23
G major
Sinfonien 1764 und 1765
Herausgeber: Horst Walter; Reihe I, Band 4; G. Henle Verlag München
Symphony No. 23 in G major
The more conventional movement pattern of fast, slow, minuet and fast is used in this third symphony from 1764. The opening Allegro, in triple time, has a touch of haughty swagger to its main theme, but Haydn's players as well as Prince Nicolaus, who was a discerning musician, would have taken great delight too in the syntax of the music: a series of three-bar phrases that makes the more regular phrasing that follows seem gauche at first; this whimsicality is intensified in the development section where the music is broken down into one-bar units. The unorthodoxies of the following movement, scored for strings alone, are more obvious, as the quiet progress of the folk-like tune is broken and the scalic flourishes in the bass instruments become more prominent. The Menuet and Trio are both very concentrated movements, the first a canon between treble and bass instruments, the second an imitative discourse on a motif derived from the minuet. Whereas most finale movements in Haydn's symphonies consist of forte passages relieved by piano passages (as in No. 28), in this Finale the composer has the ingenious idea of doing the very opposite; piano is the predominant dynamic and the symphony ends not with a bang but with an apologetic whimper.
Analysis

Analysis of the movements




Musicians

Musicians
Due to the unclear time of origin of most of Haydn’s symphonies - and unlike his 13 Italian operas, where we really know the exact dates of premieres and performances - detailed and correct name lists of the orchestral musicians cannot be given. As a rough outline, his symphony works can be divided into three temporal blocks. In the first block, in the service of Count Morzin (1757-1761), in the second block, the one at the court of the Esterházys (1761-1790 but with the last symphony for the Esterház audience in 1781) and the third block, the one after Esterház (1782-1795), i.e. in Paris and London. Just for this middle block at the court of the Esterházys 1761-1781 (the last composed symphony for the Esterház audience) respectively 1790, at the end of his service at the court of Esterház we can choose Haydn’s most important musicians and “long-serving companions” and thereby extract an "all-time - all-stars orchestra".
Flute | Franz Sigl 1761-1773 |
Flute | Zacharias Hirsch 1777-1790 |
Oboe | Michael Kapfer 1761-1769 |
Oboe | Georg Kapfer 1761-1770 |
Oboe | Anton Mayer 1782-1790 |
Oboe | Joseph Czerwenka 1784-1790 |
Bassoon | Johann Hinterberger 1761-1777 |
Bassoon | Franz Czerwenka 1784-1790 |
Bassoon | Joseph Steiner 1781-1790 |
Horn (played violin) | Franz Pauer 1770-1790 |
Horn (played violin) | Joseph Oliva 1770-1790 |
Timpani or Bassoon | Caspar Peczival 1773-1790 |
Violin | Luigi Tomasini 1761-1790 |
Violin (leader 2. Vl) | Johann Tost 1783-1788 |
Violin | Joseph Purgsteiner 1766-1790 |
Violin | Joseph Dietzl 1766-1790 |
Violin | Vito Ungricht 1777-1790 |
Violin (most Viola) | Christian Specht 1777-1790 |
Cello | Anton Kraft 1779-1790 |
Violone | Carl Schieringer 1768-1790 |
Medias

Music
Antal Dorati
Joseph Haydn
The Symphonies
Philharmonia Hungarica
33 CDs, aufgenommen 1970 bis 1974, herausgegeben 1996 Decca (Universal)



