Haydn wrote over two dozen works for the theater c.1751–96, a thirty-five year period that began and ended with German Singspiel composition. Italian opera dominated, however, especially from 1762 to 1791, the years encompassing Haydn's employment at the Esterházy court and his first London visit. Representing all the major operatic genres prominent in the second half of the eighteenth century – including intermezzo, opera buffa, opera seria, dramma giocoso, and Singspiel (for traditional and marionette opera stages) – this repertory demonstrates Haydn's development from fledgling dramatic composer to that of fully competent Opernkapellmeister. Because of the paucity of surviving sources, it is difficult to make a knowledgeable assessment of the composer's early forays into Singspiel for the German stage in Vienna during the 1750s and of other works in his native language written for the marionette theater at Eszterháza. This chapter concentrates on Haydn's Italian operas, the major interest of his primary patron and of opera audiences in general during the second half of the eighteenth century.

Context

Before learning to play the violin or the keyboard, Haydn was taught to sing by his father. Recruited at the age of eight to sing in the choir school at St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna on the strength of his pure, sonorous voice And exceptional mastery of the vocal trill, Haydn sang at church services there twice daily and at numerous religious and other local functions. He later claimed to have learned more from singing and hearing the music he was making than from formal lessons. Narrowly avoiding castration to preserve his soprano voice, Haydn was unceremoniously dismissed from the choir school when his voice changed around the age of sixteen, leaving him to seek other employment in his adopted city.