Haydn: String Quartets, part 1

 

For decades, I've been listening to the string quartets of Franz Joseph Haydn.  However, I completely immersed myself into them around 15 years ago. I bought the complete recordings and delved into them deeper than ever.  In fact, as I write this, I'm listening to string quartet Op. 76, No. 4.  

Haydn is a hero of mine, not only for his work, but also for inventing the string quartet format.  There were various quartet formats prior to Haydn, but he codified the string quartet as we know it today: 1st and 2nd violins, viola, and cello.  In the process, he also went a long way toward establishing form.

 Haydn composed between 68 and 83 string quartets.  The number isn't clearly defined, as some of the works are in dispute or spurious.  Haydn was the definition of prolific.

For the past couple of years, I've been slowly making my way through a book that's a formal and theoretical analysis of his quartets; the book is titled, The String Quartets of Joseph Haydn.  I am thoroughly enjoying this book and learning much from it.  Tough to recommend it unless you're a hardcore Haydn fan and understand music theory; it's an intense read.  

One rather remarkable side-effect of studying his string quartets was that they assisted me in learning and understanding the 36-string Double Contraguitar.  That instrument was completed right around the time I was beginning to immerse myself in Haydn's quartets.  I'm not sure I can expound on the why or how, other than the lines in the quartets would sometimes appear to me on the 36.  It got me thinking about and able to grasp simultaneous multiple lines on the 36.

I don't always think of works from the classical period  (c. 1750 - 1820) as being complex in the way I think of 20th/21st-century classical works as being complex.  However, each time I listen to Haydn's quartets, I hear something new.

And I continue to learn from them. 

Recommended.

-kk