Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art: Contexts of Musical Wit and Humor by Gretchen A.WheelockReview by: James William SobaskieNotes, Second Series, Vol. 50, No. 3 (Mar., 1994), pp. 955-956Published by: Music Library AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/898553 .

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Book Reviews Book Reviews

Americas [Washington, D.C.: OAS, 1970], p. 169 and exx. 142 and 143). Crucelaegui's vernacular motet, 0 Admirabile Sacramento, survives at the Lima, Peru, Archivo Arzo- bispal (ibid., p. 119). The plainsong Misa Viscaina (portions t 2) (copies at the San Juan Bautista and Santa Barbara Missions in California) attributable to Crucelaegui was published in Owen da Silva's Mission Music of California (Los Angeles: W. F. Lewis, 1941) on pages 57-74.

Volume 2 of Ilustracion musical en el Pais Vasco contains a detailed account of all ac- tivities at the music school in Vergara that between 1776 and 1794 drew 31 students from Cuba, 21 from Mexico, 13 from Peru (46 from Cadiz and 15 from Seville). The financial records of the school that survive show that from abroad the forty composers whose instrumental works were purchased and performed included Carl Friedrich Abel, Jean-Baptiste S6bastien Breval, Giu- seppe Maria Cambini, Muzio Clementi, Jean-Baptiste Davaux, C. W. von Gluck, Jo- seph Haydn (eight symphonies were pur- chased in 1789, five more arrived in 1792), Antonio Lolli, Ignace Pleyel, Joseph Bou- logne Chevalier de Saint-Georges, and Jo- hann Stamitz. The 1817 inventory taken after reopening of the school in 1798 at- tests the arrival of vocal music by Domenico Cimarosa, Vicente Martin y Soler, Mozart, Giovanni Paisiello, and Giuseppe Sarti. A wealth of detail concerning instruments purchased for the school occupies pages 459-64. The volume concludes with a thirty-four-page bibliography and an eighteen-page name index.

As all who are aware of peninsular hap- penings acknowledge, musicological ac- tivity in both Spain and Portugal has ex- ploded during recent years. The present excellent dissertation can be matched with numerous others of equal value (mostly un- published) that should be brought under bibliographic control for the benefit of those interested in musical matters Span- ish, Catalan, and Portuguese.

ROBERT STEVENSON

University of California at Los Angeles

Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art: Contexts of Musical Wit and Humor. By Gretchen A. Wheelock. New York:

Americas [Washington, D.C.: OAS, 1970], p. 169 and exx. 142 and 143). Crucelaegui's vernacular motet, 0 Admirabile Sacramento, survives at the Lima, Peru, Archivo Arzo- bispal (ibid., p. 119). The plainsong Misa Viscaina (portions t 2) (copies at the San Juan Bautista and Santa Barbara Missions in California) attributable to Crucelaegui was published in Owen da Silva's Mission Music of California (Los Angeles: W. F. Lewis, 1941) on pages 57-74.

Volume 2 of Ilustracion musical en el Pais Vasco contains a detailed account of all ac- tivities at the music school in Vergara that between 1776 and 1794 drew 31 students from Cuba, 21 from Mexico, 13 from Peru (46 from Cadiz and 15 from Seville). The financial records of the school that survive show that from abroad the forty composers whose instrumental works were purchased and performed included Carl Friedrich Abel, Jean-Baptiste S6bastien Breval, Giu- seppe Maria Cambini, Muzio Clementi, Jean-Baptiste Davaux, C. W. von Gluck, Jo- seph Haydn (eight symphonies were pur- chased in 1789, five more arrived in 1792), Antonio Lolli, Ignace Pleyel, Joseph Bou- logne Chevalier de Saint-Georges, and Jo- hann Stamitz. The 1817 inventory taken after reopening of the school in 1798 at- tests the arrival of vocal music by Domenico Cimarosa, Vicente Martin y Soler, Mozart, Giovanni Paisiello, and Giuseppe Sarti. A wealth of detail concerning instruments purchased for the school occupies pages 459-64. The volume concludes with a thirty-four-page bibliography and an eighteen-page name index.

As all who are aware of peninsular hap- penings acknowledge, musicological ac- tivity in both Spain and Portugal has ex- ploded during recent years. The present excellent dissertation can be matched with numerous others of equal value (mostly un- published) that should be brought under bibliographic control for the benefit of those interested in musical matters Span- ish, Catalan, and Portuguese.

ROBERT STEVENSON

University of California at Los Angeles

Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art: Contexts of Musical Wit and Humor. By Gretchen A. Wheelock. New York:

Schrimer Books, 1992. [xiv, 269 p. ISBN 0-02-872855-6. $45.00.]

Joseph Haydn's music has been loved by generations of concertgoers for its lively wit and abundant good humor. Yet these same qualities have contributed to the traditional image many preserve of him as a jovial, though somewhat naive father-figure, and have even led some critics to dismiss his music as trivial. Gretchen Wheelock's new book demonstrates that wit and humor actually represent dynamic factors that spurred Haydn's astonishing creativity. It also adds some convincing depth to the re- markable portrait that has begun to emerge in recent years, a view of the man as an irrepressible innovator and unaffected ge- nius.

Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art: Contexts of Musical Wit and Humor is a serious study of playful rhetoric in the composer's in- strumental music. Drawing upon research originally undertaken for her doctoral the- sis (Wit, Humor, and the Instrumental Music of Joseph Haydn, Yale University, 1979), the author illuminates essential historical and musical contexts that frame Haydn's "jests." In addition, she highlights the var- ious conventions of style, structure, and syntax called into play, and explores spe- cific strategies that persuade listeners to take part in the fun.

Wheelock uses the term "jest" in refer- ence to a wide range of playful nuances in Haydn's music, recognizing that wit and humor belong to a continuum that extends from the cheerful and light-hearted to the comic and downright ludicrous. But her concept of "jesting" is even more impor- tant. She argues that Haydn's musical wit and humor do not arise from isolated events, like a surprising chord or a "wrong" note, but from an ongoing process of active engagement. In this process, participation is elicited via subtle signals of playful intent, expectations are carefully aroused and then subverted, and the listener is chal- lenged to interpret departures from con- vention. The first chapter, entitled "The Musical Joke: A Laughing Matter?", devel- ops these ideas and illustrates some of the differences between humor and wit in music. It also provides fresh interpretations of some familiar Haydn jests, including the guessing-game finale of the "Joke" String Quartet, op. 33, no. 2, and the classic prank

Schrimer Books, 1992. [xiv, 269 p. ISBN 0-02-872855-6. $45.00.]

Joseph Haydn's music has been loved by generations of concertgoers for its lively wit and abundant good humor. Yet these same qualities have contributed to the traditional image many preserve of him as a jovial, though somewhat naive father-figure, and have even led some critics to dismiss his music as trivial. Gretchen Wheelock's new book demonstrates that wit and humor actually represent dynamic factors that spurred Haydn's astonishing creativity. It also adds some convincing depth to the re- markable portrait that has begun to emerge in recent years, a view of the man as an irrepressible innovator and unaffected ge- nius.

Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art: Contexts of Musical Wit and Humor is a serious study of playful rhetoric in the composer's in- strumental music. Drawing upon research originally undertaken for her doctoral the- sis (Wit, Humor, and the Instrumental Music of Joseph Haydn, Yale University, 1979), the author illuminates essential historical and musical contexts that frame Haydn's "jests." In addition, she highlights the var- ious conventions of style, structure, and syntax called into play, and explores spe- cific strategies that persuade listeners to take part in the fun.

Wheelock uses the term "jest" in refer- ence to a wide range of playful nuances in Haydn's music, recognizing that wit and humor belong to a continuum that extends from the cheerful and light-hearted to the comic and downright ludicrous. But her concept of "jesting" is even more impor- tant. She argues that Haydn's musical wit and humor do not arise from isolated events, like a surprising chord or a "wrong" note, but from an ongoing process of active engagement. In this process, participation is elicited via subtle signals of playful intent, expectations are carefully aroused and then subverted, and the listener is chal- lenged to interpret departures from con- vention. The first chapter, entitled "The Musical Joke: A Laughing Matter?", devel- ops these ideas and illustrates some of the differences between humor and wit in music. It also provides fresh interpretations of some familiar Haydn jests, including the guessing-game finale of the "Joke" String Quartet, op. 33, no. 2, and the classic prank

955 955

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NOTES, March 1994

that gave the Symphony, no. 94 ("Sur- prise") its nickname.

Many of Haydn's more intimate jests are lost on listeners unaware of the conventions they exploit or unfamiliar with the contexts that gave them meaning. One of this book's most important achievements is its eluci- dation of this critical historical background. To help readers understand what wit and humor meant in Haydn's day and how they were distinguished, chapter 2, "The De- corum of Wit and the Nature of Humor in Eighteenth-Century Essays," explores their use in an extraordinarily wide range of lit- erary sources, including the writings of phi- losophers, poets, lexicographers, drama- tists, and musicians. It also examines how the meanings and values of wit and humor underwent significant changes. Chapter 3, "'A Question of Taste?' Early Views of Haydn as Humorist," estimates eighteenth- century attitudes toward taste and propri- ety in music-making and surveys the re- ception history of the composer's work as it spread outside the Esterhazy court in the 1760s and 1770s. Anyone accustomed to thinking of Haydn as a conservative will be surprised to learn he was severely criticized in print for a variety of breaches of stylistic decorum. Wheelock makes it quite clear that Haydn was a risk-taker, if not a rogue and a rascal, right from the very beginning!

Fully half of the book is devoted to iden- tifying and interpreting specific strategies of artful jesting in Haydn's instrumental music. Wheelock's investigation takes the form of four analytical essays, each of which pursues an intriguing theme. Chap- ter 4, "Humorous Manners and the 'Really New Minuet'," focuses on Haydn's sym- phonic minuets and shows how incongruity is systematically used to subvert kinesthetic expectations associated with the danced minuet and stylistic norms pertaining to courtly decorum. The next chapter, "En- gaging Wit in the Chamber: Op. 33 Re- visited," provides a unique perspective on the masterful set of quartets that so im- pressed and inspired Mozart. Wheelock suggests that these works "represent a new conception of the genre as self-consciously addressed to an audience" (p. 91), and shows how listeners are pulled into the in- strumental dialogue, mediating exchanges that occasionally swerve toward the dys- functional. The sixth chapter, "Extended Play in Eccentric Finales," turns to Haydn's

symphonic scherzandi and examines some of the tactics used to delay the arrival of an- ticipated structural events, teasing listeners and keeping them in prolonged suspense. In chapter 7, "The Paradox of Distraction," Wheelock highlights the characterization of absentmindedness in a number of works, including the Symphonies, nos. 60 ("II dis- tratto"), 62, 88, 98, and 100. The eighth and final chapter, "The Great Art of Seem- ing Familiar," serves as an epilogue, touch- ing on a variety of issues including aes- thetics, artful play, and the role of listeners. In addition, it considers some early nine- teenth-century essays on musical wit and humor that assess the impact of Haydn's ingenious jesting.

Wheelock's command of the historical lit- erature and knowledge of Haydn's oeuvre are impressive. Her analytical essays are well illustrated, with over one hundred mu- sic examples, and are often quite insightful. However, because of decisions to avoid "technical language" (p. x) and a "rigorous theoretical approach" (p. xi), many of her discussions tend to be somewhat superficial and diffuse. William Rothstein's chapter on Haydn in his Phrase Rhythm in Tonal Music (New York: Schirmer Books, 1989) and James Webster's Haydn's "Farewell" Sym- phony and the Idea of Classical Style (Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991) have set new standards for analysis in Haydn research, and readers hoping to find similarly penetrating and engaging criticism will be disappointed by Whee- lock's effort. Nevertheless, this book suc- cessfully demonstrates that Haydn's jesting led to a greater range of expression in his music, an expansion of its formal dimen- sions, and a surprisingly sophisticated com- positional technique.

Haydn's Ingenious Jesting with Art is thor- oughly documented, with a complete bib- liography of the historical sources, a select bibliography of recent studies on musical wit and humor, and an index that includes references to individual compositions. Re- quired reading for anyone interested in Haydn, eighteenth-century style, or musi- cal expression, this book delineates an im- portant side of this composer's complex ar- tistic personality.

JAMES WILLIAM SOBASKIE

Minneapolis

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