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Orchestration Lecture Notes

Haydn · Class 2

Notes from the second class: a record of what we found in your exercises and in Haydn’s score.

These notes may contain solutions to class assignments, so please wait until you have finished your own work.

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We looked at: Symphony No. 46 in B major, Hob. I:46 (1772)

First movement, Vivace, bars 1–17. Two oboes, two horns in B alto and strings; the bassoon on the bass line.

The opening

A unison tutti, not a chordal tutti. Chords or arpeggios would blur the melody.
Keep the bass taut. On the lowest strings of the cello and double bass the sound goes slack.
Horns love octaves. Remember to use them.
The horns mark the heavy beat and leave the tutti one note early. The D♯ promises an E the natural horn cannot give in that octave. In bars 5–6 they go on to the high E.

Haydn, Symphony No. 46 in B major, first movement, bars 1–6, full score: unison forte opening for oboes, horns in B and strings; the horns play only the first note — Fig. 1 · Haydn, Symphony No. 46, I · bars 1–6

Bars 7–10: the pedal

The trap in the reduction: the F♯ entering after the beat is idiomatic for the piano. In the orchestra it becomes a syncopation that is never resolved. Keep your radar on for unfamiliar, unusual textures.

Piano reduction of Haydn, Symphony No. 46, first movement, bars 7–10: the left hand holds F sharp from the off-beat under the rising motive — Fig. 2 · The piano reduction · bars 7–10

Haydn: the long F♯ on the beat in the horns (octaves) and violas. The motive in cellos and bassoon, in the bright, singing register, not in a slack viola that takes it too easily. The oboes are silent.
The viola often doubles the basses or the second violins, and is not used in a very virtuoso or expressive way.

Haydn, Symphony No. 46, first movement, bars 7–12, full score: a long F sharp in the horns in octaves and the violas, the motive in cellos and bassoon, oboes silent until the forte — Fig. 3 · Haydn, Symphony No. 46, I · bars 7–12

Bar 13: one phrase or two?

Listen for whether a melody is one phrase or made of several, before you divide it.
The B–D♯ on the downbeat of bar 14 can be heard as the goal of the rising triad and as the springboard for the high B (the trampoline).
Heard this way, the high B is a response to it: an entry from outside, a responsorium. Haydn lets the violins stop and the oboes and horns answer (fig. 5).
Had it been meant as one long phrase, a legato from the D♯ up to the high B would probably have been more natural.

Piano reduction of Haydn, Symphony No. 46, first movement, bars 13–14: the second theme rising from B to the high B — Fig. 4 · The piano reduction · bars 13–14

Haydn, Symphony No. 46, first movement, bars 13–18, full score: the violins stop on the downbeat of bar 14 and the oboes and horns answer with the high B — Fig. 5 · Haydn, Symphony No. 46, I · bars 13–18

Adding, not dividing

Be careful not to divide phrases. That belongs to later composers.*
If part of a phrase is given to an oboe, the melody is cut up.
The horn in bar 1 does not work that way. It underlines a single note, the heavy beat of the bar, rather than being part of the melody.

* Klangfarbenmelodie. Listen to Webern’s orchestration of the Ricercar from Bach’s Musical Offering.

The DNA of the material

The small second, D♯–E, is the driving force of the symphony. It shows in Haydn’s elaboration of the motive, where falling seconds stand in clear contrast to rising seconds in small dramatic sections.

Staying within the style

Do not add what is not there: no crescendo, no fp.
The bass line is one voice.
Write a2 when both oboes share the line.

Score excerpts (figs. 1, 3 and 5): Haydn, Sinfonia No. 46, ed. H. C. Robbins Landon, Kritische Ausgabe sämtlicher Symphonien, vol. IV (Vienna: Doblinger, 1966); scan via IMSLP.

Daniel Fladmose · Composition and orchestration teaching

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