Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn was an Austrian composer. He was one of the most important, prolific and prominent composers of the classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these genres. He was also instrumental in the development of the piano trio and in the evolution of sonata form. Joseph Haydn was born in Rohrau, Austria, a village near the border with Hungary. His father was Mathias Haydn, a wheelwright who also served as "Marktrichter", an office akin to village mayor. Haydn's mother, the former Maria Koller, had previously worked as a cook in the palace of Count Harrach, the presiding aristocrat of Rohrau. Neither parent could read music. However, Mathias was an enthusiastic folk musician, who during the journeyman period of his career had taught himself to play the harp. Haydn's parents had noticed that their son was musically talented and knew that in Rohrau he would have no chance to obtain any serious musical training. It was for this reason that they accepted a proposal from their relative Johann Matthias Frankh, the schoolmaster and choirmaster in Hainburg, that Haydn be apprenticed to Frankh in his home to train as a musician.
There is reason to think that Haydn's singing impressed those who heard him, because he was soon brought to the attention of Georg von Reutter, the director of music in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna, who was touring the provinces looking for talented choirboys. Haydn passed his audition with Reutter, and in 1740 moved to Vienna, where he worked for the next nine years as a chorister, after 1745 in the company of his younger brother Michael. Haydn lived in Reutter's home with the other five choirboys. He was instructed in Latin and other school subjects as well as voice, violin, and keyboard. Reutter was of little help to Haydn in the areas of music theory and composition, giving him only two lessons in his entire time as chorister. However, since St. Stephen's was one of the leading musical centers in Europe, Haydn was able to learn a great deal simply by serving as a professional musician there.

HIS CONTRIBUTIONS
His most important contribution was to the symphony
· He wrote 90 works (symphonies) between 1760 and 1790
· These are the cornerstone of symphonic repertory
· The symphonies were the property of Prince Nikolaus and were exclusively for his enjoyment and for that of his guests
· 1799 - Haydn obtained permission to publish and he reached a much wider audience
· By mid 1780's he was considered the most accomplished and original of living active composers
· Haydn and Mozart became good friends

His Works
Smphonies, quartets, concertos and keyboard works poured from the pen of Joseph Haydn, making him one of the most important figures in classical music. Joseph Haydn: as man, musician, administrator, unofficial diplomat, inspired creator and master craftsman, he personified the best in humanity. No man is faultless, but Haydn might be said to have possessed more than the normal share of virtues. In his warmth, generosity and humility, with his humour, his total lack of malice and his transparent honesty, he endeared himself to audiences and musicians wherever he went.
The music of the Classical era (c. 1750–1830) was based on preconceived notions of order, proportion and grace. Predominant were beauty and symmetry of form, which combined to create an effectively Utopian image, an idealisation of universal experience. In the Romantic age (which Haydn anticipated, and which his pupil Beethoven came close to defining in his own revolutionary output), from the early 1800s onwards, this was gradually replaced by a cult of individual expression, the crystalisation of the experience of the moment, the unfettered confession of powerful emotions and primal urges, the glorification of sensuality, a flirtation with the supernatural, an emphasis on spontaneity and improvisation, and the cultivation of extremes – emotional, sensual, spiritual and structural. Form was not a receptacle but a by-product of emotion, to be generated from within. In Haydn, this is reflected in the Hungarian’ references that crop up in a number of his later works, such as the D major Piano Concerto and the late G major Piano Trio, with its famous ‘Gypsy’ Rondo. It was a trend directly connected to politics.
Inevitably, the ideals and consequences of the French Revolution were a source of great alarm to the rulers of the crumbling Holy Roman Empire. As a consequence, Austria, with Vienna as its capital, became a both a bastion against French imperialism and an efficient police state, in which liberalism, both political and philosophical, was ruthlessly suppressed. But the people of Vienna were not natural revolutionaries, and neither was Haydn. Indeed the Viennese were noted for their political apathy. Exceptions to this were during the two occupations by the French in 1805 and 1809 , which brought considerable hardship to the city in the form of monetary crises, serious food shortages and a fleeing population, while Austria as a whole suffered serious political and territorial setbacks.