The chief Capellmeister, and nominally the head of the orchestra, was
Gregorius Josephus Werner, an industrious musician, of whose compositions
nothing has come down to us, and of which nothing deserved to come down.
He was now old, and was to all intents and purposes replaced by Haydn,
whose revolutionary ideas and innovations generally must have greatly
disturbed the calm of his prim, formal, and pedagogic chief, who, in fact,
rarely spoke of him except as "a mere fop" and "a song scribbler." Haydn,
on the contrary, always expressed a warm respect for the old musician,
who lived for five years under the new order of things and then ceased to
repine, in death. But Prince Paul Anton died four years earlier, in fact
before Haydn had been in his service for quite a year, and was succeeded
by his brother Prince Nicolaus, the "great Esterhazy," famous for the
lavishness with which he displayed his wealth and for the enthusiasm of
his love for and patronage of the fine arts.
Under Prince Nicolaus a new order of things began, and his generosity was
at once illustrated. The salaries of all the musicians were increased,
Haydn's four hundred florins being increased to six hundred and shortly
after to seven hundred and eighty-two, or about three hundred and ninety
dollars of our money. The force of the Capelle was enlarged to seven
singers and fourteen instrumentalists, and rehearsals took place every
day. By this time, a knowledge of Haydn's music existed outside his own
country, and his works were beginning to be known in London, Paris, and
Amsterdam, and five years after he had been at Eisenstadt, the official
journal of Vienna, the _Wiener Diarium_, alludes to him as "der Liebling
unserer Nation." His industry was unrelaxing, for he had already composed,
under the Esterhazys, some thirty symphonies and cassations, several
divertimenti in five parts, six string trios, a concerto for French horn,
twelve minuets for orchestra, besides concertos, trios, sonatas and
variations for the clavier. His vocal compositions were a Salve Regina
for soprano and alto, two violins and organ; a Te Deum; four Italian
operettas; a pastoral, "Acis and Galatea," written for the marriage of
Count Anton, eldest son of Prince Nicolaus; and a cantata in honor of
the Prince's return from the coronation of Archduke Joseph as king of
the Romans. In none of these works did Haydn rise to any high power. The
greater Haydn was yet to develop.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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