Programme note
Joseph Haydn (1732–1809)
Missa in Angustiis (Nelson Mass), H XXII:11
Kyrie
Gloria
Credo
Sanctus and Benedictus
Agnus Dei
Joseph Haydn spent the last fourteen years of his life in Vienna, in a house which he had bought with the proceeds of his two visits to London. He continued to hold the title of Kapellmeister, or director of music, to the Esterházy family, which had employed him for so long. But in his last years this was purely honorary, except that his Prince gave him a pension which allowed him a comfortable retirement. And even before that, although he had to spend some time at the family’s old palace at Eisenstadt, he was never required to travel to the massive summer palace of Eszterháza in the wilds of Hungary. The principal task which his position entailed was to compose and direct a new Mass each year to celebrate the name-day (the saint’s day corresponding to a person’s Christian name) of his patron’s wife Princess Marie Hermenegild. This duty he discharged in a series of six masterpieces composed every year except one between 1796 and 1802.
These late Masses are 'symphonic' in construction: instead of being divided into separate numbers as in Bach’s B minor Mass (and Mozart’s 'Unfinished' Mass in C minor), the five sections (with Kyrie and Christe combined, and also Sanctus and Benedictus) are treated as large-scale continuous entities. By the same token, the four soloists are not allocated separate arias, but emerge from the four-part chorus in short passages of solo and ensemble writing.
For the most part the music of these Masses reflects Haydn’s sincere, untroubled faith: a contemporary recorded him as defending their cheerfulness by saying that "at the thought of God his heart leapt for joy, and he could not help his music’s doing the same". But there is a greater seriousness and urgency about much of the third Mass in the series. It is the only one of Haydn’s late Masses in a minor key, D minor; and even its major-key music is often unusually stark – as in the first section of the Credo, with its orchestral introduction in octaves and its extended two-part canon in the voices.
The reason for this austerity – and for the title of Missa in Angustiis, or “Mass in time of peril” – lies in the date of the work’s composition. It was written during July and August 1798, for performance at the parish church in Eisenstadt in September. This was a time at which the Allies’ war against Revolutionary France was going badly, and much of Austria was occupied by the French. According to one contemporary account (which has been called into question by recent scholarship), the war also impinged on the work in a more specific way. Haydn, it is said, was at work on it when a courier arrived with the news of Admiral Nelson’s victory over the French at the Battle of the Nile (on 3 August 1798), and the announcement became translated into musical terms as the stirring trumpet fanfare at the end of the Benedictus section. The nickname of 'Nelson' Mass, however, stems not from this moment, but from a visit which Nelson, together with Sir William and Lady Hamilton, paid to Eisenstadt in September 1800 – a visit which is traditionally supposed to have included a performance of the Mass.
Haydn’s own scoring of the 'Nelson' Mass was for three trumpets, timpani, strings and organ – alternating between its traditional function as continuo accompanist and a written-out solo part. The organ in this obbligato role seems to have been no more than a makeshift replacement for woodwind and horns, which at that time had been removed from the Esterházy payroll in a wartime economy drive. Later – most probably for the 1800 performance – Haydn’s assistant and successor at Eisenstadt, Johann Nepomuk Fuchs (1766–1839), added parts for a wind section of flute, oboes, clarinets, horns and bassoon, which take over the organ’s solo passages and allow it to revert to its usual accompanying role. It is in this version, presumably authorised and supervised by Haydn himself, that the Mass will be performed this evening.
© Anthony Burton
