Belated Haydn Premieres

Synopsis

Contemporary composers may bemoan that their newly-composed opera or concerto might languish unperformed for years. “Haydn was lucky,” they whine, “His stuff got played right away!”

Well, it’s true that Haydn did have his own orchestra at Prince Esterhazy’s estate and got his music played while the ink was still wet. But even Haydn had to wait for a premiere on occasion — in two instances, for a very, very long time.

Consider the last opera Haydn wrote, L’anima del Filosofo, ossia Orfeo ed Euridice — or, in English, The Soul of the Philosopher, or Orpheus and Euridice. This was supposed to premiere in 1791 in London. But a spat between the Prince of Wales and his pop, King George III, meant the performance was off. The opera was eventually premiered 160 years later — on today’s date in 1951, at the Teatro della Pergola in Florence, with a cast including Maria Callas and Boris Christoff, led by the German conductor Erich Kleiber.

And the public premiere of a Cello Concerto, a work some think Haydn wrote at Esterhazy in the 1760s, took place in the 1960s. Haydn’s score was presumed lost until 1961, when it was discovered at the Prague National Museum and finally played by cellist Milos Sádlo and the Czech Radio Symphony, led by Sir Charles Mackerras, on May 19, 1962.

Music Played in Today's Program

Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809): L’Anima del Filosofo (Orfeo ed Euridice); Cecilia Bartoli, mezzo-soprano; Academy of Ancient Music; Christopher Hogwood, conductor; Decca 452668

Cello Concerto No. 1; Mstislav Rostropovich, cello; Academy of St. Martin in the Fields; Iona Brown, conductor; EMI 65701

On This Day

Births

• 1810 - German composer and conductor Otto Nicolai, in Königsberg (Kaliningrad)

• 1865 - French composer Alberic Magnard, in Paris. He was killed by German soldiers while defending his home in Baron, Oise, on Sept. 3, 1914.

• 1865 - Danish composer Carl Nielsen, in Sortelung, near Norre Lyndelse, Funen

• 1891 - American composer Cole Porter, in Peru, Indiana

• 1912 - German-born American composer and pianist, Ingolf Dahl, in Hamburg

• 1938 - American composer Charles Wuorinen, in New York

Deaths

• 1656 - Burial date of English composer Thomas Tomkins, 84, in the village of Martin Hussingtree, near Worcester

Premieres

• 1860 - R. Schumann: Cello Concerto, posthumously, by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, at a concert commemorating the late composer's 50th birthday anniversary (see June 8), with soloist Ludwig Ebert

• 1902 - Mahler: Symphony No. 3 in Krefeld, Germany, at the Festival of the Allgemeiner Deutsche Musikverein, with the composer conducting

• 1912 - At the home of L. Láloy in Bellevue, Claude Debussy and Igor Stravinsky perform a four-hand piano version of the latter’s new ballet score for The Rite of Spring, which the Ballet Russe would premiere the following year in Paris (May 29, 1913)

• 1939 - Bax: Symphony No. 7 (dedicated to the American people), at Carnegie Hall by the New York Philharmonic, with Adrian Boult conducting. This work was commissioned by the British Council as part of the British Exhibition at 1939 World’s Fair.

• 1940 - Copland: Our Town orchestral suite (from the film score), on a CBS radio broadcast. A revised version of the suite was given its first public performance by the Boston Pops conducted by Leonard Bernstein on May 7, 1944.

• 1951 - Haydn: opera Orpheus and Eurydice, posthumously, in Florence at the Teatro della Pergola. Haydn composed this opera in 1791 for performance in London, but the work was never staged in his lifetime.

• 1966 - Britten: church opera The Burning Fiery Furnace, in Orford Church, near Aldeburgh

Others

• 1840 - Franz Liszt gives a solo performance at the Hanover Square Rooms in London billed as Recitals. This was the first time the term “recital” was used to describe a public musical performance, and it caused much discussion and debate at the time. Liszt is credited with both inventing and naming the now-common solo piano recital.

• 1904 - The London Symphony gives its first concert, with Hans Richter conducting;

• 1912 - At the home of L. Láloy in Bellevue, Claude Debussy and Igor Stravinsky perform a four-hand piano version of the latter's new ballet score for The Rite of Spring, which the Ballet Russe would premiere the following year in Paris (see May 29, 1913).

• 1968 - Leonard Bernstein conducts the New York Philharmonic in the Adagietto movement from Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 at a memorial concert for Robert Kennedy at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York