PROGRAM NOTES
by Dr. Richard E. Rodda

Symphony No. 88 in G major
Joseph Haydn (1732 - 1809)

Composed in 1787.

By 1780, Haydn’s fame in Paris was immense. His music first appeared there in January 1764, when the publisher de la Chevardiàre brought out “Six Symphonies ou Quatuors Dialogués,” which were not symphonies at all, but rather Haydn’s Op. 1 String Quartets. Nevertheless, the vogue for the compositions of this “Maître de Musique à Vienne,” as de la Chevardiàre’s edition dubbed Haydn, grew rapidly. In March, Venier issued Haydn’s Symphony No. 2 in C, and six string trios were printed by de la Chevardiàre later that year. So great did the demand become for Haydn’s music in Paris that publishers procured pieces by some of his followers and passed them off as original compositions. (This practice was so pervasive that more spurious than real Haydn compositions appeared in Paris between 1775 and 1780.) From the 1760s until Haydn’s death in 1809, Parisian publishers made a fortune on his music. Haydn, alas, got nary a penny — until about 1780.

In those days, before copyright laws, publishers were free to make any use they wanted of music or books or art works without compensating the creator. After a composer was paid his commission fee or a salary, he essentially lost control of his work. The only way he could turn a further profit was through the first sale to a publisher or by supplying additional copies of a work he retained. Before 1780, Haydn’s approved distribution was limited almost entirely to manuscript copies produced under his supervision by copyists in Vienna. All a publisher needed do was pirate one of these manuscript copies (or another publisher’s edition, for that matter), and he was free to reproduce it as he wished. With no royalties going to the composer, it is little wonder that the publishers got rich at Haydn’s expense.

Around 1780, with his international renown and the demand for his music growing steadily, Haydn began selling his works directly to publishers in various cities. He struck an agreement with Jean-Georges Sieber in Paris, a German émigré who published many of Haydn’s symphonies, to engrave his future works on, as Haydn reported, “most favorable terms for myself.” Despite this understanding, however, the splendid set of six “Paris” Symphonies (Nos. 82-87 of 1785-1786) written for Comte d’Ogny and “Le Concert de la Loge Olympique” was published in the French capital by Imbault. Haydn, now thoroughly enjoying this profitable game, sold the same pieces to William Forster in London and Artaria in Vienna.

The Symphonies No. 88 and No. 89 of 1787 were apparently written on speculation for another foray into this lucrative market. (Beginning with Nos. 76-78 of 1782 Haydn wrote all of his symphonies in sets of two or more because publishers liked to present new works in groups.) He gave the two new symphonies to Johann Tost, a violinist in the Esterházy orchestra who was moving to Paris, to sell as best he could. The unscrupulous Tost struck a deal with Sieber for not two, but three symphonies, the third being a work by Adalbert Gyrowetz that Tost passed off as Haydn’s. (Gyrowetz had enormous difficulty later persuading French musicians that this was indeed his work.) When Sieber complained about this shady deal to Haydn, the composer replied without sympathy, “Thus Herr Tost has swindled you; you can claim your damages in Vienna.” Whether Sieber, Tost or Haydn continued to peddle the new works to other publishers is unclear from the extant records, but within two years, editions of the Symphonies No. 88 and No. 89 appeared in London, Vienna, Offenbach/Main, Berlin and Amsterdam. Such sordid tales as these were the norm rather than the exception in the publishing practice of the 18th century, when a composer needed almost as much of the mercenary as the genius to make a living.

The Symphony No. 88 opens, as do most of Haydn’s late symphonies, with a slow introduction, which serves as a musical foil to the main theme (presented by the violins in quick tempo), a nimble melody whose roots are deeply embedded in the soil of folk song. This jolly little tune soon acquires a bustling rhythmic accompaniment which bounds through the energetic transition and leads to the second theme, a shy motive decorated with drooping, chromatic harmonies in the winds. The rhythmic bustle soon returns to bring the exposition to an inconclusive end on an unexpected silence. The development is concerned with the rhythm as much as the melodic shape of the main theme. (Note the grouping of notes: ta-ta-TA-da-ta-ta-tah.) It was exactly this marvelous working-out of a tiny motive to simultaneously provide thematic unity and variety — almost like a brilliant, wide-ranging sermon on a single Bible verse — that marks the maturity of the symphony as a form. The end of the development section, like that of the exposition, is signaled by an inconclusive halt and a silence that ushers in the recapitulation to recall the themes in slightly embellished versions.

The slow movement is a set of free variations on the lovely hymn tune sung at the beginning by the oboe and solo cello. The theme is gradually enriched as the movement unfolds in a wondrous display of harmonic and orchestral mastery. The third movement paints a colorful scene of peasant life with what Haydn scholar H.C. Robbins Landon termed a “barn-yard richness.” The minuet is a robust, stomping village dance; the central trio summons bagpipe drones to accompany a theme of rustic charm. The jovial theme of the finale, pronounced merrily by bassoon and violins, is a country cousin to that of the opening movement. This chipper ditty encounters a wealth of ingenious contrapuntal and harmonic adventures as it scurries along with the perfect balance of naiveté and sophistication that is one of Haydn’s most endearing qualities. The Symphony No. 88 is a masterwork of 18th-century music, one of the brightest jewels in Haydn’s unparalleled collection.

MORE NOTES ON THIS PROGRAM

SHOSTAKOVICH - Cello Concerto No. 1, Op. 107
MENDELSSOHN - Symphony No. 4 in A major, Op. 90, "Italian"

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