Opus 33 no 3 haydn biography

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When Haydn published his Op. 33 quartets and claimed he had written them in a “new and special style” it was neither an empty boast nor necessarily particularly newsworthy; every new work the master wrote seems to reveal further, unforeseen facets of his fertile imagination.

Haydn, often lauded for his considerable wit, is a prestidigitator extraordinaire, fully conversant in misdirection, taking delight in, and exploiting fully, ambiguities of form and function. He lives in the Newtonian world of expected relationships, but as soon as one peers more closely quantum weirdnesses start to crop up.

He wastes no time in toying with his audience and players in the opening of the Quartet in C Major, Op.

33 No. 3 (“the Bird”). A primary task at the start of any tonal work is to establish the key of the piece, to provide context, to set the stage upon which the action of the play will transpire. It takes at least three notes to make a chor Joseph Haydn: String Quartet in C major, Op. 33, No. 3, “The ... BOV