Piano amateurs should realize that Haydn's piano music is definitely more than a collection of silly menus, as a safe alternative to Beethoven's much more difficult sonatas. The playful and light in Haydn presupposes the terrifying, which (like mountain massifs, overhanging rocks and swirling seas) evokes feelings of 'Erhabene' in the audience. Thus Haydn's London symphonies are preceded by ominous
… introductions, as if the unpretentious entertainment had to be conquered from the troubles that threatened the bourgeois existence of those days. Haydn's entertainment is therefore not a sign of peasant smartness, as has often been thought, but of great spirit. Fortunately, there are also composers in our time who are informed by Haydn's playful attitude. Such a composer is John McCabe, who has shown himself to be just as versatile and productive in his oeuvre as his 18th-century example. John McCabe is also a pianist, however, who can count a now legendary recording of all Haydn sonatas among his discography. Even Haydn's early piano sonatas were played with love and concentration by McCabe, as if the existence of each of these seemingly insignificant little things were a miracle. But the renditions of later sonatas are also almost subdued in comparison to the virtuosity of Ronald Brautigam, for example. McCabe's careful approach, in other words, stays in touch with the symphonic dimensions of Haydn's quartets, symphonies and oratorios. McCabe's full rendition of Haydn's Piano Sonatas includes important additions, such as the Variations in F minor and the Haydn-authorized adaptation of Die sieben letzten Worte des Erlösers am Kreuz. (HJ)more
