trying way too hard. Look this, for example:



hammeredklavier said:


> ( 6:32 ~ 7:45 )
> This is way too much. The guy apparently has found something good for a melody. He clings to it with all his might, trying to arouse emotion in the listener with it. Way too artificial (almost sickening, imv).


And the awkward transition to the concluding fugue, which is in itself "generic" (compare it with the dissonant strettos of the one from Mozart's K.262) - In my view, these passages from the J. Haydn are "fillers". Honestly, I can't believe a composer of his renown (and at his level of maturity at the time) wrote this stuff. A sad excuse by his own brother's standards. It's no wonder to me why Joseph himself admitted he wasn't as good as his own brother in this area, and we now know Schubert admired Michael far more for this.
Frankly, if the Nelson mass was written by F.X. Brixi, nobody today would have known it.

How many times do we have to hear these two mentioned together: "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart", "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart"... 
With some people's occasional expressions of their "unpopular opinions" that "Haydn (Joseph) is better than Mozart because he's more cerebral, or more inventive.. bla bla bla bla..."

It's baffling, and sometimes irritating.


----------



## Bulldog

hammeredklavier said:


> Why? Simply because Joseph is much more popular, and our school teachers, textbooks have always told us "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart"?


No and no. My preferences are based solely on listening to the music of the applicable composers.

Let's get down to basics. You have an anti-Joseph Haydn obsession that you exhibit nearly every day to the point that you make ridiculous claims about his motivations and fears as if you knew him intimately. Start accepting the fact that he's a famous composer who will often be mentioned in the same sentence as Mozart. This is not a life and death matter; it's music.


----------



## EdwardBast

Bulldog said:


> Because both Gluck and Michael (good composers) were 2nd rate compared to Joseph.


Yeah, verily 'tis true we all know! 
It's ridiculous praising Mike over Joe.


----------



## hammeredklavier

Animal the Drummer said:


> No, he wouldn't have. While Haydn was a great composer in his own right, something to which Mozart himself would have attested, Mozart's unique genius would have found its voice one way or the other.


Btw, a lot of the exaggerated claims about Joseph Haydn being the "father of the string quartet" were originally made by Donald Francis Tovey (1875~1940). During his time, Neoclassicism, a reaction movement against the "excesses of late Romanticism", was gaining ground and the music of Joseph Haydn was being promoted more than ever before. Tovey also claimed that Beethoven's missa solemnis derives from pre-common practice music in a way that was never done in the 18th century, and I doubt how much of Michael Haydn he knew in both of these cases. Sort of like Bach, Michael was "stuck in the church", and he didn't want his music printed, so his fame died rapidly in the 19th century.

Joseph Haydn wasn't even the first guy to utilize the ensemble (consider G.C. Wagenseil) and besides, 4 instruments taking the role of SATB, playing 4 movements is the most "basic, standardized form" any Classical-era composer could have come up with or would have eventually conformed to. There's nothing so ingenious about it. 
We could just as well call Mozart the "father of the clarinet quintet, clarinet trio, piano quartet".



hammeredklavier said:


> Michael Haydn wrote his string quintet MH189 in 1773, in Salzburg - 1 year before Joseph (who was already working as a kapellmeister for the Esterhazies) published his Sun quartets (Op.20).
> This impassioned passage (
> 
> 
> 
> ) of the slow movement from Michael's MH189 seems to anticipate
> Mozart's K.551 (
> 
> 
> 
> )
> Also look at;
> Michael Haydn string quintet in G, MH 189 (1773) : [ 0:49 ~ 1:06 ]
> Mozart string quartet in E flat, K.428 (1783) : [ 0:49 ~ 1:14 ]
> Some treatment of chromaticism in the minuet (
> 
> 
> 
> ) and phrases in the finale also remind me of Mozart.
> also look at these sections from MH189 (
> 
> 
> 
> )
> and Mozart K.533 (
> 
> 
> 
> )





hammeredklavier said:


> Also notice the similarities in the openings of Michael's G major, MH189 and Mozart's K.387, and the finales of Michael's 23rd symphony (MH 287) and Mozart's K.387.





hammeredklavier said:


> I also think that Beethoven later in his life realized the merit of Michael over Joseph:


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## hammeredklavier

Bulldog said:


> You have an anti-Joseph Haydn obsession that you exhibit nearly every day


I don't have an anti-Joseph Haydn obsession. (I already said more than once that he's a good composer). I'm just trying to fight J. Haydn cultism, which has been growing extreme in the last decades. It's amazing how many ridiculous things have been said in attempts to elevate Joseph Haydn way out of proportion, even in this forum. 
[When Joseph writes "banalities" such as the section from Op.20 that I pointed to with score in [post #326], or the ponderously continuous sameness of rhythm in the parts (voices) in the slow movement of Op.20 No.2, he's "writing cerebral masterpieces", -but when other composers do the same, they're just "writing juvenilia".] -I see this sort of logic used in every thread (including old ones) about Joseph Haydn.
Seeing you call Michael "2nd rate compared to Joseph" without acknowledging Joseph's obvious weaknesses with respect to Michael, I sense you also have a slight tendency to be a J. Haydn cultist as well.


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## hammeredklavier

Animal the Drummer said:


> No, he wouldn't have. While Haydn was a great composer in his own right, something to which Mozart himself would have attested, Mozart's unique genius would have found its voice one way or the other.


Rather, I think, a question we really need to ask ourselves at this point is, -"how much did Mozart actually care about Joseph deep down?" 


































"Mozart wrote to his father on 29 March 1783 about the musical gatherings in the apartments of Baron van Swieten: "we love to amuse ourselves with all kind of masters, ancient and modern." So music was the main object of the other of the composers Mozart and his colleagues studied in these sessions is mentioned in the Mozart correspondence by name: Johann Ernst Eberlin, for instance, or Georg Friedrich Handel, or J.S. Bach and his sons Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel, or Michael Haydn." http://mrc.hanyang.ac.kr/wp-content/jspm/20/jspm_2006_20_10.pdf#page=4


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## hammeredklavier

Bulldog said:


> This is not a life and death matter; it's music.


I don't know if you read what I wrote previously; "there's no reason all of Joseph's baryton trios should be recorded (even though it's so hard to find a baryton player today), while his own younger brother's 20 litanies still languish in obscurity."



Bulldog said:


> Start accepting the fact that he's a famous composer who will often be mentioned in the same sentence as Mozart.


Yes I would, and apparently, Michael is a better candidate for that place . It's the J. Haydn cultists who should accept Joseph is seriously "overblown" in terms of both compositional prowess and historical significance. Start accepting that 'he may not be the "father" after all'.
I find far more linguistic similarities between 'Michael and Mozart' than 'Joseph and Mozart'.



hammeredklavier said:


> short semitonal phrases in the strings, like "D-C#-D.."
> Michael Haydn requiem in C minor (1771) [ 8:03 ]
> W.A. Mozart missa brevis K.192 in F (1774) [ 5:18 ]
> W.A. Mozart spatzenmesse K.220 in C (1775) [ 6:21 ]
> W.A. Mozart litaniae de venerabili altaris sacramento K.243 (1776) [ 10:55 ]


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## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't have an anti-Joseph Haydn obsession. (I already said more than once that he's a good composer). I'm just trying to fight J. Haydn cultism, which has been growing extreme in the last decades. It's amazing how many ridiculous things have been said in attempts to elevate Joseph Haydn way out of proportion, even in this forum.
> [When Joseph writes "banalities" such as the section from Op.20 that I pointed to with score in [post #326], or the ponderously continuous sameness of rhythm in the parts (voices) in the slow movement of Op.20 No.2, he's "writing cerebral masterpieces", -but when other composers do the same, they're just "writing juvenilia".] -I see this sort of logic used in every thread (including old ones) about Joseph Haydn.
> Seeing you call Michael "2nd rate compared to Joseph" without acknowledging Joseph's obvious weaknesses with respect to Michael, I sense you also have a slight tendency to be a J. Haydn cultist as well.


Honestly, hammeredklavier, that reads like parody. There is no "Haydn cult".


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> There is no "Haydn cult".


Yes there is. You have no idea what kind of ridiculous things they say (I'm astonished by their sheer number, whenever I go through threads about J. Haydn), in their subtle attempts to continuously elevate J. Haydn, (as if he's not been elevated enough already). These are just the tip of the iceberg:



Knorf said:


> I rate Haydn extremely highly. That his music is much less popular in recent decades than Mozart and Beethoven speaks far more to the Zeitgeist than it does to the music's quality.





wkasimer said:


> Not to be obnoxious, but I sometimes wonder if Mozart is more popular than Haydn because of "Amadeus".


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## hammeredklavier

Here's a typical way of thinking of the J. Haydn cult:




if a contemporary of J. Haydn wrote like this passage, it would be considered "repeating the theme ad-nauseam with chords". But since it's a J. Haydn work, it's considered "inventive", "interesting", "cerebral", "daring", etc.



fbjim said:


> i think it's generally right though, Haydn loves tossing in unexpected developments or surprises (and i don't mean the "surprise" symphony) which can sometimes be clunky but are always at least interesting - for some reason Haydn and not Mozart sometimes gets the "it all sounds the same" tag though.


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## Bulldog

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't know if you read what I wrote previously; "there's no reason all of Joseph's baryton trios should be recorded (even though it's so hard to find a baryton player today), while his own younger brother's 20 litanies still languish in obscurity."


I don't know if I read it either. Let's all read it and submit a report. :lol:


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## Eclectic Al

I have no musical training (beyond rudimentary piano playing) and don't want any. I have the sense that analysing music might change it for me, and could thereby spoil something I take great pleasure in.

I don't want music to be complex, innovative, representative of excellent counterpoint, spiced with dissonance, or any of those things. First and foremost I want to like it when I hear it (or at least for it to give me the sense that I might like it if I listened to it a bit more).

If it so happens (and it often does) that the music I like has some of the characteristics I set out earlier then that's fine. If I analysed the music I like then I might find that it is biased towards some of those characteristics: after all, it would be natural for my preferences to have common characteristics. However, I have no particular wish to perform that analysis as I don't see what benefit it would give me.

I like the music that I like because I like it: the fact that some might point to excellent qualities within it and others might point to deficiencies does not bother me. I am certainly not going to refuse to like music because it may be said (arguably) to have technical deficiencies or to be inferior to the work of others. I will, however, listen to things I haven't heard before because people say they are good.

It reminds me of a politically correct tendency these days for some to consider a joke before laughing at it. They analyse whether they should laugh at it before doing so, and they may refuse to do so because if fails their test of acceptability. I would rather laugh first, and maybe feel ashamed for doing so later. If I analyse the thing in advance before deciding to be amused, then I worry that the humour is lost.

Turning to Haydn, my recollection is that I avoided his music for decades, having been led to believe that it was fairly tedious stuff, all the same and lacking inspiration. To the extent that there was a cult it was one which positioned Haydn as unclean in some way: lacking the holy qualities that were required. There were the big three (Bach, Beethoven, Mozart) plus also-rans at various quality levels, Brahms (say) on the next rung down, and Haydn earthbound.

A while ago I decided (off the back of a trashy Classic FM article) that I would listen to all the symphonies - and nothing else until I had finished. I must have been bored. However, as I ploughed through I found that I rarely switched off: there was always something which tickled the ear and maintained interest. Having completed the marathon I didn't then immediately pursue other composers with relish: I decided to plough through Haydn's string quartets. (The wonders of low-cost box sets.) It took me a while to re-accommodate myself to other composers.

I usually find that I like his music. It is fine for someone to tell me that on certain technical grounds I ought to prefer Mozart's music, but the brute fact is that I don't. (His "hit rate" for me is lower.) What could follow from that is to consider the question of why that might be, not to reiterate that I shouldn't. As I noted earlier, I have no real wish to carry out that sort of analysis. However, my guess is that music is about taste, not correctness: you could go this way or that; you could interject with some brass here, or you could stick with the strings; and one might be "better" according to some technical assessment. I guess Haydn's taste fits better with mine. I like curries. If someone tells me that French cuisine is superior on technical grounds then that's fine, and they might be correct in their own terms: but I prefer curries.

Isn't there some story (which I am sure I will be told is apocryphal) of Mozart remarking, when someone criticised where Haydn had gone with a piece, that he wouldn't have done the same as Haydn either, because he couldn't have thought of something so appropriate? That's very nice and generous of him, and Mozart might have done something excellent instead: it just might (on the balance of probabilities) have been less to my taste.


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## hammeredklavier

Eclectic Al said:


> I usually find that I like his music. It is fine for someone to tell me that on certain technical grounds I ought to prefer Mozart's music, but the brute fact is that I don't. (His "hit rate" for me is lower.) What could follow from that is to consider the question of why that might be, not to reiterate that I shouldn't. As I noted earlier, I have no real wish to carry out that sort of analysis. However, my guess is that music is about taste, not correctness: you could go this way or that; you could interject with some brass here, or you could stick with the strings; and one might be "better" according to some technical assessment. I guess Haydn's taste fits better with mine. I like curries. If someone tells me that French cuisine is superior on technical grounds then that's fine, and they might be correct in their own terms: but I prefer curries.


This is a ridiculous assertion. There's nothing "technical" about anything what I wrote, - all I talked about is about being "organic" and "sensible" in expression. 
You don't have to be an expert to see:
https://www.talkclassical.com/54405-haydn-muscular-mozart-22.html#post2035322

I could just as well accuse of this stuff as being "soulless technicality":





Btw, 99% of J. Haydn advocates sound like they think J. Haydn is great just because their school teachers and textbooks have always told them "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart" endlessly, and they never really investigated (ie. gave other composers enough chance) to make judgements for themselves.


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## hammeredklavier

hammeredklavier said:


> ^even early Mozart (1770~1775) doesn't get as static as this.
> 
> One thing about Joseph is that even in the compositions he wrote at 40, such as the excessively-praised Op.20 set of string quartets, you find "banalities", which are quite surprising for a composer of his renown, -the sort you wouldn't find in the 40-year old Michael.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (13:24 and 14:34)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (5:32 and 7:15)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This is what puts me off about Joseph a little. Maybe something went wrong in his development and growth as a composer. Maybe to some extent, it hampered him all his life, -maybe it's why he sounds the way I described in [post #291] all his life. Or maybe it's just his musical temperament, I don't know for sure. *Try going through their works from their 30s up to 40. (Such as Joseph's stabat mater, Michael's requiem, etc).* I don't really feel "chill" in Joseph's use of harmony - he just can't express "passion" with as much fluidity and dynamism as Michael.
> 
> 
> 
> I don't get why it's always Joseph's name that gets mentioned alongside Mozart's. Why not Gluck (whom Berlioz and Wagner admired far more than Joseph), for example?


Have a listen:

Missa sancti Nicolai Tolentini (1772)













Requiem (1771)


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## hammeredklavier

Eclectic Al said:


> Isn't there some story (which I am sure I will be told is apocryphal) of Mozart remarking, when someone criticised where Haydn had gone with a piece, that he wouldn't have done the same as Haydn either, because he couldn't have thought of something so appropriate? That's very nice and generous of him, and Mozart might have done something excellent instead: it just might (on the balance of probabilities) have been less to my taste.


We all know Mozart prided himself on his good manners.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Xaver_Richter#1778_Richter_meets_Mozart
"Both Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his father Leopold knew Richter. Mozart would have met him still as a boy on his Family Grand tour in 1763 when the Mozart family came through Schwetzingen, the summer residence of the Elector Palatinate. Mozart met him once again in 1778 on his way back from Paris when he was headed for the unloved Salzburg after his plans to gain permanent employment in Mannheim or Paris had come to naught. In a letter to his father, dated November 2, 1778, Mozart seems to suggest that the by then elderly Richter was something of an alcoholic:

"Strasbourg can scarcely do without me. You cannot think how much I am esteemed and beloved here. People say that I am disinterested as well as steady and polite, and praise my manners. Everyone knows me. As soon as they heard my name, the two Herrn Silbermann [i. e. Andreas Silbermann and Johann Andreas Silbermann] and Herr Hepp (organist) came to call on me, and also Kapellmeister Richter. He has now restricted himself very much ; instead of forty bottles of wine a day, he only drinks twenty! ... If the Cardinal had died, (and he was very ill when I arrived,) I might have got a good situation, for Herr Richter is seventy-eight years of age. Now farewell ! Be cheerful and in good spirits, and remember that your son is, thank God ! well, and rejoicing that his happiness daily draws nearer. Last Sunday I heard a new mass of Herr Richter's, which is charmingly written."
However, Mozart was not one to laud lightly. The epithet "charmingly written" can be taken at face value and from someone like Mozart this was high praise indeed."


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## Eclectic Al

But you say things like: "In terms of depth of harmony though, the chromaticism of divertimento K.334 shreds all Joseph Haydn to pieces" and "the ponderously continuous sameness of rhythm in the parts (voices) in the slow movement of Op.20 No.2".

These remarks relate to the technical construction of pieces, and it may well be (I wouldn't know) that Mozart is often more technically accomplished than Haydn (J). Perhaps, though, some people like pieces which exhibit less chromaticism than K.334 or have less deep harmony, or don't mind a piece which retains a rhythmic sameness and don't necessarily find it ponderous. (Think dance movements which seek to retain a feel of genuine dancing by retaining stable rhythms, or ominous marches which must sound relentlessly stable.)

Maybe many people like the balance between complexity and simplicity or variety and sameness which Haydn (J) offers, and prefer that balance (often, not necessarily always) to a different balance that might exist in Mozart or Haydn (M).

If so, then pointing to, for example, the chromaticism of K.334 may be true, but it does not imply that I have to prefer it to a less chromatically sophisticated piece. I might prefer that other piece because it is less sophisticated, or owing to other characteristics that it might possess.

Incidentally, I'm listening now to K334. I lost interest during the first movement a bit. I enjoyed the variations though (- I'm a bit of a sucker for variations), and I liked some of the pizzicato interjections. The minuet sounds like something Haydn (J) and Mozart could churn out at will, although I got the feeling J would have spiced up the orchestration a bit more. Nice melody in the adagio. In the second minuet, I liked it when the strings were cut through by a bit of variety in the orchestration. The final rondo is OK, as an identikit jolly finale, but a bit long, and is perhaps the bit where this is most obviously written to be background music. So if I reflect on K334, it's OK, but doesn't really pull me in.

I wonder if one of the reasons that I tend to prefer Haydn (J)'s orchestral pieces is because of how he orchestrates, not a subject I know anything much about. One of my favourites is Symphony 93. Does Haydn tend to double up violin lines with flutes and oboes more than Mozart? It's not my thing, but I looked at a score of the opening of 93, and compared it with Mozart 40 (one of my favourites), and Haydn seemed to be using his woodwind to back up the strings more, whereas in the Mozart the strings did something and then the woodwind did something else, so his string lines were often just strings. The opening of 93 has some lovely sounds because of the combination of instruments. This adds nothing to the chromaticism or to the rhythmic variety, but it adds everything to the sounds. Did Haydn orchestrate as he did because of his position in the Esterhazy household, so he was writing for particular instrumentalists, and knew their strengths? Although I know a divertimento may be different in its orientation, I felt with K334 that it was a bit too string-dominated for me. Apologies for my rambling, but I have this nagging feeling that Haydn was a brilliant orchestrator, and that is what continually enchants the ear.


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## Bulldog

hammeredklavier said:


> Btw, 99% of J. Haydn advocates sound like they think J. Haydn is great just because their school teachers and textbooks have always told them "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart" endlessly, and they never really investigated (ie. gave other composers enough chance) to make judgements for themselves.


You have just essentially stated that Haydn advocates are a deficient bunch of lazy followers. You're really off the rails now.


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## fbjim

There's definitely someone displaying cultish behavior in here, anyway. The attempt to posit that Mozart secretly thought Joseph Haydn sucked is definitely novel, though.


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## hammeredklavier

Eclectic Al said:


> it may well be (I wouldn't know) that Mozart is often more technically accomplished than Haydn (J).


Joseph's sense in using harmony for expression is limited.
That makes his music one-dimensional in expressing various aspects of the human condition. The use of dissonance for expression in the lark string quartet is static.



> The minuet sounds like something Haydn (J) and Mozart could churn out at will


I have no idea what you're talking about. The chromatic harmony of the trio of the 2nd minuet was something Joseph could never write. None of his stuff matches that in depth of chromatic harmony. (Except maybe some bangings of the chaos intro to Die schopfung, which is the closest point Joseph gets to that.)



> although I got the feeling J would have spiced up the orchestration a bit more.


There's nothing in Joseph Haydn that matches the use of orchestral colors of Mozart's Idomeneo. I'll still give Joseph credit for "pomposity" in works like the harmoniemesse.



> The final rondo is OK, as an identikit jolly finale, but a bit long, and is perhaps the bit where this is most obviously written to be background music. So if I reflect on K334, it's OK, but doesn't really pull me in.


You know what real background music is? The slow movement from Joseph's overly-praised Op.20 no.1. The harmony is lukewarm and dragged-out all the way. Maybe Joseph should have named it "divertimento".


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## Eclectic Al

I rest my case.


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## Eclectic Al

Just listened to Haydn (J) Op 20 No 1 slow movement. Thought it was quite lovely.


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## Eclectic Al

Eclectic Al said:


> Just listened to Haydn (J) Op 20 No 1 slow movement. Thought it was quite lovely.


And following that, the finale rounds it off in style.


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## hammeredklavier

I also speculate that some prototypical ideas for building a "traverse from darkness to light" were passed from Michael (symphony No.29 in D minor , 1784) [1] on through Mozart (K.466) [2], eventually to Beethoven.

symphony No.29 in D minor - 0:01 , 12:55 , 16:22

[1]: "The third movement is a rondeau, Presto scherzante. Horns are in F, trumpets in D. The A theme could be seen as a metamorphosis of the first subject of the first movement." -wikipedia
[2]: "The entry of the piano here, a new material, but interestingly, it's exactly the same chord structure as that first entry in the first movement. A wonderful sense of Mozart referring back to what we remember, having heard before." -Charles Hazlewood

*Requiem in C minor (1771)*
"trumpet signal" & requiem 1st theme: [ 0:20 ]
requiem 2nd theme: [ 3:20 ~ 3:45 ]
lacrimosa theme: [ 11:40 ~ 11:48 ]
chromatic fourth theme (climbing from D to G in the bassline): [ 12:40 ~ 12:50 ]
hosanna theme (lacrimosa theme transformed/recapitulated): [ 24:21 ~ 24:29 ]
"trumpet signal": [ 26:48 , 27:56 ]
chromatic fourth theme recapitulated (climbing from G to C in the soprano solo): [ 28:40 ~ 28:50 ]
cum sanctis tuis fugue: [ 29:17 ~ 31:16 ]
requiem 2nd theme recapitulated: [ 31:22 ~ 31:50 ]
requiem 1st theme recapitulated: [ 31:58 ~ 32:30 ]
cum sanctis tuis fugue recapitulated: [ 32:38 ~ 34:30 ]


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## hammeredklavier

fbjim said:


> There's definitely someone displaying cultish behavior in here, anyway. The attempt to posit that Mozart secretly thought Joseph Haydn sucked is definitely novel, though.


Well, I'm just suggesting that we be reasonable. There's no need to say over and over and over and over and over and over and over again things like "Joseph Haydn, God the Father Almighty of the Symphony and the String Quartet, the Maker of Classicism", which have been done to death already. Because his very own younger brother Michael, who taught Weber and was admired by Schubert (more than Joseph), deserves as much credit as Joseph. As I said, Schubert's Deutschemesse was an homage to Michael.

The fact remains that there's not a single work in Joseph Haydn that inspired Mozart as much as Michael's C minor requiem did. I hear its influence not only in Mozart's own requiem, but also Missa brevis in D, K.194, and the influence of the Cum sanctis tuis fugue, in the Laudate pueri dominum from Mozart's vesperae K.339, and the C minor fugue for two pianos K.426.
Give me a single symphony by Joseph that was more exemplary a model to Mozart's 41th than Michael's 28th was. 



Is there catholic music by Joseph that's more similar in idiom to the benedictus of Mozart's mass in C minor (K.427) than the benedictus of Michael's Missa sancti joannis nepomuceni (1772) is? I also find the passionate arias in the Mozart mass similar in idiom to those in Michael's requiem.

There's also no need to continuously make groundless claims about Joseph "being far more inventive (in use of phrases or rhythm and whatnot)" than his contemporaries.











Clairvoyance Enough said:


> I do prefer the harmony of Mozart's darker pieces, but, again, I find them rhythmically toothless. The finale of his 40th tries to be vicious without abandoning the same elegant phrasing Mozart always employs, which sounds neat in a way, but Haydn's 44th or La Passione actually drives forward with intensity when I listen to it. In any case, I don't base my high opinion of Haydn on the sturm und drang stuff much anyway. I just find the gestures of his material one minute to the next far more interesting. I'm supposed to end up whistling the slow movement of the 27th concerto, but I never do. Bland twinkle twinkle same old.


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> I love Mozart, but the fact is that without his father, Haydn and J. C. Bach Mozart would've been speechless.





hammeredklavier said:


> Rather, I think, a question we really need to ask ourselves at this point is, -"how much did Mozart actually care about Joseph deep down?"
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> "Mozart wrote to his father on 29 March 1783 about the musical gatherings in the apartments of Baron van Swieten: "we love to amuse ourselves with all kind of masters, ancient and modern." So music was the main object of the other of the composers Mozart and his colleagues studied in these sessions is mentioned in the Mozart correspondence by name: Johann Ernst Eberlin, for instance, or Georg Friedrich Handel, or J.S. Bach and his sons Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel, or Michael Haydn." http://mrc.hanyang.ac.kr/wp-content/jspm/20/jspm_2006_20_10.pdf#page=4


"In Salzburg, if not throughout his life, Mozart was writing in a lingua franca and many of the features of that language are to be found in Michael Haydn too. That Mozart recognized Michael Haydn's mastery is suggested by a letter he sent to his father from Vienna, asking for the latest symphonies of Michael, so that he could perform them in that city." -David Wyn Jones

I think even if the bassoon-fart symphonist never existed it wouldn't have affected Mozart in any significant way. Most people who have always been told "Haydn (Joseph) and Mozart" by their school teachers and textbooks think "both J. Haydn and Mozart are Classical-sounding, and since J. Haydn came first, he must have influenced Mozart most deeply". -But I don't find their speculation insightful. 
The most remarkable commonality between J. Haydn and Mozart is J. Haydn's 78th (1782) symphony and Mozart's 24th concerto (1786), but I see that as a sort of general Sturm-und-drang gestural style, which is also found in Mozart's Ballet music from Thamos, king of Egypt (1779); not at all remarkable when you compare with the dozens of commonalities of dialect between M. Haydn and Mozart, such as the Agnus deis of Michael Haydn's requiem and Mozart's K.257, K.258. (I think that Michael also borrows from Mozart, because in some cases Mozart's works predate Michael's) 
And there's not a single piece of evidence of Mozart, throughout his life, actually copying out J. Haydn's music for study.

I once talked about how the Pre-Romantics did not intentionally strive for "individuality", but there still was a strong sense of "regional dialect" that differentiated them. For example, there's a certain structure Michael and Mozart always adhere to in their missae breves, and I have no trouble recognizing theirs from a J. Haydn one. For one thing, J. Haydn doesn't do this in his "recapitulation" sections:

Michael Haydn Missa brevis in C, "in honorem sanctissimae joannis nepomuceni" [ 4:40 ~ 4:46 ]
Michael Haydn Missa brevis in C, "in honorem sanctissimae gabrielis" [ 8:30 ~ 8:35 ]
Mozart Missa brevis in C, "orgelmesse", K.259 [ 7:22 ~ 7:27 ]
Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spaurmesse", K.258 [ 8:50 ~ 8:55 ]
Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spatzenmesse", K.220 [ 8:08 ~ 8:12 ]

and use of syncopated and arpeggiated accompaniment figures in vocal music (J. Haydn doesn't do this in his either ):
Johann Ernst Eberlin (1702-1762) Missa in C [ 3:30 ]
Michael Haydn Requiem in C minor (1771) [ 0:55 ]
Michael Haydn Te deum in C (1786) [ 0:58 ]
Michael Haydn Missa in C "in honorem sancti gotthardi" (1792) [ 4:14 ]
Michael Haydn Missa in C "in honorem sanctae ursulae" (1793) [ 0:10 ]
W.A. Mozart Missa brevis K.194 in D (1774) [ 11:06 ] ,
W.A. Mozart Missa brevis K.275 in B flat (1777) [ 2:19 ] ,
W.A. Mozart Requiem in D minor (1791) [ 0:50 , 28:27 ] ,
- and short semitonal phrases in the strings, like "D-C#-D.."
Michael Haydn Requiem in C minor (1771) [ 8:03 ]
W.A. Mozart Missa brevis in F, K.192 (1774) [ 5:18 ]
W.A. Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spatzenmesse" K.220 (1775) [ 6:21 ]
W.A. Mozart Litaniae de venerabili altaris sacramento, K.243 (1776) [ 10:55 ]
(I found them also in La finta giardiniera, K.196, but I can't remember where exactly.)

Also look at the similarities in the Crucifixi of:
Michael Haydn Missa brevis in C, "in honorem sanctissimae gabrielis" - 6:22
Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spaurmesse", K.258 - 6:29

the Cum sanctu spiriti of:
Mozart Missa longa in C, K.262 - 6:50 , 7:23
Michael Haydn Missa in C, "in honorem sanctissimae hieronymi" - 9:37 , 11:49

the Laudamus tes of:
Michael Haydn Missa in C, "in honorem sanctissimae francisci seraphici" - 3:16
Mozart Missa longa in C, K.262 - 3:49

some peculiar passages in the strings:
Michael Haydn Missa in C, "in honorem sanctissimae nicolai tolentini" - 0:00
Mozart Missa in C, "in honorem sanctissimae trinitatis" K.167 - 0:00

"Patrem omnipotentem":
Mozart Missa brevis in B flat, K.275 - 4:34
Michael Haydn Missa brevis in D minor "tempore quadragesimae" - 1:51

use of strings as introduction and accompaniment for concluding fugue:
Mozart Missa in C, "in honorem sanctissimae trinitatis" K.167 - 5:33
Michael Haydn Missa in C "in honorem sanctae ursulae" - 7:28

Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spatzenmesse" K.220 - Benedictus
Michael Haydn String quintet in F, MH 367 - Adagio

Michael Haydn Missa brevis in C, "in honorem sanctissimae raphaelis" - Kyrie
Mozart Missa brevis in C, "spatzenmesse" K.220 - Kyrie

J. Haydn simply doesn't sound like any of the above.
This particular characteristic of Mozart also shows up in Michael (albeit to a lesser extent. Again, listen to 



 , 



 ):
"I know of no other composer as fundamentally transformed while writing in minor keys, and none except Gesualdo and Wagner, who made such unforgettable use of chromaticism. (For Wagner himself, Mozart was 'the great Chromatiker'.)"
< Music, Sense and Nonsense: Collected Essays and Lectures | Alfred Brendel | P.14>

There are more but I don't want to load this page with too long a list of examples.


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## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> I also speculate that some prototypical ideas for building a "traverse from darkness to light" were passed from Michael (symphony No.29 in D minor , 1784) [1] on through Mozart (K.466) [2], eventually to Beethoven.
> ...


Lol, the "traverse from darkness to light" in the Classical era is usually about 3 or 4 measures.


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> Lol, the "traverse from darkness to light" in the Classical era is usually about 3 or 4 measures.


I'm not talking about the "modulation", but the "overall use of form":



hammeredklavier said:


> symphony No.29 in D minor - 0:01 , 12:55 , 16:22
> [1]: "The third movement is a rondeau, Presto scherzante. Horns are in F, trumpets in D. The A theme could be seen as a metamorphosis of the first subject of the first movement." -wikipedia
> [2]: "The entry of the piano here, a new material, but interestingly, it's exactly the same chord structure as that first entry in the first movement. A wonderful sense of Mozart referring back to what we remember, having heard before." -Charles Hazlewood


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## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> I'm not talking about that the modulation, but the overall use of form:


I don't think the Classical era did "dark" very well. "Dark" apparently wasn't something dwelt upon. I can't think of anything like BWV 21 in a Classical context. Now THAT is traversing from dark to light.


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> I don't think the Classical era did "dark" very well. "Dark" apparently wasn't something dwelt upon. I can't think of anything like BWV 21 in a Classical context.


I can't think of anything like 
















 in Bach either. 
Way too "calm" in terms of use of dynamics and timber. Way too "stuck" in the "doctrine of the affections" in terms of "sense of drama".


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## consuono

That first selection actually reminds me of this:




And this:




Or this:





You think Bach always composed in some static way? :lol:


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## Bulldog

hammeredklavier said:


> I can't think of anything like
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> in Bach either.
> Way too "calm" in terms of use of dynamics and timber. Way too "stuck" in the "doctrine of the affections" in terms of "sense of drama".


You started your tenure here on TC by dumping on Schubert. Then you turned you negativity to Haydn. Is Bach your next victim?


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## consuono

Bulldog said:


> You started your tenure here on TC by dumping on Schubert. Then you turned you negativity to Haydn. Is Bach your next victim?


"Must...remove...all...pretenders to Wolfgang's throne!!"


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## hammeredklavier

Bulldog said:


> You started your tenure here on TC by dumping on Schubert. Then you turned you negativity to Haydn. Is Bach your next victim?


I didn't dump on Bach. (I just meant it's a different style), It's consuono who keeps bringing irrelevant composers to the discussion.


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## Eclectic Al

Schubert's pretty good


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## hammeredklavier

consuono said:


> "Must...remove...all...pretenders to Wolfgang's throne!!"


"Must show ... my Bach fanaticism ... even in this thread!!"


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## Eclectic Al

Bach's pretty good


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## consuono

hammeredklavier said:


> "Must show ... my Bach fanaticism ... even in this thread!!"


Well I can give some examples from Handel too, if you want.

By the way:

*HAYDN RULEZ!!!!!!!!!*
(Franz Joseph I mean, not his mediocre brother :lol: )


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## Mandryka

I want to ask hammeredklavier what s/he thinks of Haydn op 50. I’ve been listening to it a lot over the past few days and in truth, I enjoy it as much as the Mozart/Haydn set, maybe more in a way.


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## fbjim

Love the Schubert Great C Major to death. That second movement...


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## Animal the Drummer

This thread was on a haydn to nothing from the start.


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## hammeredklavier

--------------------------------


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist

hammeredklavier said:


> _*Of course Joseph was a "master of bassoon farts", in a way his brother Michael and Mozart never were. *_In terms of depth of harmony though, the chromaticism of divertimento K.334 shreds all Joseph Haydn to pieces.
> I'm wondering how much of Michael Haydn people here have listened to. The darker sections of the slow movements Michael's string quintet in G (1773) and symphony No.40 in F (1789) are more idiomatically similar to those of Mozart's 25th, 26th, 41th symphonies than anything in Joseph Haydn. And as I said, Mozart was far more interested in studying Michael's music (again, look at K.291, and "Mozart's 37th symphony") than Joseph's. And I probably don't need to explains the relations between Michael and Mozart's requiems.


We have a confession, ladies and gentlemen.

*J. Haydn: master of bassoon farts.

M. Haydn: philistine of fagotti flatulence.*


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