Harmonie
Encyclopedia
Harmonie is a German
word that, in the context of the history of music, designates a band of wind instruments employed by an aristocratic patron, particularly during the Classical era
of the 18th century. The Harmonie would be employed for outdoor or recreational music.
According to Haydn
biographer Rosemary Hughes:
Roger Hellyer, writing in the Grove Dictionary notes that while the Harmonie generally had an aristocratic patron, the same music was sometimes also played by street musicians. A letter by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
to his father Leopold
(3 November 1781) noted that street musicians had serenaded him with his own composition, the wind serenade K. 375
.
A later expansion of the Harmonie can be traced with the accession of Joseph II
to the throne of the Austrian Empire in 1780. Joseph expanded music-making at his court in a number of ways, including the introduction of a Harmonie, as noted above. This Harmonie consisted of eight players, with two clarinets added to the traditional two oboes, two horns, and two bassoons. Other nobles then followed the Emperor's lead.
The Emperor's Harmonie included some distinguished players, notably the clarinettist Anton Stadler
, who was the inspiration for a number of important works by Mozart. It also included Anton's younger brother Johann
, as well as the oboist Johann Went, a composer of over 80 works for Harmonie.
The Harmonie continued as a lively musical tradition until the Napoleonic wars
forced aristocrats to retrench financially, cutting down on the number of musicians they employed. The tradition had been largely abandoned by the mid 1830's.
Some of Joseph Haydn's early works, called divertimenti or Feldpartien, were written for the Harmonie of his first full-time employer, Count Morzin
around 1760. Haydn became Vice-Kapellmeister for the Prince Paul Anton Esterházy in 1761, which was the same year that the Prince established a six-member Harmonie; Hellyer suggests that some of Haydn's early works for Harmonie were intended for this ensemble.
Mozart
also wrote for Harmonie. As a teenager traveling in Italy, he wrote the early Divertimenti K.
186 and K. 166 (1773). He wrote further divertimenti between 1775 and 1777, while working at the Salzburg court (K. 213, 240, 252, 253, 270).
Some time after his move to Vienna (1781), Mozart wrote his most extended work for Harmonie, the Serenade in B flat, K. 361. This is for an amplified wind ensemble of 13 instruments (two oboes, two clarinets, two basset horns, four (French) horns, two bassoons, and a string bass). His E flat serenade of 1781, K. 375
, is written for a Harmonie consisting of clarinets, bassoons and horns, curiously mismatching what the new Emperor had arranged as his Harmonie; Hellyer suggests Mozart, who was seeking a job at court at the time, was misinformed. Mozart later revised the work to include two oboe parts.
Perhaps the weightiest of all music for Harmonie is Mozart's Serenade No. 12 for winds in C minor
, K. 388, written in 1782 for Joseph II's eight-player Harmonie. Hellyer calls it "a curiously sombre and powerful work which often conveys a mood of dramatic intensity totally alien to the informal background music normally associated with the serenade type."
. When members of the Harmonie participated in performances with such orchestras, it became possible for the composer to enrich the musical texture with wind parts, without increasing the payroll cost of his patron. Thus, "Harmonie" came also to designate the wind section of a small orchestra. Of this practice, Fitzpatrick writes,
Joseph Haydn
's Mass in B flat major, (H.
22/14, 1802) is nicknamed the "Harmoniemesse," because (unlike the other masses Haydn wrote during this time) it includes parts for a whole wind section, thanks to the recent reinstatement of these instruments in the musical establishment of Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II.
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
word that, in the context of the history of music, designates a band of wind instruments employed by an aristocratic patron, particularly during the Classical era
Classical period (music)
The dates of the Classical Period in Western music are generally accepted as being between about 1750 and 1830. However, the term classical music is used colloquially to describe a variety of Western musical styles from the ninth century to the present, and especially from the sixteenth or...
of the 18th century. The Harmonie would be employed for outdoor or recreational music.
Descriptions
Horace Fitzpatrick writes (reference below):- From about 1756 onward the Emperor [of Austria] and the Austrian nobles kept house bands called Harmonien, usually made of pairs of oboeOboeThe oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...
s, hornHorn (instrument)The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
s, bassoonBassoonThe bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...
s, and after about 1770, clarinetClarinetThe clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
s. These wind groups formed part of the household musical staff, and provided serenade for banquets and garden parties. Joseph IIJoseph II, Holy Roman EmperorJoseph II was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. He was the eldest son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Francis I...
kept a crack Harmonie for his private delectation, drawn from the principal wind players of the Imperial operaOperaOpera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
. His successor Franz IIFrancis II, Holy Roman EmperorFrancis II was the last Holy Roman Emperor, ruling from 1792 until 6 August 1806, when he dissolved the Empire after the disastrous defeat of the Third Coalition by Napoleon at the Battle of Austerlitz...
carried on this practice.
According to Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
biographer Rosemary Hughes:
- "Feldharmonie" or simply "Harmonie," was the wind band, maintained by most noblemen even when they could not afford a larger orchestra, for performing at hunting parties and other outdoor entertainments.
Roger Hellyer, writing in the Grove Dictionary notes that while the Harmonie generally had an aristocratic patron, the same music was sometimes also played by street musicians. A letter by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
to his father Leopold
Leopold Mozart
Johann Georg Leopold Mozart was a German composer, conductor, teacher, and violinist. Mozart is best known today as the father and teacher of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and for his violin textbook Versuch einer gründlichen Violinschule.-Childhood and student years:He was born in Augsburg, son of...
(3 November 1781) noted that street musicians had serenaded him with his own composition, the wind serenade K. 375
Serenade No. 11 (Mozart)
The Serenade No. 11 for Winds in E-flat major K. 375, was written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, on 15 October, 1781, for St Theresa's day.The original version of the serenade is scored for 2 clarinets, 2 horns, and 2 bassoons...
.
History
During the historical period of the Harmonie, the ensemble gradually grew in size. Hellyer (2006) suggests that during the early period, in the 1750s, a Harmonie could consist of just five instruments (two oboes, two horns, and one bassoon), though a second bassoon could be included as well. The Harmonie compositions of Haydn and Mozart (see below) all use at least six instruments.A later expansion of the Harmonie can be traced with the accession of Joseph II
Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor
Joseph II was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. He was the eldest son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Francis I...
to the throne of the Austrian Empire in 1780. Joseph expanded music-making at his court in a number of ways, including the introduction of a Harmonie, as noted above. This Harmonie consisted of eight players, with two clarinets added to the traditional two oboes, two horns, and two bassoons. Other nobles then followed the Emperor's lead.
The Emperor's Harmonie included some distinguished players, notably the clarinettist Anton Stadler
Anton Stadler
Anton Stadler was an Austrian clarinet and basset horn player for whom Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote both his Quintet for Clarinet and Strings and Clarinet Concerto....
, who was the inspiration for a number of important works by Mozart. It also included Anton's younger brother Johann
Johann Stadler
Johann Nepomuk Stadler was an Austrian clarinet and basset horn player and younger brother of the clarinet player Anton Stadler....
, as well as the oboist Johann Went, a composer of over 80 works for Harmonie.
The Harmonie continued as a lively musical tradition until the Napoleonic wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
forced aristocrats to retrench financially, cutting down on the number of musicians they employed. The tradition had been largely abandoned by the mid 1830's.
Music for Harmonie
- Main article: HarmoniemusikHarmoniemusikHarmoniemusik is a musical term denoting a form of 18th century chamber music similar to Tafelmusik, but almost exclusively for wind instruments. From 1780 until 1840 harmoniemusik flourished in the courts of Europe...
Some of Joseph Haydn's early works, called divertimenti or Feldpartien, were written for the Harmonie of his first full-time employer, Count Morzin
Count Morzin
Count Morzin was an aristocrat of the Austrian Empire during the 18th century. He is remembered today as the first person to employ the composer Joseph Haydn as his Kapellmeister, or music director...
around 1760. Haydn became Vice-Kapellmeister for the Prince Paul Anton Esterházy in 1761, which was the same year that the Prince established a six-member Harmonie; Hellyer suggests that some of Haydn's early works for Harmonie were intended for this ensemble.
Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
also wrote for Harmonie. As a teenager traveling in Italy, he wrote the early Divertimenti K.
Köchel-Verzeichnis
The Köchel-Verzeichnis is a complete, chronological catalogue of compositions by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart which was originally created by Ludwig von Köchel. It is abbreviated K or KV. For example, Mozart's Requiem in D minor was, according to Köchel's counting, the 626th piece Mozart composed....
186 and K. 166 (1773). He wrote further divertimenti between 1775 and 1777, while working at the Salzburg court (K. 213, 240, 252, 253, 270).
Some time after his move to Vienna (1781), Mozart wrote his most extended work for Harmonie, the Serenade in B flat, K. 361. This is for an amplified wind ensemble of 13 instruments (two oboes, two clarinets, two basset horns, four (French) horns, two bassoons, and a string bass). His E flat serenade of 1781, K. 375
Serenade No. 11 (Mozart)
The Serenade No. 11 for Winds in E-flat major K. 375, was written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, on 15 October, 1781, for St Theresa's day.The original version of the serenade is scored for 2 clarinets, 2 horns, and 2 bassoons...
, is written for a Harmonie consisting of clarinets, bassoons and horns, curiously mismatching what the new Emperor had arranged as his Harmonie; Hellyer suggests Mozart, who was seeking a job at court at the time, was misinformed. Mozart later revised the work to include two oboe parts.
Perhaps the weightiest of all music for Harmonie is Mozart's Serenade No. 12 for winds in C minor
Serenade No. 12 (Mozart)
The Serenade No. 12 for Winds in C minor K. 388/384a, was written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1782 or 1783. The work is sometimes called "Nacht Musique". In 1787, Mozart transcribed the work for viola quintet. This transcription survives as String Quintet, K...
, K. 388, written in 1782 for Joseph II's eight-player Harmonie. Hellyer calls it "a curiously sombre and powerful work which often conveys a mood of dramatic intensity totally alien to the informal background music normally associated with the serenade type."
"Harmonie" as wind section
The aristocrats who employed a Harmonie would often also maintain a small orchestra, numerically dominated by, or consisting entirely of, the string sectionString section
The string section is the largest body of the standard orchestra and consists of bowed string instruments of the violin family.It normally comprises five sections: the first violins, the second violins, the violas, the cellos, and the double basses...
. When members of the Harmonie participated in performances with such orchestras, it became possible for the composer to enrich the musical texture with wind parts, without increasing the payroll cost of his patron. Thus, "Harmonie" came also to designate the wind section of a small orchestra. Of this practice, Fitzpatrick writes,
- It was [Franz II's Harmonie] who made up the wind section in BeethovenLudwig van BeethovenLudwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
's orchestra of 1800 [at the premiere of the composer's First SymphonySymphony No. 1 (Beethoven)Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 in C major, Op. 21, was dedicated to Baron Gottfried van Swieten, an early patron of the composer. The piece was published in 1801 by Hoffmeister & Kühnel of Leipzig...
].
Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
's Mass in B flat major, (H.
Hoboken-Verzeichnis
The Hoboken-Verzeichnis is the catalogue of over 750 works by Joseph Haydn as compiled by Anthony van Hoboken.Unlike Ludwig von Köchel's catalogue of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's works, or Otto Erich Deutsch's catalogue of Franz Schubert's works, which are both arranged chronologically by date of...
22/14, 1802) is nicknamed the "Harmoniemesse," because (unlike the other masses Haydn wrote during this time) it includes parts for a whole wind section, thanks to the recent reinstatement of these instruments in the musical establishment of Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II.