Musikverein
Exhibition Hall

Haydn in London
March 20 – June 20, 2009

Monday to Friday 9 a.m. – 6 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Entrance: € 5,00 (Students, pensioners € 3,00)
Guided tours will be announced or by prior appointment

Information, details, descriptive material: office@a-wgm.com
TEL +43 1 505 86 81 44, FAX +43 1 505 86 81 66

Joseph Haydn spent altogether over 37 months, that is more than three years, in London: From January 1791 to July 1792 and then again from February 1794 to August 1795. Count Esterházy's Court Orchestra had been disbanded and Haydn himself retired with a lavish pension. This enabled him, in the Autumn of 1790, to accept a previously repeatedly extended invitation to London, even though he was – for those times – already an old man. He learned a smattering of English, occupied his own apartments together with his servant, was a star of the musical scene and enjoyed his first stay so much that he subsequently accepted a second invitation.

Whether it was a court ball at Buckingham Palace or the Mayor's Banquet, Haydn was invited everywhere. He stood in the centre of social and musical life, evoked admiration and envy, proved himself to be an extremely good businessman and brought so much money home that he was able to buy himself a house in Vienna.

Even though Haydn had enjoyed ideal working conditions at the court of Count Esterházy, as a composer he was challenged in entirely new ways in London. He worked with orchestras much larger than he had known before, appeared in concert halls in front of an audience more numerous than he had heretofore imagined: An audience that came only for his sake and that always expected new surprises from him, and he wrote works such as had never before been demanded from him. At an age at which other composers had completed their life's work, Haydn began to explore new paths.

The exhibition allows the visitors to immerse themselves in Haydn's life and activities in London: How the city presented itself to Haydn, the Royal Court, the festivities, society, the friends – all this comes to life in front of the visitors' eyes. Haydn the composer and the businessman, the conducter and the celebrated star, in public and private, his honorary doctorate from Oxford University, the compositions created in London – all informatively communicated to the visitors by means of entirely authentic objects: City maps and city prospects, oil paintings and graphics, scores and letters in Haydn's handwriting, elaborately printed music, documents regarding everyday life, Haydn's business activities and his personal interests, objects of especial beauty (such as the miniature portrait by Ott, which was considered lost until a few years ago and is here exhibited for the first time, or the recently discovered, previously entirely unknown index of works in Haydn's own handwriting) and details (like admission tickets to Haydn's concerts, numbered and initialled by himself), feasts for the eye and objects of study – an extremely colourful and varied exhibition that is aimed less at the musical connoisseur than at visitors interested in cultural history.

The commonly accepted image of Haydn as the charming, humorous 'Father of the Symphony and the String Quartet', who spent his life mainly at a princely court in the small-town or rural provinces, is deliberately corrected and complemented by the portrait of the cosmopolitan man of the world who made a place for himself in the largest European city where he was an absolute star, his fame radiating back to his home country. Haydn had always been self-possessed, powerful and a good businessman; all the same, both artistically and personally, London proved a great enrichment to the late years of his life.

All the objects exhibited come from the archive, library and collections of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Wien which was founded in 1812, three years after Haydn's death. It is, still today, an unique venue of Haydn documentation, whose inventory is continually being expanded. Several new acquisitions will be publicly shown for the first time.

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