Luogo e data di registrazione		Stadtpfarrkirche Bad Tölz (Germany) - 6/7 September 1994
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer / Recording supervisor		Wolf Erichson
	Recording Engineer		Stephan Schellmann (Tritonus)
	Prima Edizione LP		-
	Prima Edizione CD		Sony / Vivarte - SK 66 260 - (CD) - durata 62' 57" - (p) 1995 - DDD
	Cover Art		Mary and Joseph Appear to Five Saints by G.B. Tiepolo (1696-1770) - Archiv für Kunst und Geschichte, Berlin
	Note		-

Missa Sancti Bernardi de Offida “Heiligmesse” Haydn was in England for the second time when he received a letter from the fourth reigning member of the Esterházy family under whom he was to serve: Prince Nikolaus II wanted his Kapellmeister to return to Austria and re-establish the Prince's choir and orchestra. Haydn had contractual ties which kept him in England until the summer of 1795, but after that he was glad to return to his native country, especially since the Napoleonic Wars showed no signs of abating. Prince Nikolaus II required of his Kapellmeister that he deal with the (in part onerous) administrative duties as head of a large musical establishment, but, apart from that, Haydn was expected only to provide, once a year, a largescale mass to celebrate the name-day of the Princess Maria Hermenegild, née Princess Lichtenstein, with whom Haydn was on the best of terms - much better than with the arrogant Prince Nikolaus II, whose knowledge of female anatomy was infinitely superior to his knowledge of music. The small orchestra to which Haydn would return consisted of a wind band (pairs of oboes, clarinets, bassoons and horns), a small choir with organ and a string orchestra with a timpani player. The horn players could also play trumpets, and were in fact required to do so in the new mass. It was for this group that Haydn composed the first of his six final masses which spanned the years 1796-1802. Since Haydn was not sure who would sing the solo vocal parts, he was careful to avoid difficult writing, taking his soloists from the choir. The new mass was dedicated to St. Bernard of Offida (1604-94), who had been beatified by Pope Pius VI on May 19, 1795; it was presumably first performed on September 12, 1796, the name-day of the Princess, at the Bergkirche in Eisenstadt. Not knowing his orchestra very well, Haydn wrote very conservative clarinet parts, but a year or so later he rewrote them, giving them much more to do, and also providing horn parts to double, one octave lower, the trumpets. It is this second version that has been recorded here. Haydn's Missa Sancti Bernardi de Offida makes full use of the symphonic form which he had brought to a new level of sophistication and inspiration in the twelve symphonies he had composed for London between 1791 and 1795. But the customary symphonic scheme was artfully modified to fit ecclesiastical purposes. Thus the Kyrie opens with the kind of slow introduction found in eleven of the twelve “London” Symphonies; but the rest of the movement is very different. The ensuing Allegro moderato has a theme of almost folk-like simplicity, which is interrupted by a brilliant fugue; but it, too, is broken off to allow for the “Christe eleison”, before it is continued - in short a subtle combination of church and symphony. In the Gloria, after the opening fanfare-like announcement, we arrive at perhaps the most astonishingly intellectual achievement of the mass, a movement uniting "Gratias agimus tibi” with “Qui tollis”, and containing contrapuntal feats so intricate that they are scarcely recognizable except to experts (the orchestra is divided into top and bottom sections, which are then reversed in double counterpoint at the octave). There is a sense of enormous momentum in this spiritually dense music, which is unlike anything Haydn had previously composed. In the Credo we may note that the “Et incarnatus est" is a strict canon, which also exists as a secular work by Haydn with the words “Gott im Herzen, ein gut Weibchen im Arm” (God in the heart and a good girl on the arm). The final section of the Credo is a grand fugue on the words “Et vitam venturi”. The Sanctus is based on an old German church melody (the Latin words being translated “Heilig, heilig, heilig”) which Haydn weaves into the middle parts of the texture. This device led to the work being assigned the subtitle "Heiligemesse". The Benedictus is another slowish Moderato movement of great depth and spirituality, with no vocal soloists. Haydn's later clarinet parts are especially telling here. The austere Agnus Dei in B flat minor leads to a conclusion of symphonic grandeur (“Dona nobis pacem”), where, towards the end, we find a colossal deceptive cadence, rounded off by a theatrical fortissimo flourish. Mare Clausum This unfinished ode was commisioned by one of Haydn's interesting British friends, Lord Abingdon, who in February 1795 was sentenced for libel and imprisoned for three months. Haydn had begun the music in 1794, but understandably the project then languished. The work consists of a richly scored aria "Nor can I think my suit is vain", followed by a rousing D major chorus “Thy great endeavours”. But the text (from the preface to Selden's Mare Clausum) was not such as to inspire even a thoroughgoing Angloplile like Haydn, and Abingdon's libel suit may have provided a welcome excuse to abandon the project, despite the splendid music Haydn had hitherto been able to compose for it. Motetti de Venerabili Sacramento The only source of this music, rediscovered in 1959 by Hungarian scholars, was a set of manuscript parts from the former Servite Monastry in Pest, dated 1776. The work was, however, composed in the 1750s and its authenticity is suggested - apart from the fact that Haydn was on friendly terms with the Servites - by an entry in Haydn's Entwurf-Katalog, a "draft catalogue", where the four movements are listeds as “Hymnus de Venerabili / lmus / 2dus / 3 / 4”. These are works for the Corpus Christi procession, celebrated in Austria with special fervour and during which the Host was carried triumphantly through town and country. Here is music with melodies like Austrian folk-tunes, one (No. 4) looking forward to Haydn`s patriotic hymn “Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser” of 1797. 'There are vocal soloists and a choir, and the orchestra consists of oboes, trumpets and strings (with organ and bassoon as part of the continuo). Students of Haydn will find many other telling details of melodic line and orchestration which remind one of later works by the composer: in No. 1, for example, there is a passage presaging the opening movement of Symphony No. 41. Here we find the real essence of Haydn`s early success: the winning melodies, the brilliant orchestration with delightful writing for the trumpets - and always an uncanny sense of formal pithiness. Motetto “Insanae et vanae curae” In 1784, Haydn revised his oratorio II ritorno di Tobia (1775), adding among other things a D minor chorus with the words “Svanisce in un momento” which proved to be a great success. Some time later, perhaps even as much as a decade afterwards, Haydn sanctioned a Latin arrangement of this chorus with the words “Insanae et vanae curae”, changing the orchestration slightly (four horns became two horns and two trumpets, and a kettledrum part was added). The Esterházy archives in Eisenstadt own authentic manuscript parts and there is another set by one of Haydn's personal copyists in the Conservatory Library in Graz. This is certainly one of the most effective and dramatic of Haydn's pre-Creation choruses, and the contrast between the turbulent D minor sections and the contrasting piano interludes is extremely telling. Te Deum for the Empress Marie Therese This magnificent choral drama, in three parts, was a commission from the Empress Marie Therese, not to be confused with Maria Theresa (d. 1780). The younger Empress was the wife of Emperor Francis II who began his reign in 1792 and under whom Austria lost all except the crucial final battles of the Napoleonic Wars. The Empress was musical and could sing the soprano part of The Creation. This grand Te Deum was composed about 1799 or 1800 and was used at Eisenstadt to celebrate Lord Nelson's arrival there in September 1800. Its orchestration includes three trumpets -like the “Nelson” Mass - rather than the usual two. The beginning uses the Gregorian Te Deum melody from the eighth psalm-tone, which Haydn (as in the Missa Sancti Bernardi de Offida) artfully conceals in the middle voices. The middle section,“Te ergo quaesumus” opens, Creation-like (Chaos),with a thunderous unison C and proceeds, mysteriously, in C minor. The third section concludes with a stirring double fugue on the words “In te, Domine, speravi”. The conclusion is of a brassy magnificcnce which is doubly effective not least because this is very rare in Haydn. © 1995 H. C. Robbins Landon