Favourite Haydn recordings

[BBMmk2]

Talking about Haydn’s Masses etc, I failed to mention JEGGERS recording. What do people think of Hickox’s set of religious works?

[antongould]

I am not up to picking favourite recordings but, thanks to theses boards, I have grown to love Haydn across the board. In fact I would say that, as I type, the Oxford is my overall favourite symphony .......

[gurnemanz]

I only recently got to know "Die sieben letzten Worte unseres Erlösers am Kreuz" for string quartet via the very recommendable recording from Cuarteto Casals. Compelling intensity (and I'm an atheist) + beautiful sound. Recorded in the Oratorio de la Santa Cueva, the Cádiz church in which the work was first performed on Good Friday 1786.

[MickyD]

This is an excellent orchestral version of the Seven Last Words, with a very dramatic church acoustic:

[Bryn]

This is an excellent orchestral version of the Seven Last Words, with a very dramatic church acoustic:

And HIPPer than most, in that it was recorded in venue for which it was conceived. This is indeed the original work, before the composer and others decided to make arrangements/reductions.

Here's what the performance looked like. The audio gives a fair idea of why one (and only one) of the amazon.co.uk customer reviewers did not like it. I think it sounds like it captured the event very well.

[BBMmk2]

Ah yes, The Seven Last Words. I have The London P.O., Jurowski for the Orchestral version, John McCabbe, the piano, and The Callino Quartet.

[silvestrione]

I am not generally keen on Sviatoslav Richter's late recordings, but an exception is the first item in a Live CLassics recital from 1992, the Haydn Andante con variazioni in F minor. The best-ever performance for me, by a long way. The variety of touch is phenomenal, but it's not just that, it's that ability of his to play a piece in one breath, as it were, with complete concentration and unity. And what a piece!

[verismissimo]

Greatly enjoying 'Arianna a Naxos' and the 'Scena di Berenice' sung by the lamented Arleen Auger with Hogwood and the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston.

[Dave2002]

Trumpet Concerto Alan Stringer ASMF Marriner

Slightly OT - Alan was the principal trumpet player in the RLPO for many years. http://trumpetguild.org/content/itg-...-mbe-1928-2012 Another very good one gone. Apart from him, there were a few other very good players in the RLPO "back then" - with a superb double bass player whose name I can't remember.

Re Haydn, I love many of his works, but for recordings I think I'd have to choose the Nelson Mass with Willcocks on Argo (Decca - a correction see msg 25 below - not EMI). This was the first version I got to know - and many years ago I made a trip to Manchester specifically to hear that work, which was perhaps hardly known at the time.
HIckox also made a recording which is well worth hearing - and perhaps my views re Willcocks are based on nostalgia - there are quite a number of good recordings of Haydn masses now. Bernstein's are also very good, as are Bruno Weil's with Tafelmusik.

I sometimes play Haydn keyboard sonatas - very badly - but I enjoy that. Others wouldn't - hearing me, that is. Anyone who can dabble on the piano should give them a go. Generally I would prefer to hear "authentic" performances in recordings, but Christian Zacharias (I think it was him - unless Zimerman - another superb pianist - also went to East Neuk) blew me away with some of his performances from the East Neuk festival which the BBC broadcast. Not sure if there are any commercial CDs.

Lastly, I think both the Takacs and the Italian Quartets have done some superb discs of string quartets, while the Kodaly quartet are also very good, and their set has been cheap on Naxos. There's one string quartet disc which I picked up second hand with just a few quartets - probably the Italian Quartet - which is absolutely lovely. I'll have to find it again.

[Pulcinella]

Re Haydn, I love many of his works, but for recordings I think I'd have to choose the Nelson Mass with Willcocks on EMI. This was the first version I got to know - and many years ago I made a trip to Manchester specifically to hear that work, which was perhaps hardly known at the time.

Pedantic correction: The King's Nelson was on Decca (Argo). I recall reading somewhere why a switch to John's was made for the other great late masses and/or why John's didn't record the Nelson for that set. The King's Paukenmesse referred to above was on EMI. I'm not sure of the chronology of the recordings (might check dates later and update this post: I'm still having a lie-in ) and the reason for the switch between recording labels.

[Dave2002]

Pedantic correction: The King's Nelson was on Decca (Argo).

Indeed - well spotted.

[gurnemanz]

In the very early days of CD I acquired that King's Nelson on Decca in a cheapskate way. Having lost its case and printed insert, the disc on its own was being sold for 50p. It is a classic recording, coupled with Vivaldi Gloria. Two Choral Soc staples. I have sung both several times.

[Dave2002]

In the very early days of CD I acquired that King's Nelson on Decca in a cheapskate way. Having lost its case and printed insert, the disc on its own was being sold for 50p. It is a classic recording, coupled with Vivaldi Gloria. Two Choral Soc staples. I have sung both several times.

I should still have the original LP too. Another LP I had was Kubelik's Paukenmesse, which was on Heliodor. Also very good, and I think it's now on CD. I assume this is the same version - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Haydn-Cecil.../dp/B001N00VVY

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The "Nelson" Mass was the first piece of Classical Music I ever performed in (as an eleven-year-old treble/soprano) in the early '70s - and, yes, it was that Willcocks LP that was in the school record library. Within ten years, I was singing in another performance of the same work - as a Bass - in the University choir. As with most works I've been involved in, none of the many fine recordings quite match memories of the work as I now imagine it - but Bruno Weil and Tafelmusik & the Tolzer Knabenchor is the recording I most frequently play when I want to listen to it.

[aeolium]

I also remember being bowled over by that King's Nelson. If "favourite recordings" is to mean anything here - there are too many to mention - then I take it to mean those recordings which first opened up the wonders of particular Haydn genres. Another one for me is the Furtwängler recording of Haydn 88, which I still love even though I would happily listen to utterly different performances of the work. And the earlier mentioned Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos recording of the Creation, a Haydn work I came to relatively late. And the Vanguard LPs of the Haydn Sturm und Drang symphonies, Janigro/I Solisti di Zagreb in 44/45, Blum/Esterhazy in 39 and 52 etc. And the Quartetto Italiano in the "Lark" and "Quinten" quartets. It matters not a jot to me that probably none of these would get a mention in present-day BaLs of these works; they opened up inexhaustible delights for me and I am grateful for that.