Joseph Haydn, "The Creation" - Part I

Joseph Haydn, "The Creation"

Haydn’s greatest work, The Creation was completed in 1797. He used the through-composed to create the most powerful, extraordinary works of the eighteenth-century. The great contrast of soft vs. loud, minor vs. major, unison vs. full harmony, “dry” pizzicato vs. full orchestra to illustrate the differences between light and chaos, and something before or after creation (1). The original text of this libretto was English, entitled “The Creation of the World”. It depicted the seven days of creation in Genesis, chapter one to verse 3 of Chapter two and John Milton’s Paradise Lost. The book of Psalms was another source of the libretto, especially in Psalm 19, verse 1-5 (for the items 12 and 13) and chapter 54, verse 27-30 (for items No.28). In Vienna, Gottfried van Swieten translated and adapted this libretto into German. Therefore, The Creation became the first large-scale choral work published to be in bilingual text in musical history. But the original text underwent for several revisions afterward. It was performed over 40 times in Vienna. Besides, in the year following year, The Creation became extremely popular all over Europe.

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(1)Juliet Meyers, Haydn and His World (Chichester, 1997), p.66

There were thirty-three movements in The Creation. In some editions, there one additional item because of the subdivision is different, such as Eulenburg’s version. For example, Eulenburg edition divided song No. 27 into three individual pieces. In this essay, the edition of Novello has be used to illustrate the no. of the movement.

According to Temperley, in his book of Haydn, The Creation. The original text can be divided into three parts. Part One covered the first four days of creation with musical introduction to represent the chaos by using the key of C minor; Part Two cover the fifth and sixth days of creation during which the animals and humans were created. Part Three deal with Adam and Eve’s gratitude and mutual love in the Garden of Eden.

More details are shown in the table below (2):

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(2) Nicholas Temperley, Haydn: The Creation, (Cambridge, 1991), p.48
(3)Lecture note from Dr. David Evans (School of Music, UWB)

Parts 1 and 2 represent the six days of creation. Each day has a similar planning. Those begin with narration, continuing with descriptive commentary and end with a hymn of praise. The narrative passages are sung by soprano called Gabriel, tenor called Uriel and bass called Raphael (4).

We only look from part division, the aesthetic construction can be found in such a large-scale of work. It should be a foundation structure for Haydn to build up the music afterward. The setting of the text, orchestration and voices arrangement are also link with each other logically. He used his imagination and sense to plan and arrange the music. Ideally, the pictures of the days of creation can be seen under his excellent sense of descriptive. In eighteenth-century vocal music, there was no other piece like Haydn’s The Creation.
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(4)Jones, Oxford Composer Companions, edited by David Wyn Jone, (New York, 2002)

Setting of the text

Each of the days has a similar text setting. It roughly contains four sections as shown below (5): Take Second Day as an example 1.

Section 1/ Prose from Genesis, in the past tense, for recitative.
Section 2/ Commentary in verse, in the present tense, for aria or ensemble.
Section 3/ Prose, in the past tense, for a recitative introduction…
Section 4/ Choral hymn of praise by the heavenly host.

Example 1
(The Second Day, no.3)

Section 1/ Prose from Genesis, in the past tense, for bass recitative.


【Recitative】And God made the firmament, and divided the waters, which were under the firmament, from the waters, which were above the firmament, and it was so.

Section 2/ Commentary in verse, in the present tense, it was set for bass aria or ensemble.
Outrageous storms now dreadful arose; as chaff by the winds are impelled the clouds. By heaven’s fire the sky is enflamed and awful rolled the thunders on high. Now from the floods in streams ascend reviving showers of rain, the dreary wasteful hail, the light and flaky snow.

(The Second Day, no.4)

Section 3/ Prose, in the past tense, for a soprano recitative introducing…

【Air】The marvelous work beholds amazed the glorious hierarchy of Heaven

Section 4/ Choral hymn of praise by the heavenly host

【Chorus】and to the ethereal vaults resound the praise of God and of the second day.

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(5) Op. cit Nicholas Temperley, p.21

From example 1, the prose for the first half bass recitative comes from Genesis, Chapter One, verse six to seven. Another half of the bass recitative is a kind of commentary on how the environment around was in that period of time. But in the section three (Aria) that mentioned in example 1, the section divisions can not be seen clearly. In the last section of the second day ends with a Choral hymn of praise. However, this division can be seen clearly from song no.11 which will be discussed later.

Haydn attempted to write his music in accordance with the setting of the text that I mentioned above such as key signature, musical ideas and orchestration etc.

I/ Keys are related to the setting of text.

Generally, the minor and major keys are used in different contexts. Also, Haydn also used the minor key to create the atmosphere of the scenery before created. In the opening, Haydn used full orchestra playing in the key of C minor to describe the chaos and darkness. Take item.7 as example 2. Haydn used D minor key to describe the situation before the mountains and rocks were merge. He changes measure 28 to F major in order to matching the words that describe the mountains and rocks emerging afterwards.

Example 2

Words:-
D minor [Rolling in foaming billows uplifted roars the boist’rous sea.]
F major [Mountains and rocks now emerge;]

Score:-

Example 2

According to the survey from MUSO, Feb/Mar 07, Issue 27, the key signature is related to the colour. For example, c major is white and c minor is black. This can be traced from how Haydn used key signatures as colour in The Creation. Moreover, Haydn also linked his key signatures with the meaning of the word. (See example 3 below)

Example 3

II/ The Musical Ideas are related to the setting of text.

Haydn interwove his musical ideas into the text as well. Take item no.11, Awake the Harp as an example 4, it is a Chorus that represents the Heavenly Host, called on to praise God. If you remember what I mentioned in the plan of text setting before, the division of part four can be seen clearly here. The words are shown below:

Awake the harp, the lyre awake!
In shout and joy your voices raise!
In triumph sing the mighty Lord!
For the heavens and earth has clothed in stately dress.

Obviously, the words are calling people to praise God. This piece starts with a full chorus in singing ‘Awake the harp’ as if they are calling people to praise. (See example 4 below)

Moreover, Haydn also used the technique of ‘call and respond’ in the third beat of bar 1 and strings parts and woodwind parts in the third beat of bar 2 as well. The chorus part as appears as it is calling people to praise and the strings parts respond to the call from chorus. (See example 4 below) Later on, the chorus has the same technique in bar 11.

Example 4

Go to Part II

written by Cheng Po Chun (Eva)@2007