This recording invites us to study six symphonies from Haydn’s ‘Sturm und Drang’ period.
Daniel Barenboim had been conducting the English Chamber Orchestra for 20 years when he made the first of the three LPs newly remastered and compiled on this recording.
Barenboim vividly outlines the drama of the ‘Trauer’ Symphony (No. 44), the horn-led festivity of the piece dedicated to the Empress Maria Theresia (No. 48) and the unpredictable twists and turns of the ‘Farewell’ (No. 45).
Deprived of memorable nicknames, Nos. 46 and 47 have never achieved the renown of the other four symphonies composed around the turn of the 1770’s, yet Barenboim is alive to their revolutionary qualities. Haydn was not a conservative but one of music’s great innovators and experimenters, exemplified by the ingenuity of No. 47’s Minuet and Trio and the subtle, proto-Minimalist rhythmic patterning of the symphony’s not-so-slow movement.
While Barenboim has since become renowned for his broadly conceived interpretations of Bruckner and Wagner, the forward drive and relentless energy of No. 49 (‘La Passione’) belong in spirit to the early recordings of Mozart concertos and Beethoven sonatas that propelled him to international fame as a prodigiously gifted young musician.
Here is Mr. Barenboim conducting the Haydn Farewell Symphony, and watch the orchestra members as they depart…
