Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 4.djvu/32

The opening passages of that in E♭ are hardly less emphatic. They have little connection with the tendencies of his contemporaries, but seem in every respect an experiment on independent lines, in which the interest depends upon the vigour of the thoughts and the unexpected turns of the modulations; and the result is certainly rather fragmentary and disconnected. The slow movement is commonly connected with the first and last either by a special transitional passage, or by a turn of modulation and a half close. It is short and dependent in its character, but graceful and melodious. The last is much more systematic in structure than the first; sometimes in definite binary form, as was the case with the early violin sonatas. In orchestration and general style of expression these works seem immensely superior to the other early symphonies which have been described. They are scored for horns, flutes, oboi, fagotto, strings, with a figured bass for 'cembalo,' which in the symphonies previously noticed does not always appear. There is an abundance of unison and octave passages for the strings, but there is also good free writing, and contrasts between wind and strings; the wind being occasionally left quite alone. All the instruments come in occasionally for special employment, and considering the proportions of the orchestras of the time Bach's effects must have been generally clear and good. The following is a good specimen of his scoring of an ordinary full passage:—

It has sometimes been said that Haydn was chiefly influenced by Emmanuel Bach, and Mozart by John Christian Bach. At the present time, and in relation to symphonies, it is easier to understand the latter case than the former. In both cases the influence is more likely to be traced in clavier works than in those for orchestra. For Haydn's style and treatment of form bear far more resemblance to most of the other composers whose works have been referred to, than to Emmanuel Bach. There are certain kinds of forcible expression and ingenious turns of modulation which Haydn may have learnt from him; but their best orchestral works seem to belong to quite distinct families. Haydn's first symphony was written in 1759 for Count Morzin. Like many other of his early works it does not seem discoverable in print in this country. But it is said by Pohl,^[1] who must have seen it somewhere in Germany, to be 'a small work in three movements for 2 violins, viola, bass, 2 oboes, and 2 horns'; from which particulars it would appear to correspond exactly in externals to the examples above described of Abel's and J. C. Bach's, etc. In the course of the next few years he added many more; most of which appear to have been slight and of no great historical importance, while the few which present peculiarities are so far isolated in those respects that they do not throw much light upon the course of his development, or upon his share in building up the art-form of the Symphony. Of such a kind is the movement (dramatic in character, and including long passages of recitative) in the Symphony in C, which he wrote as early as 1761.^[2] For, though this kind of movement is found in instrumental works of an earlier period, its appearance in such a manner in a symphony is too rare to have any special historical bearings. The course of his development was gradual and regular. He seems to have been content with steadily improving the edifice of his predecessors, and with few exceptions to have followed their lines. A great deal is frequently attributed to his con-

1. Joseph Haydn, vol. i. 284 (1875).
2. Ibid. 287, 397.