THE EMPEROR’S HYMN--THE CREATION AND THE SEASONS.
1793-1809.
Criticism at Home--His Relations to Beethoven--Jealousy of the
Great Mogul--His Second London Journey--The Military Symphony--His
Longings for Home--Great Popularity in England--Reception by the
Royal Family--His Gifts--Return to Vienna--Origin of the Emperor’s
Hymn--The Creation and the Seasons--Personal Characteristics--His
Death--Haydn’s place in Music.
On his journey back, in July, 1792, Haydn again visited Bonn. The
court musicians gave him a breakfast at the suburb of Godesburg, and
Beethoven laid before him a cantata, probably the one written on the
death of Leopold II, to which the master gave special attention and
“encouraged its author to assiduous study.” The arrangements were
unquestionably made at that time, by which the young composer afterward
became Haydn’s scholar, “for Beethoven even then had surprised every
one with his remarkable piano playing.”
Since the death of Gluck and Mozart, Haydn had been recognized in
Vienna, and indeed in all Germany, as the first master. In the spring
of 1792 the _Musikalische Correspondenz_ declared that his services
were so universally recognized, and the influence of his numerous
works was so effective, that his style appeared to be the sole aim of
composers, and they approached more closely to perfection the nearer
they approached him. The fame he had won in England was no longer
doubted or disputed. Every account spoke of him in a manner that
betrayed a feeling of national pride, says Dies, and all the more
was this the case after he had brought out his six new symphonies in
the Burg Theater, on the 22nd and 23rd of December, to which very
naturally, eager attention was given in Vienna. His success was of
great advantage to that same Tonkunstler Societat which had once
treated him so shabbily. He was elected a member, exempt from dues, but
it was never necessary to make any claim upon him.
The “country of wealth” had so materially improved his fortune that he
bought a little house in a “retired, quiet place” in the suburb of
Gumpendorf, which his wife, with the utmost naivete, had picked out
for herself, when she should become a widow, but which became his own
resting-place in his old age. He added a story to it afterward and
lived there until his death, surviving his wife about nine years.
Composition and instruction still remained his regular quiet work. The
lessons at this time, in the case of one scholar at least, were pretty
troublesome. “Haydn has announced that he shall give up large works
to him, and must soon cease composing,” one writes from Bonn, at the
beginning of 1793, referring to Beethoven. It was a characteristic of
the old master that he advised the young scholar, three of whose trios
(op. 1) had been played before him and about which he had said many
complimentary things, not to publish the third, in C minor. He feared
that the rest of the music, in contrast with such “storm and stress,”
would appear tame and spiritless, and that it would rather hurt than
help him in the estimation of the public. This made a bad impression
upon the easily suspicious Beethoven. He believed Haydn was envious
and jealous and meant no good to him. Thus it appears, that from the
very beginning _all_ confidence in the instruction was destroyed, and,
besides this, it had little prospect of success, since the still more
revolutionary youth had gone far beyond his fame-crowned senior in his
innovations. Still he remained until the end of the year 1793, and
the greater youth never forgot what he owed the great master. “Coffee
for Haydn and myself,” and other observations of a like character
in Beethoven’s diary, show, that besides the matter of instruction
there was a personal friendly intercourse between them. Ostensibly it
discontinued when Haydn’s second journey offered a fitting pretext,
but, as a matter of fact, he was at that time a scholar of Schenk, who
is mentioned in Mozart’s biography. He had very often complained to
other musicians that he did not get on well with his studies, since
Haydn was occupied altogether too much with his work and could not
devote the requisite attention to him. Schenk, who had already heard
Beethoven extemporize at one of his associates’, the abbe Gelinek,
met him one day, as he was returning from Haydn, with his music
under his arm, glanced it over and found that several errors remained
uncorrected. This decided Beethoven’s change and choice.
Notwithstanding all this, it was reported in Bonn from Vienna, in the
summer of 1793, that the young countryman made great progress in art,
and this was to Haydn’s credit, who, with the help of his Fux and
Philip Emanuel Bach, was able to collect and arrange the well acquired
theoretical knowledge of the “genial stormer,” in a practical manner,
and thereby substantially raised him to his own rank, although he did
not comply with the understood wish of his teacher that he would place
“Scholar of Haydn” upon the sonatas (op. 2), dedicated to him, because,
as he declared in justification of his refusal, that he had not learned
anything from him. This remark refers to the higher instruction in
composition, where their ideas differed. Yet in 1793, he went with
Haydn to Eisenstadt, and he had even intended to go with him the
next winter to England. Beethoven’s pupil, Ries, also expressly says
that Haydn highly esteemed Beethoven, but as he was so stubborn and
self-willed, he called him “the great Mogul.” How entirely free from
envy Haydn was towards younger artists at this time, is shown by a note
to his godson, Joseph Weigl, afterward the composer of the “Schweizer
Familie.” “It is long since I have felt such enthusiasm for any music
as yesterday in hearing your ‘Princess of Amalfi,’” he writes to him,
January 11, 1794. “It is full of good ideas, sublime, expressive, in
short, a masterpiece; I felt the warmest interest in the well deserved
applause that greeted it. Keep a place for an old boy like me in your
memory.” He had always helped to open the way for the young scholar
into the best musical circles of Vienna, and now that the teacher was
again about to depart, the scholar could seek his own fortune without
going astray.
The preparation of the necessary works for this second journey had
been the too constant occupation of the old man. It must have been
undertaken however for other reasons than these; for Haydn knew that
he must have something to live upon, even in his simple manner, in
his unemployed old age. It was not right that a self-willed young
beginner, who paid nothing for his instruction, as he had no other
means of support except his salary from the Elector, should take
up too much of his valuable time. It was enough to impart the main
points of instruction without giving any attention to little and
merely incidental errors which would disappear of themselves in time.
We know Haydn’s views of such things, and there was a characteristic
illustration of them in his later days. The contrapuntist,
Albrechtsberger, Beethoven’s subsequent teacher, who, according to
the latter’s witty statement, at best only created musical skeletons
with his art, insisted that consecutive fourths should be banished
from strict composition. “What is the good of that?” said Haydn.
“Art is free and should not be tied down with mechanical rules. Such
artifices are of no value. I would prefer instead that some one would
try to compose a new minuet.” Beethoven actually did this, and called
it, in his op. 1, Scherzo. “Haydn rarely escaped without a side cut,”
says Ries of Beethoven--but however all this may be, we may not only
imagine but we know that this opposition between the two artists, which
arose from their different temperaments, made no real difference in
Beethoven’s respect for Haydn.
We now come to the second London journey. This time the Prince
interposed objections. He desired indeed no personal service, but
he had a pride in Haydn and his fame, and thought he had secured
sufficient glory. He may also have thought that a man sixty years old
ought not to expose himself to the hardships of a distant journey, and
the persecutions of envy. Haydn appreciated his good intentions, but he
still felt strong, and preferred an active life to the quiet in which
his Prince had placed him. Besides, he knew that the English public
would still recognize his genius, and he had engaged with Salomon to
write six more symphonies, and had many profitable contracts with
various publishers in London. The Prince at last gave way and allowed
Haydn to go, never to see him again, for he died shortly afterward,
and Haydn had the fourth of the Esterhazys for patron and master, upon
whose order he composed a requiem while in London as a tribute to the
departed.
On the 19th of January, 1794, the journey began. While at Scharding,
an incident happened which clearly shows Haydn’s good humor. The
customs officers asked what his occupation was. Haydn informed them,
“A tone-artist;” (Tonkunstler), “What is that?” they replied. “Oh!
yes, a potter,” (Thonkunstler), said one. “That’s it,” averred Haydn,
“and this one,” (his faithful servant, Ellsler) “is my partner.” At
Wiesbaden, he realized with much satisfaction the greatness of his
fame. At the inn his Andante with the kettle-drum effect, which had
so quickly become a favorite, was played in a room near by him. Dies
says: “He regarded the player as his friend, and courteously entered
the room. He found some Prussian officers, all of whom were great
admirers of his works, and when he at last disclosed himself they would
not believe he was Haydn. ‘Impossible! impossible! you, Haydn! a man
already so old! this does not agree with the fire in your music.’ The
gentlemen continued so long in this strain that at last he exhibited
the letter received from his king, which he always carried in his
chest for good luck. Thereupon the officers overwhelmed him with their
attentions, and he was compelled to remain in their company until long
after midnight.”
This time Haydn lived very near to his friend and admirer, Frau
Schroter, yet we learn nothing further of their relations to each
other. The leading accounts of this second visit have not been kept,
but in reality they repeat the events of the first. His name this time
was free from detraction. They agreed that his power had increased,
and that one of the new symphonies was his best work. His name was in
request for every concert-programme, and the repetition of his pieces
was as frequent as during his first visit. “In geniality and talent who
is like him?” says the _Oracle_, March 10, 1794.
Sir G. Smart in 1866, then in his ninetieth year, and who was a violin
player with Salomon, relates a neat story of this time, to Pohl, the
biographer. At a rehearsal there was need of a drummer. Haydn asked:
“Is there any one here who can play the kettle-drum?” “I can,” quickly
replied young Smart, who never had had a drum stick in his hand, but
thought that correct time was all that was necessary. After the first
movement, Haydn went to him and praised him, but intimated to him that
in Germany they required strokes which would not stop the vibrations
of the drum. At the same time he took the sticks and exhibited to the
astonished orchestra an entirely new style of drumming. “Very well,”
replied the undaunted young Smart, “if you prefer to have this style,
we can do it just as well in England.” Haydn’s first drum lessons with
his cousin Frankh, in Hamburg, will readily occur to the reader.
On the 12th of May, 1794, the Military Symphony, another favorite among
all Haydn’s friends, was performed for the first time. It overflows
with genial merriment, and often with genuine frolicsome humor. Not
long afterward, the news reached him that the new Prince Nicholas
wished to reorganize the orchestra at Eisenstadt, and had appointed him
anew as Capellmeister. Haydn received this news with great pleasure.
This princely house had assured him a living, and, what was of still
more importance, had given him the opportunity of fully developing his
talent as a composer. His profits in London far exceeded his salary
in the Fatherland, and a persistent effort was made to keep him in
England, but he decided as soon as his existing engagements were
concluded to return to his old position.
A secret but very powerfully operating reason may also have been the
same which to-day actuates that greatest of natural tone artists,
Franz Liszt--wherever he may go, he always returns to Germany. It is
the spirit of music itself which permeates every fiber of our life, in
the earnest feeling of which we bathe and find health. Notwithstanding
the attractive performance of the orchestra and of the virtuosi, the
most of whom were Germans, the master did not find London and England
peculiarly musical. What he thought of the theater is recorded in his
diary: “What miserable stuff at Saddler’s Wells! A fellow screamed
an aria so frightfully and with such ridiculous grimaces that I
began to sweat all over. N. B. He had to repeat the aria! _O che
bestie!_” There yet remained much of the English jockey style in these
musico-theatrical performances, and the value of music was reckoned
upon another standard than that which belongs to intellectual things.
Thus we may readily believe, though Haydn himself pretended not to
hear it, that the rough mob in the gallery, hissing and whistling,
cried out, “Fiddler, Fiddler,” when the orchestra rose to honor him,
an artist and a foreigner, upon his first appearance in the theater.
After these not very agreeable experiences of English musical taste,
Haydn looked upon it as a comical proof of his reputation, when, as
Griesinger relates, Englishmen would approach him, measure him from
head to foot, and leave him with the exclamation, “You are a great man.”
Still another circumstance shows how absolutely he preferred his
Austrian home. In August, 1794, he visited the ruins of the old
abbey of Waverly. “I must confess,” he writes in his diary, “that
every time I look upon this beautiful ruin, my heart is troubled as
I think that all this once occurred among those of my religion.” His
continual abode among people of the Protestant confession, so opposed
to his own Catholicism, disturbed those feelings and ideas of the
simple man in these later years which had swayed his inner nature for
two generations. This is a matter of personal feeling, and does not
affect that toleration which in all religious matters characterized
his beautiful nature. Finally, political freedom, which had made
England so powerful, was not agreeable to his primitive manner of life.
While he says not a word of the excellencies of the life of a great
free people, he several times alludes to the rude noises and frantic
shouts of the “sweet mob” (suessen Poebels) in London festivals and
at the theaters. Socially considered, notwithstanding the political
freedom, the barriers that separated classes were just as distinct
and insurmountable as they are to-day. Nowhere in the world, indeed,
is custom more formal--reason enough in itself to make him love his
Fatherland all the more fervently.
His fame in England, however, continually increased. He was already
called a genius inferior to no one, and this, too, in the same
connection with the mention of a performance of Hamlet, which he had
attended. His sportive humor allied him very closely to the great
English tragic poet: if not so deep and so quickly moving to tears,
he still derived his power doubtless from the same simple source of
feeling. He himself mentions one instance of his roguish humor while
in London, according to Dies and others. He was intimately acquainted
with a German who had acquired boundless dexterity in the violin
technique, and was addicted to the common practice of always making
effects in the extremely high tones. Haydn wished to see if he could
not disgust him with this dilettantist weakness and induce a feeling
for legitimate playing. The violinist often visited one Miss Janson,
who played the piano very skillfully, and was accustomed to accompany
him. Haydn wrote a sonata for them, called it “Jacob’s Dream,” and sent
it anonymously to the lady, who did not hesitate to perform it with the
violinist, as it appeared to be an easy little work. At first it flowed
easily through passages which were begun in the third position of the
violin. The violinist was in ecstasies. “Very well written. One can
see the composer knows the instrument,” he murmured. But in the close,
instead of lowering to a practical place, it mounted to the fifth,
sixth, and at last to the seventh position. His fingers continually
crowded against and through each other like ants. Crawling around
the instrument and stumbling over the passages, he exclaimed with
the sweat of misery on his brow: “Who ever heard of such scribbling?
The man knows nothing about writing for the violin.” The lady soon
discovered that the composer meant to illustrate by these high passages
the heavenly ladder which Jacob saw in his dream, and the more she
observed her companion stumbling around unsteadily upon this ladder,
reeling and jumping up and down, the thing was so comical that she
could not conceal her laughter, which at length broke out in a storm,
from which we may fancy that it cured the dilettante of his foolish
passion. It was not discovered until five or six months afterward who
the composer was, and Miss Janson sent him a gift.
Haydn’s influence upon the public during his second visit to London is
observed even in still higher degree. Salomon, indeed, said, though
somewhat figuratively, yet openly, to “proud England,” that these Haydn
concerts were not without their influence upon the public interests,
since they had created a permanent taste for music. In the spring of
1795, Haydn saw the royal pair several times. The first time it was at
the house of the young and musical Duchess of York, whom the Prince
of Wales had introduced to him. The Hanoverian George III. was already
prepossessed in Handel’s favor. Philip Emanuel Bach writes of him in
1786: “The funniest of all is the gracious precautions that are taken
to preserve Handel’s youthful works with the utmost care.” But on this
evening, when only Haydn’s works were played by the royal orchestra,
under Salomon’s direction, and of course, excellently, he showed great
interest in them also. “Dr. Haydn,” said he, “you have written much.”
“Yes, Sire, more than is good.” “Certainly not; the world disputes
that.” The King then presented him to the Queen, and said he knew that
Haydn had once been a good singer and he would like to hear some of
his songs. “Your Majesty, my voice is now only so large,” said Haydn,
pointing to the joint of his little finger. The King smiled, and Haydn
sang his song, “Ich bin der Verliebteste.” Two days afterward, there
was a similar entertainment at the residence of the Prince of Wales,
who required his presence very often.
He related to Griesinger that upon that occasion he directed twenty-six
musicians, and the orchestra often had to wait several hours until the
Prince rose from the table. As there was no compensation for all this
trouble, when Parliament settled up the bills of the Prince, he sent in
an account of one hundred guineas, which was promptly paid. Haydn was
not very well pleased about the matter, although upon the occasion of
his first acquaintance in 1791, he had written that the Prince loved
music exceedingly, had very much feeling, but very little money, and
that he desired his good will more than any self-interest. Still he
had, as his will shows, many poor relatives, who had claims upon him,
and was it right that he should lose at the hands of the princely
son of the richest land in the world, upon whom he had bestowed such
faithful artistic services? While yet in London he met with a bitter
proof of what he was to endure on account of these relatives. He was
compelled to immediately settle the debt of a married nephew, who was
the major-domo of the Esterhazy family, and we see by his will that
these relatives had squandered more than six thousand florins of his
through his great kindness. His remarkable goodness was as much an
obligation in his estimation, as nobility or genius in others, and he
never allowed any possible means of practicing it to escape without
some good cause.
He was repeatedly invited to the Queen’s concerts, and was also
presented by her with the manuscript of Handel’s “Savior at the Cross.”
As Germans, both she and the King were eager to keep him in England. “I
will give you a residence at Windsor for the summer,” said the Queen,
“and then” with a roguish glance at the King, “we can some times have
tete-a-tete music.” “O, I am not jealous of Haydn,” said the King, “he
is a good and noble German.” “To maintain that reputation is my highest
ambition,” quickly exclaimed Haydn. After repeated efforts to persuade
him, he replied that he was bound by gratitude to the house of his
Prince, and that he could not always remain away from his fatherland
and his wife. The King begged him to let the latter come. “She never
crosses the Danube, still less the sea,” replied Haydn. He remained
inflexible on this point, and he believed that it was on this account
that he received no gift from the King, and that no further interest
was manifested in him by the court. The real and deeper reason for his
decision we have already learned.
The concerts of the year 1795 were laid out upon a more magnificent
scale than before, as political events upon the continent had disturbed
the interest in them in various ways. Haydn, Martini, Clementi, and
the most distinguished players and singers from all countries--London
had never witnessed more brilliant concert-schemes. Haydn opened the
second part of every concert with a symphony. The _Oracle_ says of one
of these: “It shows the fancy and style of Haydn in forms that are not
at the command of any other genius.” After he gave his benefit concert,
May 4, 1795, upon which occasion the Military Symphony and the Symphony
in D major, the last of the twelve London series, were played, he
wrote in his diary: “The hall was filled with a select company. They
were extremely pleased and so was I. I made this evening four thousand
florins. It is only in England one can make so much.” These pleasant
experiences gave him the idea of writing a work of the style which
was very popular and greatly esteemed in England--the oratorio. He
had begun one such with English text, which was unfinished, however,
because he could not express himself with sufficient feeling in that
language.
He was the recipient of many gifts at this time, among them a cocoanut
cup with a silver standard from Clementi; a silver dish, a foot in
width, from the well-known Tattersall, for his help in the work of
improving the English church music; and even nine years later, the
influences of his London visit were apparent in a gift sent to him of
six pairs of woolen stockings, upon which were embroidered six themes
of his music, like the Andante from the drum symphony, the “Emperor’s
Hymn,” etc. He was the first, since Handel’s time, who had universally
and permanently succeeded with his music in London, and had impressed
his listeners with an earnest and realizing sense of the real meaning
of music. He was the first, for when Mozart, and afterward Beethoven,
were known in London, a new dynasty began. Now Haydn ruled as firmly
as Handel had previously. He had established his pre-eminence by
the immense number of works of all kinds he had written. Griesinger
gives a list in his own catalogue comprising in all seven hundred
and sixty-eight pages, among which, besides the opera of “Orpheus”
and the twelve London symphonies, whose subjects are given in the
volume, “Haydn in London,” there are six quartets, eleven sonatas, and
countless songs, dances and marches--indeed, there is no end to them.
The work that made his sway absolute was “The Creation,” the text of
which had been given to him by Salomon while still in London, where he
had acquired “much credit in vocal music,” and the crowning close, so
to speak, of his London visit was made at home.
In August, 1795, Haydn returned to Vienna by way of Hamburg and
Dresden, as the French held possession of the Rhine. This time his
journey had been very profitable. His second visit had added an equal
amount to the twelve thousand florins made in his first, and he also
retained his publisher’s royalties in England as well as in Germany and
Paris. He could now contemplate his old age without any apprehensions
since he had a certainty to live upon, though a modest one. “Haydn
often insisted that he first became famous in Germany after he had been
in England,” says Griesinger. The value of his works was recognized,
but that public homage, which surpassing talent usually enjoys, first
came to him in old age, and for this reason now we call him “our
immortal Haydn.” On the 18th of December, 1795, he gave a concert
again in Vienna with his new compositions, but this time for his own
personal profit. Three new symphonies were played. He was overwhelmed
with attentions and his receipts were more than a thousand guldens.
Beethoven assisted in this concert, a proof of the good feeling
existing at this time between teacher and scholar.
One day the Baron Van Swieten, who is well known in connection with
the time of Beethoven and Mozart, and whom he had known for twenty
years or more, said to him: “We must now have an oratorio from you
also, dear Haydn.” “He assisted me at times with a couple of ducats
and sent me also an easy traveling carriage on my second journey
to England,” says Haydn. The Emperor’s librarian, Van Swieten, was
secretary of an aristocratic society, whose associates illustrated
the real meaning of that term, as they comprised the entire musical
nobility of Europe--Esterhazy, Lobkowitz, Kinsky, Lichnowsky,
Schwartzenberg, Auersperg, Trautmannsdorf and others. They had been
accustomed for years to bring out large vocal works in the beautiful
library-hall of the imperial city. Handel was the chosen favorite, and
Mozart had arranged for these concerts the “Acis and Galatea,” “Ode
to St. Cecilia,” “Alexander’s Feast” and “The Messiah.” They did not
possess or they did not yet know anything of this style in Germany, for
Sebastian Bach had not been discovered in Vienna. Haydn’s “Ruckkehr
des Tobias,” like Mozart’s “Davidde penitente,” was written in a style
which belonged to the opera, and the “Requiem” was already at hand and
had been performed, but they were the only things of their class. On
the other hand the “Zauberfloete” had drawn thousands to the theater,
year in and year out. Why could they not hear this characteristic pure
German music in the concert-hall? In this work there was, so to speak,
a specimen of the “Creation” with animals, beings and the Paradise on
every hand, in which the loving pair, Pamina and Tamino, are solemnly
tested. How much more varied appear the life-pictures in Lidley’s
“Creation”--a poem which Haydn had placed in Van Swieten’s hands! The
society, without doubt upon Swieten’s suggestion, guaranteed the sum
of five hundred ducats and the latter made the translation of the
English text. Three years later the most popular of all oratorios, “The
Creation,” was completed.
Meanwhile, with the exception of the Mass, which was the product of the
war-time of 1796, in which the Agnus Dei commences with kettle-drums
as if one heard the enemy already coming in the distance, an artistic
event occurred which, if not reaching the limits of musical art as
such, yet in the most beautiful manner fulfilled its lofty mission of
welding together the conceptions and feelings of all times and peoples,
and directing them to a high mission--it was the composition of “God
Save the Emperor Francis.”
This song has its origin in the revolutionary agitations of the
year (1796), brought over from France, which determined the Imperial
High Chancellor, Count Saurau, to have a national song written which
should display “before all the world the true devotion of the Austrian
people to their good and upright father of his country, and to arouse
in the hearts of all good Austrians that noble national pride which
was essential to the energetic accomplishment of all the beneficial
measures of the sovereign.” He then applied to our immortal countryman,
Haydn, whom he regarded as the only one competent to write something
like the English “God Save the King.” In reality this minister aroused
the noblest German popular spirit, and established it in a beautiful
setting, far exceeding his restricted purpose at the outset. Haydn
himself had already arranged the English national hymn in London. More
than once, upon the occasion of public festivals, it had afforded him
the opportunity of learning in the most convincing manner the strong
attachment of the English to their royal house, the embodiment of
their State. He had also preserved his own devotion to his Fatherland
through many a sharp test. His long continued stay in a foreign land
had only served to fully convince him what his Austrian home and
Germany were to him. Above all, the music represents not merely his own
most original utterance of the people, and he, who had already learned
the Lied in the childhood of the people itself, had been the first to
introduce it in a becoming and all-joyous manner in the art of music.
Thus his full heart was in this composition, and the commission came to
him, as it were, direct from his Emperor. Far more than “God Save the
King,” this Emperor’s Hymn is an outburst of universal popular feeling.
The “Heil dir im Siegerkranz,” or any special Fatherland-song, could
not be the German people’s hymn, and the “Deutschland, Deutschland
uber Alles” has only become so, because it was set to Haydn’s melody,
which accounts for its speedy and universal adoption as the people’s
hymn. The German people realize in it the spirit of their own life,
in its very essence, as closely as music can express it. In reality,
there is no people’s hymn richer, or, we might say, more satisfying
in feeling, than this. The “God Save the King,” so fine in itself, of
which Beethoven said he must sometime show the English what a blessing
they had in its melody, appears poor and thin in contrast with such
fullness of melodic rhythm and manifold modulation. In the second
verse the melody produces with most beautiful effect that mysterious
exaltation which enthralls us when in accord with the grandest impulses
of the people, and the responsive portion of the second part--the
climax of the whole--carries this exalted feeling, as it were, upon
the waves of thousands and thousands of voices to the very dome of
Eternity. The construction of the melody is a masterpiece of the first
order. Never has a grander or more solid development been accomplished
in music with such simple material. “God Save the Emperor Francis,” as
a worldly choral, stands by the side of “Eine feste Burg.” It reveals
the simplest and most popular, but at the same time in the most graphic
manner, the characteristic mental nature of our people, and in like
manner has compressed it within the narrowest compass, just as music
for centuries has been the depository of the purest and holiest
feelings of the Germans. Had Haydn written nothing but this song, all
the centuries of the German people’s life would know and mention his
name. We shall yet hear how much he esteemed the song himself. Not long
afterward he revealed his musical “blessing” in the variations upon its
theme in one of his best known works, the so-called “Kaiser Quartet.”
“On the 28th of January, 1797, Haydn’s people’s hymn received the
imprimatur of Count Saurau,” says a chronology of his life. The people,
however, set its real seal of universal value upon this song when
they affectionately and enthusiastically appropriated it as their
own property. “On the 12th of February, the birthday of the Emperor
Francis, Haydn’s people’s hymn was sung in all the theaters of Vienna,
and Haydn received a handsome present in compensation,” it is further
related. We recognize him in all his modesty in the following note to
Count Saurau: “Your Excellency! Such a surprise and mark of favor,
especially as regards the portrait of my good monarch, I never before
received in acknowledgment of my poor talent. I thank Your Excellency
with all my heart and am under all circumstances at your command.”
To this day there is generally no patriotic festival in all Germany
at which this song is not sung or played as an expression of genuine
German popular or patriotic feeling. It is a part of our history as
it is of our life. Richard Wagner’s “Kaiser March” is the first that
corresponds with it as an expression of popular feeling. In its poesy
it is a hymn in contrast with that mere Lied, and, notwithstanding
its most powerful and soaring style as a composition, it is, like the
Marseillaise, a set scene which arouses the national pride of our time
in a glittering sort of way; but Haydn’s song, though belonging to
the more primitive era of the nation, still remains as the expression
of our most genuine national feeling. Finally it accomplishes a
most important work in its special province of art. It reflects the
heartiness of the German people in a grand composition, as Mozart
had already done in the “Magic Flute,” and is set in a crystalline
vase, as it were, for the permanent advantage of art. This is the
historical significance of Haydn’s creation. Together with Mozart’s
“Magic Flute,” it marks the consummate triumph of German music, and
has, like the deep purpose of the preceding epoch of the North German
organ-school, especially Sebastian Bach, gradually opened the way to
the transcendent dramatic creations of Richard Wagner.
“Haydn wrote ‘The Creation’ in his sixty-fifth year, with all the
spirit that usually dwells in the breast of youth,” says Griesinger. “I
had the good fortune to be a witness of the deep emotions and joyous
enthusiasm which several performances of it under Haydn’s own direction
aroused in all listeners. Haydn also confessed to me that it was not
possible for him to describe the emotions with which he was filled as
the performance met his entire expectation, and his audience listened
to every note. ‘One moment I was as cold as ice, and the next I seemed
on fire, and more than once I feared I should have a stroke.’” How
deeply he infused his own spirit into this composition is shown by
another remark: “I was never so pious as during the time I was working
upon ‘The Creation.’ Daily I fell upon my knees and prayed God to
grant me strength for the happy execution of this work.”
One may see that his heart was in his work. “Accept this oratorio with
reverence and devotion,” wrote his brother Michael, himself no ordinary
church-composer. The most remarkable characteristic of the work is
not, that his choruses rise to the Infinite, as his brother expresses
it. Handel has accomplished this, and Bach also, with inexpressibly
greater majesty and spiritual power. The heartfelt nature of his music,
its incomparable naturalness, its blissful joyousness, its innocence
of purpose, like laughter in childhood’s eyes--these are the new
and beautiful features of it. A spring fountain of perennial youth
gushes forth in melodies like “With Verdure Clad,” “And Cooing Calls
the Tender Dove,” “Spring’s Charming Image.” And how full of genuine
spirit is some of the much talked of “painting” in this work. The
rising of the moon, for instance, is depicted so perceptibly that it
almost moves us to sadness. How well Haydn knew the value of discords
is shown by the introductory “Chaos!” How his modulations add to the
general effects, as for instance, in the mighty climax in the finale
of the chorus, “The Heavens are telling the Glory of God!” The stately
succession of triads in the old style never fails at the right moment.
This new development of the spontaneous emotions of life, from the
fascinating song of the nightingale to the natural expression of
love’s happiness in Adam and Eve, could only come from a heart full of
goodness, piety, and purity of thought. It is a treasure which Austria
has given to the whole German people out of its very heart, and is as
meritorious as our classical poetry, and as permanent. This enduring
merit of the work transcends all that the esthetic or intellectual
critics can find to criticise in the painting of subjects not musical.
The ground tone is musical throughout, for it comes from the heart of
a man who regards life and the creation as something transcendently
beautiful and good, and therefore cleaves to his Creator with
child-like purity and thankful soul.
“The Divinity should always be expressed by love and goodness,” Dies
heard him say very expressively. This all-powerful force in human
existence is the source of the lovely fancies which float about us in
the melodies of the “Creation,” enchanting every ear and familiar to
every tongue. A criticism made at that time upon Haydn’s measures is to
the effect that their predominant characteristics are happy, contented
devotion, and a blissful self-consciousness of the heavenly goodness.
This is the fundamental trait in all of Haydn’s music, particularly
of the “Creation.” He was always certain that an infinite God would
have compassion upon His infinite creation, and such a thought filled
him with a steadfast and abiding joyousness. That Handel was grand in
choruses, but only tolerable in song, he says himself; and this is a
proof of his deep feeling for natural life and its individual traits.
Still, on the other hand, he guards himself in these pure lyric works
from dramatic pathos, and is right when he leaves this to the stage.
He acknowledges in his exact recognition of the various problems and
purposes of art, that Gluck surpassed others in his poetic intensity
and dramatic power. He, himself, with his artistic sense, could sketch
the ideal types of nature, inspire them with the breath of life,
give them the sparkle of the eye, and the inward gracious quality
of his own true, loving and soulful nature. This places him above
even his renowned predecessors, contemporaries and followers--Graun,
Hasse, Philip Emanuel Bach, Salieri, Cherubini, and the rest, and in
this province of art exalts him to the height of the classic. Many of
these melodies will certainly live as long as German feeling itself,
particularly among youth and the people whose manhood ever freshly
renews itself.
The scope and style of the work were also in consonance with its
performance. It was first given with astonishing success at the
Schwartzenberg Palace, and then, March 19, 1799, at the Burg Theater,
and brought him in, according to Dies, four thousand florins. A year
later, Beethoven’s very picturesque and attractive Septet was played
for the first time at the Schwartzenberg and much admired. “That is my
Creation,” Beethoven is said to have remarked at that time. In fact,
the form and substance of the “Creation” melodies are manifest in it,
but he has gained the power of developing them with greater effect; and
yet Beethoven composed one Creation piece, which was unquestionably
the result of Haydn’s work--the ballet, “Creations of Prometheus.” The
following conversation occurred between the two composers not long
afterward: “I heard your ballet yesterday; it pleased me very much,”
said Haydn. (It was in the year 1801 that the work was performed.)
Beethoven replied: “O, dear Papa, you are very good, but it is far from
being a ‘Creation.’” Haydn, surprised at the answer and almost hurt,
said, after a short pause: “That is true. It is not yet a ‘Creation,’
and I hardly believe that it will ever reach that distinction,”
whereupon they took leave of each other in mutual embarrassment.
If the prejudices of the old master on this occasion against the
conceited “Great Mogul” appear to be somewhat too actively displayed,
we see him on the other hand in all his modesty, in a letter to
Breitkopf and Haertel, the publishers of the _Allgemeine Musikalische
Zeitung_: “I only wish and hope, now an old man, that the gentleman
critics may not handle my ‘Creation’ too severely nor deal too hardly
with it,” he wrote, in sending them the work in the summer of 1799.
“They may find the musical grammar faulty in some places, and perhaps
other things also, which I have been accustomed for many years to
regard as trifles. But a true connoisseur will see the real cause as
quickly as myself, and willingly throw such stumbling stones one side.
This is, however, between ourselves, or I might be accused of conceit
and vanity, from which my heavenly Father has preserved me all my life.”
In the same letter he writes: “Unfortunately my business increases with
my years, and yet it almost seems as if my pleasure and inclination to
work increase with the diminishing of my mental powers. Oh, God! how
much yet remains to be done in this glorious art, even by such a man
as I. The world pays me many compliments daily, even upon the spirit
of my last works, but no one would believe how much effort and strain
they cost me, since many a time my feeble memory and unstrung nerves
so crush me down that I fall into the most melancholy state, so that
for days afterward, I am unable to find a single idea until at last
Providence encourages me. I seat myself at the piano and hammer away,
then all goes well again, God be praised.” Griesinger speaks of another
method which, he employed in his old age to arouse himself to renewed
labor: “When composition does not get on well, I go to my chamber, and,
with rosary in hand, say a few Aves, and then the ideas return,” said
Haydn.
What further remains? We have spoken of the Kaiser Quartet, and we
know that there were several other pieces, among them the op. 82,
which has only two movements. “It is my last child,” said he, “but it
is still very like me.” As a Finale, he appended to it, in 1806, the
introduction of his song, “Hin ist alle meine Kraft” (“Gone is all my
power”), which he also had engraved as a visiting card in answer to
friends who made inquiries about his condition. In a letter to Artaria,
in 1799, he also speaks of twelve new and very charming minuets and
trios. His principal composition, however, was a second oratorio,
which the Society before spoken of desired, after the success of the
“Creation,” and for which Van Swieten again translated the text. It was
the “Seasons,” after Thomson.
“Haydn often complained bitterly of the unpoetical text,” says
Griesinger, “and how difficult it was for him to compose the ‘Heisasa,
Hopsasa, long live the Vine, and long live the Cask which holds it,
long live the Tankard out of which it flows.’” He was frequently
very fretful over the many picturesquely imitative passages, and, in
order to relieve the continual monotony, he hit upon the expedient of
representing a drinking scene in the closing fugue of the “Autumn.” “My
head was so full of the nonsensical stuff that it all went topsy-turvy,
and I therefore called the closing fugue the drunken fugue,” he said.
He may have been thinking of the scene he witnessed at the Lord Mayor’s
Feast in London, where “the men, as was customary, kept it up stoutly
all night, drinking healths amid a crazy uproar and clinking of
glasses, with hurrahs.”
He especially disliked the croaking of the frogs and realized how much
it lowered his art. Swieten showed him an old piece of Gretry’s in
which the croak was imitated with striking effect. Haydn contended that
it would be better if the entire croak were omitted, though he yielded
to Swieten’s importunities. He wrote afterward, however, that this
entire piece, imitating the frog, did not come from his pen. “It was
urged upon me to write this French croak. In the orchestral setting
the wretched idea quickly disappears, and on the piano it can not be
done. I trust the critics will not treat me with severity. I am an old
man and liable to make mistakes.” At the place “Oh! Industry, O noble
Industry, from thee comes all Happiness,” he remarked that he had been
an industrious man all his life, but it had never occurred to him to
set industry to music. Notwithstanding his displeasure, he bestowed
all his strength upon the work in the most literal sense, for shortly
after its completion, he was attacked with a brain-fever from which
he suffered torments, and during which his fancies were incessantly
occupied with music. A weakness ensued which constantly increased.
“The ‘Seasons’ have brought this trouble upon me. I ought not to have
written it. I have overdone,” he said to Dies.
The imperious Swieten, who thought he understood things better than
the teacher and professor, annoyed him very much. He complained of
the aria where the countryman behind his plow sings the melody of
the Andante with the kettle-drum, and wanted to substitute for it a
song from a very popular opera. Haydn felt offended at the request,
and replied with just pride: “I change nothing. My Andante is as
good and as popular anyhow as a song from that opera.” Swieten took
offense at this, and no longer visited Haydn. After a lapse of ten or
twelve days, actuated by his overmastering magnanimity, he sought the
haughty gentleman himself, but was kept waiting a good half hour in an
ante-room. At last he lost his patience and turned to the door, when he
was called back and admitted. He could no longer restrain his passion,
and addressed the Director as follows: “You called me back at just the
right time. A little more and I should have seen your rooms to-day for
the last time.” As we think of the “Great Mogul,” and the scene with
Goethe at Carlsbad, we feel, especially from a social point of view,
that a full century lies between Haydn and Beethoven. Art was become of
age and with it the artist. Haydn himself had helped open the way to an
expression of the deeper value of our nature, and brought it, as he
did pure instrumental music, to a higher standard of merit. Swieten had
already personally experienced Haydn’s anger. That epistolary complaint
about the “frog-croak” had certainly not been made public from anything
of his doing, but yet it was very sincerely intended. Swieten made him
experience his displeasure for a long time afterward, but there is
nowhere any indication that he took it specially to heart.
The first performance of the “Seasons” took place April 24, 1801.
Opinions were divided about the work. At this time occurred the
meeting of Haydn with his scholar, Beethoven, and the conversation
about the “Prometheus.” “Beethoven manifested a decided opposition
to his compositions, although he laughed repeatedly at the musical
painting, and found special fault with the littleness of his style.
On this account the ‘Creation,’ and the ‘Seasons’ would many a time
have suffered had it not been that Beethoven recognized Haydn’s higher
merits,” relates his scholar, Dies. Haydn himself expressed the
difference between his two oratorios very nicely. At a performance of
the “Seasons,” the Emperor Francis asked him to which of the two works
he gave the preference. “The Creation!” answered Haydn. “And why?” “In
the ‘Creation’ the angels speak and tell of God, but in the ‘Seasons’
only peasants talk,” said he. “In his mouth there is something of the
Philistine,” said Lavater of Haydn’s face. In comparison with the
ideal types of the “Creation” melodies, we find again in the “Seasons”
the melodious and modulatory effects of the good old times, and the
humor itself is home-made. Notwithstanding this, there is much of
the genuine Haydn geniality and freshness in this his last work, and
the tone-painting is much in the style of the “Creation.” In these
two oratorios of Haydn, and in Mozart’s “Magic Flute,” we constantly
recognize the remote precursors of the powerful musical painting in
Richard Wagner’s “Ring des Nibelungen.”
From this period Haydn’s biography is no longer the record of his
creative power, but of his outer life, though his fame continually
increased. In 1798 the Academy of Stockholm, and in 1801 that at
Amsterdam, elected him to their membership. In the year 1800, copies
of the “Creation” were circulated in Europe, and the musicians of the
Paris opera, who were the first to perform it, sent him a large gold
medal with his likeness on it. “I have often doubted whether my name
would survive me, but your goodness inspires me with confidence, and
the tribute with which you have honored me, perhaps justifies me in the
belief that I shall not wholly die,” he replied to them. The Institut
National, the Concert des Amateurs and the French Conservatory, also
sent him medals. In 1804 he received the civic diploma of honor from
the city of Vienna, while the year before, in consideration of the
performance of his works for the benefit of the city hospitals, a
gold medal had been presented him. These concerts brought in over
thirty-three thousand florins, so great was Haydn’s popularity at
that time. In 1805 the Paris Conservatory elected him a member, which
was followed by election to the societies of Laybach, Paris and St.
Petersburg.
He was thoughtful of his end, and in 1806 made his will, which is
characterized by many beautiful and humane features. No one at his
home, or in its immediate neighborhood, was forgotten, and there were
very many in the list which may be found in the “Musical Letters.”
It closes: “My soul I give to its all-merciful Creator; I desire my
body to be buried in the Roman Catholic form, in consecrated ground.
For my soul I bequeathe No. 1, ‘namely,’ for holy masses twelve
florins.” “I am of no more use to the world; I must wait like a child
and be taken care of. Would it were time for God to call me to Him,”
he said to Griesinger. The agreeable change to this retired life in
his quiet little house, for his wife was no longer living, showed
him in what respect, friendship and love he was held, both by visits
and letters. A striking proof of the source from which his creations
arose is his letter of 1802 to distant Rugen, where his “Creation” had
been performed with piano accompaniment. “You give me the pleasing
assurance, which is the most fruitful consolation of my old age, that
I am often the enviable source from which you and so many families,
susceptible to true feeling, obtain pleasure and hearty enjoyment in
their domestic life--a thought which causes me great happiness,” he
writes to those musical friends. “Often, when struggling with obstacles
opposed to my works--often, when strength failed and it was difficult
for me to persevere in the course upon which I had entered--a secret
feeling whispered to me, ‘there are few joyful and contented people
here below; everywhere there is trouble and care; perchance your labor
sometime may be the source from which those burdened with care may
derive a moment’s relief.’”
He no longer cared much for his youthful works. “Dearest Ellsler: Be
so good as to send me at the very first opportunity the old symphony,
called ‘Die Zerstreute,’ as Her Majesty, the Empress, expresses a
desire to hear the old thing,” he humorously writes to Eisenstadt in
1803. He composed nothing more after this time, although he sent twelve
pieces to Artaria in 1805, and thought the old Haydn deserved a little
present for them, though they belonged to his younger days.
In the spring of 1804, C. M. Von Weber writes: “I have spent some time
with Haydn. The old man is exceedingly feeble. He is always cheerful
and in good humor. He likes to talk of his adventures, and is specially
interested in young beginners in art. He gives you the impression of a
great man, and so does Vogler (the abbe), with this difference, that
his literary intelligence is much more acute than Haydn’s natural
power. It is touching to see full grown men approach him, call him
‘papa,’ and kiss his hand.” At this time also, he received a letter
from Goethe’s friend, Zelter, at Berlin, in which he wished Haydn
could hear with what “repose, devotion, purity and reverence,” his
choruses were sung at the Sing Akademie. “Your spirit has entered
into the sanctuary of divine wisdom. You have brought down fire from
heaven, to warm our earthly hearts, and guide us to the Infinite. O,
come to us! You shall be received as a god among men.” Thus writes with
enthusiastic rapture this dry old master mason, wedded to forms, who
could nevertheless appreciate the special quality of Haydn’s music--its
popular and simple humor. Griesinger tells us how he regarded flattery.
A piano player began in this wise: “You are Haydn, the great Haydn.
One should fall upon his knees before you. You ought to live in a
splendid palace, etc.” “Ah! my dear sir,” replied Haydn, “do not speak
so to me. You see only a man to whom God has granted talent and a good
heart. It went very hard with me in my young days, and, even at that
time, I wearied myself with the struggle to preserve my old age from
the cares of life. I have my comfortable residence, enough to eat and a
good glass of wine. I can dress in fine cloth, and, if I wish to ride,
a hackney coach is good enough for me.”
For the thorough quiet of his life at this time he was indebted to his
last Prince, more than to any other. “The friends of harmony often
flatter me and bestow excessive praise upon me. If my name deserves
commendable distinction, it dates from that moment when the Prince
conceded larger scope to my liberty,” he said to Dies, when the latter
asked him how he could, in addition to his regular service, have
written two oratorios. The family of his illustrious patron frequently
visited him, and, in order to spare his feelings as much as possible,
they personally brought him the news of the death of his beloved
brother, Johann, who had also been in their service. In 1806, the
Prince increased his compensation fully six hundred gulden, so that he
could enjoy still more comfort. His excellent servant, Ellsler, father
of the famous danseuse, took most faithful care of him. He had such
a feeling of affectionate reverence for Haydn, that many a time when
he was fumigating the sick chamber, he would stop before his master’s
picture and fumigate it. Tomaschek, at that time a young musician from
Prague, who is mentioned in the work “Beethoven, according to the
description of his Cotemporaries,” visited him in the summer of 1808,
and has given us a very detailed picture of his style and appearance.
“He sat in an arm-chair. A prim and powdered wig with side locks,
a white collar with golden buckle, a richly embroidered white
waistcoat of heavy silk stuff, a stately frill, a state dress of
fine coffee-brown material, embroidered ruffles at the wrist, black
silk knee breeches, white silk hose, shoes with large curved silver
buckles over the instep, and upon the little table standing on one
side, near his hat, a pair of white leather gloves--such were the
items of his dress upon which shone the dawn of the 17th (18th?)
century,” says Tomaschek. To this we may add Griesinger’s remark:
“When he expected company, he placed his diamond ring on his finger,
and ornamented his attire with the red ribbon to which the Burgher
medal was attached.” “The tender feelings inspired by the sight of the
fame-crowned tone-poet disposed me to sadness,” continues Tomaschek.
“Haydn complained of his failing memory, which compelled him to give
up composition altogether. He could not retain an idea long enough
to write it out. He begged us to go into the next room and see his
souvenirs of the ‘Creation.’ A bust by Gyps induced me to ask Haydn
whom it represented. The poor man, bursting into tears, moaned rather
than spoke, ‘My best friend, the sculptor Fischer; O, why dost thou
not take me to thyself?’ The tone with which he said it pierced me to
the heart, and I was vexed with myself for having made him mournful.
At sight of his trinkets, however, he grew cheerful again. In short,
the great Haydn was already a child in whose arms grief and joy often
reposed together.”
The 27th of March witnessed one of the grandest displays of respect
Haydn had ever experienced. “The old man at all times loved his
fatherland, and he set an inestimable value upon the honors he
received in it,” so Dies begins an account of the performance of the
“Creation” in Italian, which took place in this year (1808), under
Salieri’s direction. On alighting from the Prince’s carriage, he was
received by distinguished personages of the nobility, and--by his
scholar Beethoven. The crowd was so great that the military had to keep
order. He was carried, sitting in his arm-chair, into the hall, and
was greeted upon his entrance with a flourish of trumpets and joyous
shouts of “long live Haydn.” He occupied a seat next his Princess,
the Prince being at court that day, and on the other side sat his
favorite scholar, Fraulein Kurzbeck. The highest people of rank in
Vienna selected seats in his vicinity. The French ambassador noticed
that Haydn wore the medal of the Paris Concert des Amateurs. “Not alone
this, but all the medals which have been awarded in France you ought
to have received,” said he. Haydn thought he felt a little draft. The
Princess threw her shawl about him, many ladies following her example,
and in a few moments he was covered with shawls. Eibler, Gyrowetz and
his godson, Weigl, were also present. Poems by Collin and Carpani,
the adapter of the text, were presented to him. “He could no longer
conceal his feelings. His overburdened heart sought and found relief in
tears,” continues Dies. “He was obliged to refresh himself with wine to
raise his drooping spirits.” When the passage, “And there was Light,”
came, and the audience broke out into tumultuous applause, he made a
motion of his hands towards Heaven and said, “it came from thence.” He
continued in such an agitated condition that he was obliged to take
his leave at the close of the first part. “His departure completely
overcame him. He could not address the audience, and could only give
expression to his heartfelt gratitude with broken, feeble utterances
and blessings. Upon every countenance there was deep pity, and tearful
eyes followed him as he was taken to his carriage.”
“It was as if an electric fire flowed through Haydn’s veins, so
powerfully had the events of that day excited his spirits,” says
Dies, speaking of a visit to him eight days afterward. But Tomaschek
declares: “The tremendous applause which was given to the ‘Creation’
soon cost the old man his life.” We are now perceptibly approaching
that event, and yet he was permitted to live to experience still
another honor--the brilliant success of his scholar, Beethoven, in the
grand concert given in December of that same year.
“As Haydn’s illness increased, Beethoven visited him less frequently,”
says Van Seyfried, and he adds, with a correct knowledge of the
circumstances, “chiefly from a kind of reserve, since he had already
struck out upon a course which Haydn did not entirely approve.”
Notwithstanding this, the amiable old man eagerly inquired after his
Telemachus, and often asked: “What is our great Mogul doing?” Above
all things else, well defined formalism in artistic work suited him,
like that of Cherubini, who, after repeated visits, begged for one
of his scores upon the occasion of his departure from Vienna, in the
spring of 1806. “Permit me to call myself your musical father and
you my son,” said Haydn, and Cherubini “burst into tears.” In 1788,
Cherubini heard for the first time, in Paris, a Haydn symphony, and was
so greatly excited by it, that it forcibly moved him from his seat. “He
trembled all over, his eyes grew dim, and this condition continued long
after the symphony was ended,” it is said. “Then came the reaction. His
eyes filled with tears, and from that instant the direction of his work
was decided.” He could all the more easily come to an understanding
with the old “papa,” as he had declared with reference to the “Leonora
overture,” brought out this year, he could not, on account of the
confused modulations, discover the key note.
In characteristic fashion, neither Dies nor Griesinger devote more than
a word to Haydn’s relations to Beethoven, and yet the quartets op. 18,
had appeared some time before, and were admired in Vienna by the side
of Haydn’s and Mozart’s. “Fidelio,” and the first symphonies had also
met with success. The Fifth and Sixth were brought out in the concert
of December, 1808, and surely friends told him of the powerful works
of the new master, who was really “thoughtful, sublime, and full of
expression,” and it could only increase Haydn’s own fame as the creator
of this kind of music. He himself was now too old to rightly appreciate
the character of a Beethoven, who represented an entirely new world.
He occupied the long and often tedious time with prayers and
reminiscences of his old adventures, particularly of those days in
England, which he cherished as the happiest of his life. He had a
particular little box, which was filled with his gifts from potentates
and musical societies. “When life is at times very irksome, I look upon
all these and rejoice that I am held in honor all over Europe,” he
said to Griesinger. Then he would occupy himself with the newspapers,
go through the little house accounts, entertain himself with the
neighbors and the servants, particularly with his faithful Ellsler,
play cards with them in the evening, and was very happy if he won a
couple of kreutzers. Music was a trouble to him at last, and there
is a very remarkable illustration of this in connection with his
“Kaiserlied,” “I am actually a human piano,” he said to Dies in 1806.
“For several days, an old song, ‘O Herr, wie lieb ich Dich von Herzen’
is played in me. Wherever I go or stay, I hear it above all else, but
when it torments me and nothing will deliver me from it, if only my
song, ‘God save the Emperor,’ occurs to me, then I am easier. It cures
me.” “That does not surprise me. I have always considered your song
a masterpiece,” replied Dies. “I have always had the same opinion,
though I ought not to say it,” said Haydn. During this mentally as well
as physically weak condition of the old man, then in his 77th year,
occurred the Austrian war of Freedom of 1809. “The unhappy war crushes
me to the earth,” he complained with tearful eyes. “He was continually
occupied with thoughts of his death during his last year, and prepared
himself for it every day,” says Griesinger. In April of that year he
read his will to his dependents, and asked them if they were satisfied.
They thanked him with tearful eyes for his kind provision for their
future. On the 10th of May, while engaged in dressing, the sound of
a cannon-shot was suddenly heard in the near suburb of Mariahilf. A
violent shudder overcame him. After three more shots, he fell into
convulsions. Then he rallied all his strength and cried out: “Children,
fear not. Where Haydn is, nothing can happen to you.” In fact, during
the next fourteen days he pursued his customary manner of life, only it
was noticed after the actual occupation by the French, he maintained a
severe aspect, which he managed to forget while he played his favorite
composition, “The Emperor’s Hymn.” As he had long been accustomed to
see distinguished foreigners, and had received men like Admiral Nelson
and Marshal Soult, he in like manner accepted visits from several
of the French officers, one of whom he received while enjoying his
afternoon rest in bed. It was the last visit. He was Sulemy, a French
captain of hussars. He sang to the master, whom he so greatly revered
that he would have been contented if only to see him through the
key-hole, the aria “In Native Worth,” and so beautifully that Haydn
burst into tears, sprang up and embraced him with kisses. On the 26th
of May he played his “Kaiserlied” three times in succession, with an
expression that surprised himself. He died May 31st, 1809, and passed
away in an unconscious state. His funeral ceremonies were very simple,
on account of the war-time, yet the French authorities noticed his
death in a very respectful manner. Eleven years later his remains were
taken to Eisenstadt.
Haydn’s works, according to a catalogue made by himself in 1805, which
however is not complete, consist of 118 symphonies, 83 quartets, 19
operas, 5 oratorios, 15 masses, 10 small church-pieces, 24 concertos
for various instruments, 163 (?) pieces for the bariton, 44 sonatas,
42 songs, 39 canons, 13 songs for several voices, 365 old Scotch songs
and numerous five-and-nine-part compositions in various instrumental
forms--truly, a genuine fruitfulness of the creative spirit. “There
are good and badly brought up children among them, and here and
there a changeling has crept in,” said he. There could have been no
more suitable epitaph for him than “Vixi, Scripsi, Dixi,” though he
earnestly declared, “I was never a rapid writer, and always composed
with deliberation and industry.” Above all things, it commends his
works to the connoisseur that they in good part have the enduring
form. “The record of Haydn’s life is that of a man who had to struggle
against manifold obstacles, and by the power of his talent and untiring
effort worked his way up, in spite of them, to the rank of the most
prominent men of his profession,” Griesinger truly says. He also makes
a just estimate of his works as follows: “Originality and richness of
ideas, genial feeling, a fancy dominated by close study, versatility
in the development of simple thoughts, calculation of effects by the
proper division of light and shade, profusion of roguish humor, the
easy flow and free movement of the whole.” Were one to add to these
the specially prominent characteristic of his music, it would be
the distinct German character of his works which on the one hand is
reflected in refreshing heartiness and naturalness, and on the other
in spirited humor; and which essentially embodies the earnestness and
loftiness of those two older Germans, Bach and Handel, and founded
that era in which German instrumental music achieved the mastery
of the world. In form as well as in substance, Haydn created the
artistic pattern of the symphony and the quartet, and, never let it be
forgotten, was the one who from his genuine nature and his love of the
people, evolved the first German National Hymn.
THE END.
FOOTNOTE:
[A] [This portrait, copied from the original, will be found in the
frontispiece of this volume.--TRANSLATOR.]
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
This book does not use umlauts in German words, except in the case of
_Händel_ in the chapter descriptions.
Archaic or alternate spelling has been retained from the original.