Haydn Symphony No. 104
Haydn Symphony No. 104 Program Notes
Some of the greatest musical innovations take place when composers have space to experiment. That is exactly what took place when Prince Paul Anton Esterházy hired a 29-year-old freelance composer, Joseph Haydn, to run the music for their court, during Vienna winters and especially at their newly-built Hungarian summer palace, which included an opera theater. Haydn conducted, composed, and managed all musical performances. While the operas are less frequently performed, Haydn’s string quartets and symphonies are the cornerstones of both genres. At the beginning of his tenure, the orchestra contained between 13-15 players, but it grew under Paul Anton’s brother and successor, Prince Nicolaus: in its heyday (in the 1780s) there were up to 24 members. Meanwhile, throughout the 18th century the city of London was growing into a bustling metropolis, with a flourishing middle class. Both nobility and public subscriptions (ticket sales) supported an active musical life. Composers such as Handel and Johann Christian Bach (son of Johann Sebastian) did well in settling there, and in his last months, even Mozart was planning his first trip to London (as an adult, that is). With time, Haydn’s operatic duties at the court waned, and he promoted his instrumental music in Vienna and abroad. When the son of Nicolaus Esterházy, Anton, inherited the estate in 1790, the orchestra was wound up. Within a short time, the London-based violinist and concert promoter Johann Peter Salomon paid Haydn a visit, insisting (with a contract for a considerable sum of money) that Haydn, now nearly sixty, visit London. This visit was a tremendous success on every level, as were later visits and series of performances, even in 1795, after Salomon’s concerts had dried up. The Symphony No. 104 was performed at a benefit concert on May 4, 1795, and Haydn wrote on the manuscript that it was the twelfth symphony he’d composed in England. The critic (and friend of Haydn), Charles Burney, wrote that Haydn’s symphonies of this time were “such as were never heard before, of any mortal’s production; of what Apollo & the Muses compose or perform we can only judge by such productions as these.”Symphony No. 104 in D major, nicknamed the London, is the last of the 12 symphonies Haydn wrote for his triumphant visits to London in the 1790s, and the final symphony of his career. It is a work of supreme craft and mature mastery, widely considered his greatest symphony.
Haydn composed the symphony in 1795, and it was premiered in London on May 4, 1795, at a benefit concert. The audience was enthusiastic and Haydn was deeply moved by his London reception.
A typical performance lasts approximately 28 to 32 minutes.
The slow introduction builds suspense before the main movement bursts in with irresistible energy. Listen for the beautiful slow movement and the finale, which is built on a Croatian folk tune that Haydn heard in London, giving it a charmingly earthy quality beneath its polished surface.
Haydn composed his final symphony at age 63 after a career spanning five decades. His London visits were triumphs that showed him how celebrated he had become internationally — at home in Austria he had always worked in relative isolation, and the London concerts revealed to him the full extent of his fame.
