Haydn • Acht Sauschneider müssen sein - Derek Adlam, clavichord

ID: GMCD7260 (EAN: 795754726022)  | 1 CD | DDD
Vydano: 2003

LABEL:

Guild GmbH

Kolekce:

The Great Composers

Podkolekce:

Keyboard

Skladatel:

HAYDN, Franz Joseph

Interpreti:

ADLAM, Derek

Dal informace:

Recorded: North Transept of the Priory Church of Our Lady and St Cuthbert,Worksop -17-20 September 2002, by kind permission of the Vicar, the Reverend Father Andrew Wagstaff SSC

The clavichord was made by Derek Adlam in 1982. It is a copy of an instrument of 1763 by
Johann Adolph Hass, Hamburg, Russell Collection, Edinburgh. Strung throughout in brass, the clavichord has a five-octave compass of FF to f3, unfretted, with an additional 4 foot string in the bass. The pitch is a1 = 405Hz, an approximation of mid-18th century Hamburg pitch. It is tuned in a sixth-comma system (Young 2), allowing free modulation but retaining a sense of key and chord colour.

A distinguished musician once paused during a lecture and said “You know … the great composers are much underrated!” As so often in humour, this joking remark concealed a profound truth. Haydn’s music has in the past often been undervalued. When compared to Mozart and Beethoven, he has been seen as a lesser figure although it is difficult to understand why this might be. In his own lifetime, he was acknowledged to be a great master and his creative genius, while different from that of his two greatest contemporaries, was in so many ways equal to theirs. Haydn was a great innovator and an essential and influential figure in the development of symphonic forms during the latter part of the 18th century. Despite this, many of his finest works remain virtually unknown today. There are many neglected masterpieces amongst his operas, symphonies, trios and quartets. Between 1765 and 1795 he wrote some of the most original and finest solo keyboard music we have from that period, but only a handful of these works are heard in today’s concert halls. Yet the keyboard was the foundation of his art, and many of his keyboard works encapsulate his musical genius.

A key to understanding this situation may perhaps be found in the instruments for which Haydn wrote, and our access to performances on them today. From the Renaissance, keyboard instruments were important in all German-speaking countries. For private music making and for study, the clavichord was supreme. We know that from his earliest years, Haydn was inseparable from his clavichord, and composed at the instrument. Although he claimed that he was not a first-rate keyboard performer, this was probably excessive modesty on his part. In reality he was a gifted player, perhaps only lacking the flair and pleasure in self-display that all concert performers must possess. His understanding of the clavichord’s musical potential was so great that it can be said to have unlocked his musical imagination. Through it he developed new styles and textures in keyboard music, and used it during the evolution of the most important musical form of his time. This keyboard music does not transfer entirely successfully to the thicker, heavier textures of the modern piano even in the most sensitive hands. It can often sound slight or miniaturized even if played with due attention to style. The music’s scale, vitality, strength and quicksilver imagination is revealed fully only on the instruments of Haydn’s own time, and particularly on the clavichord.