Know anything about the history of Haydn and Hummel concerto

[Clarke Shmark]

I am a student (a trumpet player) and for my Classical and Romantic music course I want to write a research paper comparing and contrasting the Haydn and Hummel trumpet concertos. I found lots of information on Haydn's life, and one great article from ITG journal on the Hummel concerto, but not much else. If anyone knows of a resourse I could look into that discusses Haydn or Hummel's concertos in depth I would really appreciate your help. I would also be interested in information on the trumpets Haydn and Hummel were writing for.

[RGale]

The instrument Haydn and Hummel wrote for was the keyed bugle. There are several recordings of it being played ;Crispian Steele-Perkins has one out. Look for Anton Weidinger, Keyed Bugle, and various listings under the composers.

[tcutrpt]

This link may help you grasp a better understanding of the Haydn: http://www.mid-mo.net/slgreene/haydn.htm
_________________
Matt Cyr
trumpetmc@gmail.com

[trumpetmike]

The Concertos in question WERE NOT written for the Keyed Bugle, but for the keyed trumpet.
Different instrument – found the following whilst searching through the Grove Dictionary of Music, it might be useful.



Keyed trumpet
(Fr. trompette à clefs; Ger. Klappentrompete; It. tromba a chiavi).

A trumpet, generally with two double bends held in a horizontal plane. In the type developed by the Austrian trumpeter Anton Weidinger (1766–1852), the keys are brought together on one side of the instrument so as to be operated by one hand only; the other hand merely holds the instrument. Austrian specimens are usually fingered with the left hand, Italian ones with the right. The keys cover soundholes, and when opened raise the pitch: the key nearest the bell by a semitone, the next by a tone etc. Some trumpets have four, and some six keys, but five is the most common.
The first keyed trumpets were pitched in D and E . Later (c1820) they were made in G, A or A , with crooks for lower pitches; with the fixed position of the soundholes, this resulted in differing intonation and fingering, according to the crook employed. In Italy, they were also constructed in families of various sizes.
The first keyed trumpet was made in Dresden in c1770 (according to information in Schubart’s Ideen zu einer Ästhetik der Tonkunst), and in 1791–2 Nessmann built a keyed trumpet in Hamburg. This was praised by Gerber (Neues historisch-biographisches Lexikon, 1812–14). In an advertisement for his ‘Grand Public Concert’ given in Vienna (28 March 1800) Weidinger stated that work on his ‘organisirte Trompete’, which had taken seven years, was finally accomplished. He also claimed the concert to be the first public performance on the instrument, which was equipped with several keys. However, in 1798 Weidinger had played in Kozeluch’s Symphonie concertante for mandolin, trumpet, double bass, keyboard and orchestra at a public concert; the instrument used was called ‘organisirte Trompete’, so that the ‘first performance’ of 1800 must have been on a perfected model. The concert also included Haydn’s Trumpet Concerto in E , written for Weidinger as early as 1796; the Kozeluch work is less demanding and less chromatic.
With Weidinger the keyed trumpet gained considerable success as a solo instrument. It was also used in military music from about 1820, especially in Austria and Italy, but towards 1840 it was superseded by the valve trumpet. Reconstructions of keyed trumpets have been made since 1971 by the firm of Instrumentenbau Egger (Basle) and distributed by Meinl & Lauber.
The tone of the keyed trumpet is softer and less penetrating than that of the previously employed natural trumpet, frequently being compared with a sonorous oboe or clarinet.
The keyed trumpet is not to be confused with the KEYED BUGLE, a member of the flugelhorn family, although it, too, was often called trompette à clefs.

Keyed bugle [key bugle, Kent bugle, Royal Kent bugle, Kent horn etc.]
(Fr. bugle à clefs, trompette à clefs, cor à clefs; Ger. Klappenhorn, Klappenflügelhorn; It. cornetta a chiavi; Dutch Klephoorn).

A conical, wide-bore, soprano brass instrument, with sideholes controlled by keys similar to those found on woodwind instruments. It is the precursor of the modern flugelhorn. In the Hornbostel-Sachs system it is classified as a trumpet.
Keyed bugles are important in the brass band movement on both sides of the Atlantic. Early examples had only five keys, but instruments with up to 12 are found. The key closest to the bell (B on an instrument in C) is the only one that remains open when the instrument is at rest; the others are opened to provide a chromatic sequence (C , D and E by the right hand, E and F, on the lower part of the instrument, by the left), which may be augmented by alternatives and trill keys. Some later instruments have a whole-tone valve in place of the E and F keys. Most have a single loop, but short, double-wound models are also found. Most early keyed bugles were pitched in C with a crook to B ; later, others appeared in high E .
Most keyed bugles were made of copper with brass or German silver keys and fittings; instruments made of solid silver, gold and tortoiseshell also exist. Most of the fingering systems are extensions of the original concept, but the instruments made by Kersten of Dresden are notable exceptions: here an attempt was made to divide the arrangement of six keys equally between the hands. Keyed bugle mouthpieces are similar to those used on modern flugelhorns and 19th-century cornets in that they have a deep and conical cup. The mouthpieces are made of brass or ivory and are sometimes silver-plated. The rims tend to be flatter and sharper in shape than modern ones. As a result of the wide conical bore and the deep conical mouthpiece, a very mellow and woolly sound is produced, similar to but not identical with the sound of the modern flugelhorn. Because of the sonic phenomena associated with venting, the keyed bugle has a unique timbre.
The bandmaster of the Cavin Militia, Joseph Haliday (c1772–1827), added five keys to the common military bugle in Dublin in 1810. Haliday’s patent (British patent no.3334) is dated 5 May 1810. Shortly after the instrument’s invention, Haliday is believed to have sold the patent rights to the Dublin maker Matthew Pace for £50. It must have been about this time that a sixth key was added. While Haliday was stationed in Wexford with his band, J.B. Logier wrote his Introduction to the Art of Playing on the Royal Kent Bugle (1813), dedicating it to the Duke of Kent. It is probable that Logier made Haliday’s ‘bugle horn’ commercially successful by stamping ‘Royal Kent Bugle’ on instruments sold to military bandsmen (which Haliday, as a nationalistic Irishman, was unlikely to have done). Haliday attempted to discredit Logier, but he no longer had control of his invention.
One of the most famous English keyed bugle players was John Distin, whose playing may have inspired keyed bugle obbligato parts in some English operas of the period. Many English orchestral trumpeters also played the keyed bugle. Keyed bugles were commonplace in most British bands by the time of the Allied occupation of Paris in 1815. After Grand Duke Konstantin of Russia heard Distin playing with the Grenadier Guards Band, he asked the Parisian instrument maker Halary (Jean Hilaire Asté) to duplicate the English instruments. Halary’s instrument (French patent no.1849, 1821) extended the idea of the keyed bugle to a whole consort of instruments, the tenor and bass members of which he called ophicleides. In 1822 a rider was attached to the original patent allowing for an even greater range of instruments, some of which were apparently never produced. Halary’s instruments were approved by the Académie des Beaux-Arts, and the Athénée des Arts awarded him a medal for his achievement. This provoked a surge of keyed bugle making in London and the main European musical centres as well as in the USA. The American names of Graves and E.G. Wright and the British firms of Percival, Pace and Köhler represent a high standard of craftsmanship; many beautiful instruments survive in museums and private collections.
In Germany, catalogues mention Klappenhorn or Klappenflügelhorn frequently among listings of military and wind music, but the keyed bugle was not considered seriously as an orchestral or solo instrument. However, it met with great success in the USA where famous soloists like Richard Willis (the first director of the West Point Military Academy Band), Francis (‘Frank’) Johnson (a black bandmaster in Philadelphia) and Edward (‘Ned’) Kendall performed solos and band pieces that were to establish an important tradition. The earliest documented use of the keyed bugle in the USA occurred in 1815. Many performers received ornate gift or presentation bugles: Frank Johnson was given a handsome silver one by Queen Victoria; some performers are known only through the inscriptions on the bugles they were given.
By the 1840s most bands in the USA were supplied with valved instruments, and both keyed and valved instruments were used. Kendall’s famous duel with the great cornet player Patrick S. Gilmore in 1856 has been thought to signal the demise of the keyed bugle in the USA. Keyed bugles were, however, still used on both sides of the Atlantic up to the mid-1860s.
Most method books for the keyed bugle contain a selection of operatic airs and popular tunes (in solo and duet form). Band arrangements with parts for keyed bugle are common in catalogues of the period. Contemporary programmes indicate that vocal solos with keyed bugle obbligato were popular, but few selections were published in this format. An example of this type of parlour literature is a ballad by T. Phillips, entitled The Last Bugle (Philadelphia, 1822).
The keyed bugle was assigned important parts in a number of stage works including Bishop’s The Miller and his Men (1813) and Guy Mannering (1816), Phillips’s The Opera of the Russian Imposter (1822), Rossini’s Semiramide (1823) and Rudolphe Kreutzer’s Ipsiboé (1824). The parts for trompettes à clefs in the Paris score of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell and in Meyerbeer’s Robert le diable were, according to Dauverné, played on valved instruments and not the keyed bugles that the score indicated. At least two substantial works for solo bugle and orchestra are known, A.P. Heinrich’s Concerto for Kent Bugle or Klappenflügel (1834) and Joseph Küffner’s Polonaise pour le cor de signal-à-clef obligée (1823).
Substantial parts for the keyed bugle appear in the repertory of the Cyfarthfa Band, a 19th-century ensemble formed from the ranks of the Cyfarthfa Iron Works at Merthyr Tydfil, Wales; a sample of this repertory was recorded by the Wallace Collection on period instruments in 1995. The interest in period instrument performances of American Civil War brass band music has encouraged the use of keyed bugles in such ensembles. The Chestnut Brass Company has been a leader in this area, recording the music of Frank Johnson and other 19th-century American popular composers. The English composer Simon Proctor has contributed a Concerto (1991) for keyed bugle and orchestra which was given its first performance by Ralph Dudgeon and the Richmond (Virginia) Philharmonic in 1994.



As for the pieces in question, as well as finding recordings that are performed on the keyed trumpet (sleeve notes are frequently excellent on this sort of historical performance recording) I would strongly suggest obtaining a critical edition of the sheet music. Ed Tarr has produced an excellent Haydn edition, with a fair few pages of information about the historical significance. I have a feeling that he has done the same with the Hummel, I just can’t seem to find my copy this morning – I think I have let a student borrow it.

Ed Tarr’s book, “The Trumpet” is also well worth obtaining if you are thinking of doing any sort of historically informed performance or discussion.

[JackD]

This site might be useful:

http://abel.hive.no/trumpet/articles/keyed_trumpet/

One of the most important developments was an increased chromatic ability - plenty examples of low register chromaticism in the Haydn, and look out for the modulation to Cb mj in mvt. II.

[thelurker]

Check out Doctoral dissertations through interlibrary loan, it is a great way to get some obscure info.

[Nonsense Eliminator]

There is a short book called "The Keyed Trumpet, and its Greatest Virtuoso Anton Weidinger" by Reine Dahlqvist you should try to track down. (That title and the spelling of the name may not be exactly correct.)

[JackD]

From the site I posted:

Reine Dahlqvist:
The Keyed Trumpet and Its Greatest Virtuoso, Anton Weidinger. The Brass Press 1975


... apart from a comma in the wrong place, you got it exactly right.

[SCtrumpet1127]

Wow,
I was just gonna put a post, because I am writing a paper for school (Rhode Island College) about the Haydn Trumpet Concerto. What a coincidence. I would like to thank Clarke for putting this post, and those websites that people put for there replies it helped alot.

Thanks,

Sammy

[jjohnson]

I find it somewhat amusing that the Haydn concerto, one of THE most famous concertos, was actually written for an experimental instrument. I guess it's no surprise it was another 150 years before the piece gained real popularity. Anyone write any good hosaphone pieces lately? Jason

[trumpetmike]

Not specifically a hosaphone piece, but Leopold Mozart wrote a concerto for Alpine Horn which works very well on a hose.
It was performed by Dennis Brain at the Hoffnung concerts, to great amusement. A lovely little piece, really suitable for the hose!

I have also come across two works written for hose that are more recent;
Serenade for Hosepipe in F (3.76 metres) - Alan Civil
A Short Piece for a Long Piece of Garden Hose - Gordon Carr (also for hosepipe in F)

Both published by Broadbent & Dunn Ltd

[308WIN]

Clarke,
I don't mean for this to come off as a flame BUT.....

I find it a little disconcerting that a student comes here and (for lack of a better term) asks us (in his first post, no less) to do his research for him. Look, you said you found an article about Hadyn's life and only ONE article about the Hummel in an ITG journal. You're kidding me right!? It seems like every other ITG journal has blurbs about Hadyn, Hummel etc (I mean we don't have much else, really). You got some good links from the guys here, but you should've ALREADY looked in New Grove's (that should be your first stop anyway), ITG (including searching ALL the archives....most every college library has 'em) journals, and Dissertation Abstracts. Heck, most of the trumpet related dissertation abstracts involve to some extent Hadyn, Hummel, keyed trumpets etc. Also, if this is a legitimate research paper, internet references are not acceptable as sources. I teach college students and would not consider this a legitimate reference for a research paper. If you use the internet as a "card catalog" to get you to the real source, then that's fine. But don't use it as your sole source of information. Doing so cheapens your efforts, and reduces the legitimacy of the paper. There's a reason many call the internet the "errornet". Even if your library is small, most colleges have an inter-library loan program and enable you to sign out books from other libraries. Use those sources and you will find all the information you could ever want.

Rich