MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Haydn, (M.): 5 Symphonies

Musicologist Karl Geiringer has claimed that Michael Haydn has not received the recognition he deserves from posterity, taking the view that his church music, his choruses for male voices, and many of his instrumental works are on a respectable level and ought to be revived.

Michael Haydn never compiled a thematic catalog of his works, nor did he ever supervise the making of one. The earliest catalog was compiled in 1808 by Nikolaus Lang for his 'Biographische Skizze' (Biographical Sketch). In 1907 Lothar Perger compiled a catalogue of his orchestral works, the Perger-Verzeichnis, for Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Österreich, which is somewhat more reliable than Lang's catalog and attaches P. (for Perger) numbers to many of Haydn's instrumental works. And in 1915 Anton Maria Klafsky undertook a similar work for Michael's sacred vocal music. In 1982, Charles H. Sherman, who has edited scores of many of his symphonies for Doblinger, published a chronological catalog of them which some recording companies have adopted. Later, in 1991, Sherman joined forces with T. Donley Thomas to publish a chronological catalog of Michael's complete works using a single continuous range of numbers after Ludwig Ritter von Köchel's pioneering catalog of all Mozart's works and Otto Erich Deutsch's similar comprehensive compendium for all Schubert's works. Further important amendments to the Sherman/Thomas catalogue have been made by Dwight Blazin.

The task of cataloging Michael's music is made easier by the fact that he almost always entered the date of completion on his manuscripts. Guesswork as to date was necessary only where autograph manuscripts did not survive.