Haydnween (Emptying the Desk Drawer #3)

This new entry in my "Emptying Out the Desk Drawer" series, meant to preserve random little things I created for social media, is actually a cheat because, far from gathering dust in a corner, this ghastly creation is bursting with country-fresh flavor. I just made it a few hours ago in as little time as possible - which was part of the point. Think of it as Transcription Tartare.

Quick backstory. I have an ongoing Facebook group chat about many things musical. The subject of my general lack of interest in (and, ok, outright dissing of) Haydn's music had come up. Oh, right, it came up because I posted this image.

I'm not here to make a grand case about Haydn's over-ratedness, and as ever, I'm happy to admit that this may be a failing on my part. But I'll just summarize by saying that, while I absolutely appreciate his craftsmanship and his enormously positive influence on the evolution of musical style (Beethoven without Haydn isn't Beethoven), his gestures (and Haydn's music is very gestural) tend not to inspire much of an emotional reaction in me. Even a legendary "supposed to be stirring" chorus like The Heavens are Telling mostly just inspires me to do things like this. 

Also worth mentioning that there IS some Haydn I truly love. I once wrote about a string quartet movement which I fell for so much that I recorded it as a piano solo. And I think his C Major Cello Concerto is one of the most perfect pieces ever written. I really, really love every second of it. It's possible that I love this piece in part because I got to know it before I knew the Classical Style really well, and so the gestures and developmental techniques feel completely fresh and original. I'll confess there's also a part of me that's always wondered if maybe...just maybe...he didn't write it since it was only discovered in 1961. Suspicious?

It does have some Haydnesque features; most notably, its themes and some of its passagework are quite similar to things in his Violin Concerto in C Major, a work which has always bored me to tears. (I've accompanied it many, many times.) Someone might fairly say, "if you love the cello concerto, you should at least like this." But it simply doesn't do anything for me, harmless as it is. It's just there. The conspiracy-theorist in me would be tempted to say, "maybe some enterprising cellist decided it would be nice to have a Haydn cello concerto,* wrote it in the style of the violin concerto, but then added some more interesting ideas inspired by what we've learned since the 18th century." I understand that this is unlikely and probably heresy. But I do think it sometimes.

So, in response to the picture above, one friend - a big Haydn fan - posted a recording of the very same violin concerto, knowing it would annoy me. Another gracious friend in the group wrote:

"this piece is well-crafted—making good musical sense, artfully blending high energy with more reflective moods, etc. But whether one actually likes listening to it is a matter of taste. I'll say no more, except to make it understood that I in no way desire to undermine [Friend #1]'s enjoyment of the piece."

To which I responded:

"I desire to undermine [Friend #1]'s enjoyment of the piece."

This was just because I thought it was a funny thing to say, but of course, I immediately thought of how I might carry out this undermining. My pride in what I'm about to post comes from how quickly it was generated and how diligently I avoided doing anything to make it not sound awful. I quickly found MIDI data for the first movement, entered this into Soundtrap (perfectly useful educational software for producing music, but with a not so sophisticated sound palette), assigned the parts to digital saxophones, added the most obnoxiously heavy and uncool drum part I could find in twelve seconds and....that's about it. (OK, I did add two sound effects.) 

The point is, usually even when making something intentionally bad, I would look to refine the mix, maybe pan parts left and right to add clarity, do some EQ work, smooth things out with reverb, adjust some balances, maybe mix in a few different-sounding instruments. Maybe be disappointed that the only option provided for "baritone sax" was "Baritone Sax - Staccato."  If nothing else, maybe tweak the alignment so the drums are precisely on the beat. Nope. The point here was to make this sound as bad and unproduced as possible. 

So, of course....I love it. I've already said way too much to introduce it, but will finish by saying it seems like a natural thing to post on Halloween. Booo!

---

---

* yes, there is that other Haydn cello concerto, but it interests me much, much less.