Talk:Haydn and Mozart

Mozart's musical influence on Haydn?
I came here looking for information on that -- symphonies specifically, but any genres would be interesting. Relatedly, it'd be nice to have a broader summary of which Mozart works Haydn had access to, in performance or score. Thx in advance! "alyosha" (talk) 20:14, 13 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the input. Your question is a hard one, though.  Here is what I could find.


 * We know that Haydn knew Mozart's "Haydn" Quartets, since he played them in Mozart's company.
 * Haydn probably knew the last string quintets, for the same reason.
 * We know Haydn knew The Marriage of Figaro because he reported in a letter to Marianne von Genzinger that he heard it in a dream, and because he was getting ready to perform it with his Esterhaza ensemble when the performance was cancelled by the death of his patron Prince Nicolaus.
 * Haydn probably knew at least something about Cosi Fan Tutte, because Mozart invited him to attend a rehearsal.
 * Karl Geiringer, in his Haydn biography, says that Haydn knew Don Giovanni but he doesn't indicate his source information.


 * This is probably only a fraction of the music by Mozart that Haydn knew. I doubt that anything like the full list is retrievable--all we have is what got written down.


 * On top of this, there is totally subjective stuff based on the music itself. For example, Daniel Heartz (Mozart, Haydn, and early Beethoven p. 649) thinks that a passage in the 3rd-to-last number of The Seasons, about death, is a quotation from the slow movement of Mozart's 40th Symphony (Haydn wrote The Seasons about ten years after Mozart died.) I find this touching, but the corresponding passages are sufficiently different that Heartz's suggestion can hardly be taken as proven (or even encyclopedic, really). Similarly, Karl Geiringer's Haydn biography includes several claims that particular works of Haydn were influenced by works written by Mozart. These seem to be merely subjective responses by Geiringer to the music and not based on any historical evidence.


 * Maybe other editors could offer more help. Yours sincerely, Opus33 (talk) 17:07, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Haydn as Mozart's mentor
The section "Haydn as Mozart's mentor" says "during the early Vienna years, when Mozart was influenced by Baron van Swieten to take up the study of Baroque counterpoint, Haydn lent him his personal copy of the famous counterpoint textbook Gradus ad Parnassum, by Johann Joseph Fux, which was heavily covered with Haydn's personal annotations." <This is wrong. Mozart studied the treatise using his father's copy as early as 1770.

"9 Fux, Gradus ad Parnassum (Vienna, 1725); Mozart's father bought a copy of Fux's treatise in 1746." (Mozart's Piano Sonatas Contexts, Sources, Style By John Irving · 1997, Page 183) "43 Stanley Sadie notes that Leopold Mozart's library included that era's standard text on counterpoint, Johann Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum (Ascent to Mount Parnassus, 1725), which the young Mozart would presumably havemastered." (Mozart An Introduction to the Music, the Man, and the Myths By Roye E. Wates · 2010)

I'm deleting the whole section "Haydn as Mozart's mentor" since it contains nothing of substance. --Wikiwickedness (talk) 03:01, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Mozart's view of Haydn's prowess as a composer
Editors of the article have written that "Their relationship is not very well documented, but the evidence that they enjoyed each other's company and greatly respected each other's work is strong, and suggests that the elder Haydn acted, in at least a minor capacity, as a mentor to Mozart."

But other than Niemetschek's claims, is there evidence Mozart 'greatly respected' Haydn as a composer?

"Scholars have questioned the authenticity of Niemetschek's claims regarding Mozart. Niemetschek claimed to have had a long association with Mozart, but the lack of direct quotations or citings of personal conversations leads some scholars to doubt his claims. " --Wikiwickedness (talk) 03:11, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Excellent
Excellent article. Thanks! Danielshumway (talk) 05:11, 18 December 2023 (UTC)