Haydn Symphonies

It would be a sad day if Haydn and Mozart symphonies were only to be heard on period instruments, but with Sir Georg Solti and Sir Colin Davis jointly perpetuating the tradition of Haydn performances which Beecham created in the 78rpm era, with its combination of elegance and warm humanity, we need have no fears on this score.

In the series of live recordings with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, this outstanding recording took place both in Germany and abroad. Jansons’ previous Ravel/Bartók recording has received an ECHO Klassik in 2008. On this new album, the orchestra presents key symphonic works by Joseph Haydn: the Sinfonia Concertante No. 105 and symphonies No. 100 and No. 104. Once again Jansons and the Orchestra prove to have a superb flair for the musical content of those works.

Michael Haydn is understandably overshadowed by his famous older sibling, as Salieri and Leopold Mozart are by Wolfgang Amadeus. In all three cases, these Chandos recordings go a long way towards restoring the balance. With just a handful of recordings of his music, the disc or download of Michael Haydn’s music becomes mandatory for a real appreciation of Mozart’s relation to his contemporaries, especially as one of Michael Haydn’s symphonies was long attributed to Mozart as his No.37 – he actually wrote only the slow introduction.

When you compose more than 100 symphonies, all of them good, it's only natural that the public will find ways to identify the ones they like the most. These symphonies with nicknames are not necessarily better than those without, but they do give an excellent overview of Haydn's unsurpassed achievement as a symphonist.

These three early symphonies join the series of ASMF/Marriner recordings of all the 'named' symphonies of Haydn. They are delightfully lightweight with unusual prominence given to the woodwind, and they receive here wholly enjoyable 'chamber-music' style performances of great style and precision. The recorded balance has ideal spread and depth, the harpsichord being just in evidence. The sum of its many musical and technical virtues makes this CD compulsive listening through every one of its 13 movements.

Haydn's Symphony No. 31 is known as the "Hornsignal" from its prominent horn parts in the first and last movements. Written in anticipation of palace-warming festivities at the Eszterháza estate, the symphony has a celebratory air in its bold fanfares and hunting calls. Haydn's originality is evident not only in his clever motivic development of these ideas, but also in his placement of the horn pairs at a distance from each other. Haydn's experimentation was unusual for its time, but it shows some of the freedom he enjoyed as Prince Nicholas' court composer.