ree
periods into which that master's art-work is usually divided. There is
good reason for this difference. Haydn's sonatas are not of equal
importance with those of his successor; and then some are
old-fashioned, others second-rate. Beethoven's sonatas are by no means
all of equal merit, yet there is not one but has some feature, whether
of form, or development, or technique, by which it may be
distinguished. And yet a close and careful study of Haydn's sonatas
will show that he, too, had his periods of apprenticeship, mastery,
and maturity. Let not our readers take alarm. We are not going to
analyse his thirty-five sonatas, or to enter into minute details. But
we shall try, by selecting some of the most characteristic works, to
show how the master commenced, continued, and concluded.
The earliest of the published sonatas,[73] No. 1 (33), is somewhat of
a curiosity. It consists of four movements: an Allegro in G major; a
Minuetto and Trio, G major and minor; an Adagio in G minor; and an
Allegro molto in G major. It is the only sonata of Haydn's which
contains four movements. The plaintive Trio and the Scarlatti-like
Finale are attractive.
In the year 1774, J.J. Hummel, at Amsterdam, published six sonatas,
the last three of which appear to have been originally written for
pianoforte and violin;[74] and in 1776 six more were printed by
Longman & Broderip as Op. 14. These may serve as specimens of Haydn's
early style; and in them, by the way, the composer was accused of
imitating, nay, caricaturing, E. Bach.
In the _European Magazine_ for October 1784 there appeared an account
of Joseph Haydn, "a celebrated composer of music," in which occurs the
following:--
"Amongst the number of professors who wrote against our rising author
was Philipp Emanuel Bach of Hamburgh (formerly of Berlin); and the
only notice Haydn took of their scurrility and abuse was to publish
lessons written in imitation of the several styles of his enemies, in
which their peculiarities were so closely copied, and their extraneous
passages (particularly those of Bach of Hamburgh) so inimitably
burlesqued, that they all felt the poignancy of his musical wit,
confessed its truth, and were silent."
Further on the writer mentions the sonatas of Ops. 13 and 14 as
"expressly composed in order to ridicule Bach of Hamburgh"; nay, he
points to the second part of the second sonata in Op. 13 and the whole
of the third sonata in the same work by way of s
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