This composer, to whom is given the name of “father of the symphony and the quartet,” was born at Rohrau, a small Austrian village on the Leitha, in the night between 31st March and 1st April 1732.  At a very early age the boy’s sweet voice attracted the notice of G. Reuter, capellmeister of St. Stephen’s, Vienna, and for many years he sang in the cathedral choir.  In 1749 he was dismissed, the alleged cause being a practical joke played by him on one of his fellow-choristers.  He was, as Sir G. Grove relates in his article “Haydn” in the Dictionary of Music and Musicians, thrown upon the world “with an empty purse, a keen appetite, and no friends.”  Haydn took up his abode in an attic in the old Michaelerhaus.  But it chanced that Metastasio lived in the same building, and the famous poet took an interest in the penniless composer, and, among other things, taught him Italian.  Metastasio was extremely fond of music, and we know from his letters that the flowing compositions of his countrymen delighted him more than the learned music of Germany.  Then Haydn made the acquaintance of Porpora, who gave him instruction in composition and in the art of singing.  And he is also supposed to have studied the works of San Martini, an Italian composer in the service of Prince Esterhazy.  In addition, Italian music was much played and much admired in Vienna.  Emanuel Bach also, as we have seen, came under Italian influence, but not until he had finished his studies under his father’s guidance.  Once more, we may conclude that Haydn, before he commenced writing clavier sonatas, had made acquaintance with those of Paradies and of Alberti.  These early Italian influences should be noted, for one is apt to think rather of the young composer as plodding through Fux’s “Gradus” and playing Emanuel Bach’s sonatas on his “little worm-eaten clavier.”  During his last years Haydn told his friend Griesinger that he had diligently studied Emanuel Bach, and that he owed very much to him.  From the painter Dies, in his biographical notice of the master, we also learn how fond he was of playing Emanuel Bach’s sonatas.  And this influence was undoubtedly not only a strong, but a lasting one; in 1788, the year in which E. Bach died, Haydn wrote to Artaria, begging the latter to send him that master’s last two works for clavier.

In reference to Haydn, musicians are apt to speak merely of his sonatas, whereas those of Beethoven are generally described by their key, or their opus number; or as belonging to one of the three periods into which that master’s art-work is usually divided.  There is good reason for this difference.  Haydn’s sonatas are not of equal importance with those of his successor; and then some are old-fashioned, others second-rate.  Beethoven’s sonatas are by no means all of equal merit, yet there is not one but has some feature, whether of form, or development, or technique, by which it may be distinguished.  And yet a close and careful study of Haydn’s sonatas will show that he, too, had his periods of apprenticeship, mastery, and maturity.  Let not our readers take alarm.  We are not going to analyse his thirty-five sonatas, or to enter into minute details.  But we shall try, by selecting some of the most characteristic works, to show how the master commenced, continued, and concluded.