Joseph Haydn

NAME Franz Joseph Haydn

WHAT FAMOUS FOR Known as the “Father of the Symphony” and the “Father of the String Quartet,” Haydn helped shape the Classical style of music. His innovative symphonies, quartets, and oratorios influenced Mozart and Beethoven, and his sense of structure, wit, and emotional range became foundational to Western classical music.

BIRTH Joseph Haydn was born on March 31, 1732 (or possibly April 1) in the village of Rohrau, Lower Austria, near the Hungarian border. He was the second of twelve children.​

FAMILY BACKGROUND Haydn's father, Mathias (or Matthias) Haydn, was a wheelwright who also served as "Marktrichter" (marketplace supervisor or village mayor). His mother, Maria Koller, had worked as a cook in the palace of Count Harrach before her marriage. 

Neither parent could read music, though Mathias was an enthusiastic folk musician who had taught himself to play the harp during his journeyman years. 

Two of Haydn's siblings also became professional musicians: his younger brother Michael Haydn became a highly regarded composer, and another brother, Johann Evangelist, was a tenor.​

CHILDHOOD Haydn grew up in an area of considerable ethnic diversity near the Austrian-Hungarian border. The family home was a modest dwelling in a village of clay houses thatched with straw. Despite humble circumstances, the household was filled with music, with family members regularly singing together. At age five, Haydn could already "sing all my father's simple easy pieces correctly".​ (1)

1825 depiction of the house where Joseph Haydn was born and spent his early childhood.

Around 1737 or 1738, when Haydn was approximately six years old, Johann Matthias Frankh, a cousin of Mathias Haydn by marriage and schoolmaster in the nearby town of Hainburg, heard the boy sing and was so impressed that he offered to take him in for musical training. Haydn's parents, recognizing their son's musical gift and knowing he would have no chance for serious musical training in Rohrau, accepted the proposal. Haydn never again lived with his parents.​

Life in the Frankh household was harsh for young Haydn. He later remembered "being frequently hungry and humiliated by the filthy state of his clothing," and received "more floggings than food". However, he quickly profited from his musical training and could soon play both harpsichord and violin, while singing treble parts in the church choir.​ (2)

EDUCATION In 1739, Haydn's impressive singing brought him to the attention of Georg Reutter the Younger (or Georg von Reutter), the director of music at St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna, who was visiting Hainburg seeking new choirboys. After passing his audition, eight-year-old Haydn moved to Vienna in 1740, where he worked for the next nine years as a chorister.​

Haydn lived in the Kapellhaus next to the cathedral with Reutter, Reutter's family, and the other choirboys (his younger brother Michael joined in 1745). The choirboys were instructed in Latin and other school subjects as well as voice, violin, and keyboard. However, Reutter was of little help in music theory and composition, giving Haydn only two lessons in his entire time as chorister. Nevertheless, since St. Stephen's was one of the leading musical centers in Europe, Haydn learned a great deal simply by serving as a professional musician there.​

Like Frankh before him, Reutter did not always ensure Haydn was properly fed. Haydn was motivated to sing well in hopes of gaining invitations to perform before aristocratic audiences, where singers were usually served refreshments.​

In 1749, Haydn's voice broke, and after cutting off the pigtail of a fellow chorister in a prank, he was caned by Reutter and dismissed from the choir, which also meant losing his home.​

After leaving the choir, Haydn faced several challenging years struggling to make a living as a freelance musician in Vienna. He took on various jobs including teaching, playing violin, and accompanying singers. During this difficult period, Haydn began to compose his first works and studied counterpoint with the renowned Italian composer Nicola Porpora (1686-1768). Working for Porpora—"cleaning shoes, beating his coat and arranging his antique periwig"—Haydn was taught composition in return. This relationship proved invaluable, as Porpora introduced Haydn to the Italian style of composition and helped him refine his craft. Haydn also studied the famous textbook "Gradus ad Parnassum" by Johann Joseph Fux.​ (1)

CAREER RECORD 1749–1757: Haydn worked as a music teacher, street serenader, and accompanist, barely earning a living. During this time, he served briefly as an accompanist and secretary to the renowned Italian composer and opera master Nicola Porpora, from whom he gained valuable compositional advice.

1757–1760: His first major appointment was as Music Director for Count Karl von Morzin. He wrote his first symphonies for the Count's orchestra.

1761–1790: Haydn was first appointed Vice-Kapellmeister (1761) and later Kapellmeister (Music Director) (1766) to the incredibly wealthy and powerful Hungarian princely family of Esterházy.

1791–1792 and 1794–1795: Following the death of Prince Nikolaus I Esterházy, Haydn was free to travel. He accepted a lucrative offer from impresario Johann Peter Salomon to visit London.

1795–1809: He returned to the service of the new Prince Esterházy, but his duties were light.

APPEARANCE Haydn was a man of short stature and slender build. His face was marked by an unfortunate case of smallpox contracted in his childhood, which left his complexion pitted and dark, a feature he was self-conscious about. He had a prominent, aquiline nose.

According to the historian  H. C. Schonberg Joseph Haydn was "short and dark, his face was pitted by smallpox, his legs were too short for his body. His nose had a polyp that threw it out of shape, and he appears to have been sensitive about it."(1)

Sensitive about his looks, Haydn was quite surprised when women flocked to him during his London visits. (3)

About a dozen portraits of Haydn exist from various periods of his life. Seven authentic portraits are documented, painted by artists including Ludwig Guttenbrunn (1770), John Hoppner (1791), Thomas Hardy (1792), George Dance (1794), William Daniell (1794), and Johann Zitterer (two portraits in 1795).​

Haydn as portrayed by John Hoppner in England in 1791

FASHION For most of his career with the Esterházy family, Haydn wore the servant's livery that befitted his social rank as a court employee. His contract specified that he and his musicians should appear "neatly in white stockings, white linen, powdered, and either with pigtail or hairbag". 

Outside of court duties, especially during his successful London years, Haydn dressed in the fashionable, well-tailored attire of a successful, respected gentleman.

CHARACTER Haydn was known for his pious (deeply religious) and optimistic nature. He was an incredibly hard worker, dedicated to his craft, and possessed a quiet sense of duty. 

Haydn was generally described as good-humoured, kind, and generous, especially to his musicians and subordinates. His nickname among his musicians was Papa Haydn due to his fatherly care for them. The nickname originated from the younger orchestral players who admired his kindness, patience, good humor, and the way he defended them before Prince Nikolaus Esterházy when issues arose.

Outside the world of business, Haydn was very generous. He supported his brother Johann for decades, gave substantial sums to relatives and servants, and volunteered his services for charitable concerts. He even offered to teach the two infant sons of Mozart for free after their father's death.​

SPEAKING VOICE Haydn spoke with a gentle Austrian accent and was said to have a soft-spoken, friendly manner, equally at ease with nobles and musicians.

SENSE OF HUMOUR Haydn's music is famous for its wit and humor. His Symphony No. 94 earned the nickname "The Surprise" due to a sudden loud chord in the slow movement, which Haydn reputedly said "will make the ladies scream". He also wrote quartets that seemed to tease musicians with unexpected pauses and twists, reflecting his lighthearted intelligence. (4)

RELATIONSHIPS Haydn fell in love with Therese Keller while working for Count Morzin, but she was earmarked by her family for religious life and eventually joined a nunnery. After five years of prompting by her father Johann Keller and influenced by "a young man's natural urges," Haydn married Therese's older sister, Maria Anna Theresia Keller, on November 26, 1760 at St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna.​ (5)

The marriage was completely unhappy from the outset. Maria Anna was cold, unsympathetic to his music, and allegedly wasteful. The marriage produced no children, and since divorce was not permitted by the laws of the time, "the couple spent countless drab and miserable years together". By the 1770s, Haydn and his wife were completely estranged. 

Haydn bluntly stated: "My wife was unable to bear children, and for this reason, I was less indifferent towards the attractions of other women than I might have otherwise been".​

In 1791, Haydn arrived in England for his lucrative visits. Maria Anna stayed in Vienna. After his return home in the mid-1790s, Haydn bought a house in a quiet Viennese suburb and they moved in together in 1796. Maria Anna suffered from severe rheumatism and chronic pain, and she traveled to a spa in Baden for her health. She died there on March 20, 1800. Haydn's friend Fredrick Silverstolpe reported: "Haydn is now writing with new zeal since he has had the good luck to lose his nasty wife".​ (6)

During his marriage, Haydn conducted a long-term love affair with the singer Luigia Polzelli. He also had relationships with pianist and widow Marianne von Genzinger and amateur musician Rebecca Schroeter. All of these women were considerably younger than him.​ Haydn bluntly stated: "My wife was unable to bear children, and for this reason, I was less indifferent towards the attractions of other women than I might have otherwise been".​ (6)

Anna Haydn Unauthenticated miniature attributed to Ludwig Guttenbrunn

Haydn enjoyed a close friendship with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The two composers, a generation apart, met in Vienna around Christmas 1783. They became good friends, playing together in impromptu quartets, with Haydn on violin and Mozart playing viola. Mozart affectionately addressed Haydn as "Papa" and used the informal "du" form of speech. 

In 1785, Mozart dedicated his six "Haydn Quartets" to his older friend, writing that he was sending his "six sons" to his "best friend". Haydn declared: "I tell you before God, and as an honest man, your son is the greatest composer known to me by person and repute". When Mozart died in 1791, Haydn was "quite beside [himself] over his death," telling others "I love him too much".​

Haydn also briefly taught the young Ludwig van Beethoven, though Beethoven later claimed, somewhat ungraciously, that he had “learned nothing from Haydn.”

MONEY AND FAME During his early years, he was often impoverished. His salary under the Esterházy family was substantial and stable, making him a comfortably well-off court official. His London trips made him wealthy and financially independent.

Haydn's early years of poverty and awareness of the financial precariousness of musical life made him astute and even sharp in his business dealings. While some wealthy contemporaries were surprised at his business acumen, this might be viewed sympathetically in light of his struggles with poverty during his freelance years.​

Haydn achieved international fame in his lifetime, particularly after the London tours. He was celebrated across Europe, and his later public appearances in Vienna were major social events. He was arguably the most famous living composer in the world by the time of his death.

FOOD AND DRINK His early years were marked by scarcity, but later in life, he enjoyed the rich, formal food of the aristocratic courts. He had a noted fondness for good wine. Haydn was known for hospitality but never excess.

COMPOSING CAREER As Joseph Haydn’s reputation grew, his music began echoing through ever grander rooms — the kind with chandeliers the size of small elephants and nobles who wore lace cuffs you could use as tablecloths. One performance at the home of Baron von Fürnberg proved fateful: it earned him a proper job with Count Morzin in Bohemia around 1757. For the first time in his life, Haydn had a steady income, a small orchestra to command, and someone else footing the bill for candles and ink. He even married, which in the 18th century was considered the pinnacle of stability, though it would turn out to be one of his less inspired decisions.

When Count Morzin went bankrupt — an occupational hazard of the minor aristocracy — Haydn barely had time to pack before receiving a better offer. In 1761, he was hired by Prince Paul Anton Esterházy, whose family was so rich that they probably measured wealth in units of palaces. Haydn became Vice-Kapellmeister and, in due course, full Kapellmeister after his elderly superior passed away.

Being a “house officer” for the Esterházys meant Haydn was part servant, part celebrity, and entirely at their beck and call. He wore powdered wigs and white stockings, followed the family as they migrated between estates, and was contractually forbidden from getting too chummy with the other musicians. (“No undue familiarity,” his contract warned, as if Haydn were likely to start a food fight in the orchestra pit.)

Despite the starch and etiquette, the post was a dream come true for a composer. The Esterházy princes — first Paul Anton and then the music-mad Nikolaus I — adored music and gave Haydn daily access to his own private orchestra. During his thirty years in service, he wrote symphonies, operas, and chamber pieces with the steady enthusiasm of a man who’d discovered both caffeine and inspiration.

Prince Nikolaus had his own eccentricities, not least his fondness for the baryton, a sort of musical hybrid between a cello and a furniture creak. Between 1765 and 1775, Haydn dutifully composed around 200 works for the thing, presumably while wondering if the prince might one day switch to something more popular. Happily, around 1775, Nikolaus did — to opera. Haydn suddenly found himself not only composing but also running an entire theater company, training singers, and substituting arias into other people’s operas, a kind of 18th-century remix culture.

In 1779, a small miracle occurred: Haydn’s contract was rewritten to allow him to publish his own music. Until then, everything he composed technically belonged to the Esterházy family, like an especially musical household appliance. Now he could sell his work to publishers across Europe — and he did, with gusto. His fame blossomed, and soon his string quartets and symphonies were in demand from Paris to Prague.

By the 1780s, Haydn had become a curious contradiction — Europe’s most celebrated composer, but one effectively confined to a palace in the Hungarian countryside. When Prince Nikolaus died in 1790, his successor immediately downsized the orchestra, freeing the 60-year-old Haydn to accept an offer that must have seemed like a holiday: a concert series in London.

The English adored him. He was hailed as a genius, mobbed at concerts, and treated like musical royalty. One observer reported that Haydn’s presence “so electrified the audience” that people sat bolt upright for the entire performance — a rare feat in Georgian London. He wrote twelve “London Symphonies” during his visits (1791–1792 and 1794–1795), earning a fortune in the process. By the time he returned home, he was considerably wealthier, internationally adored, and still entirely unspoiled. He even declined offers to stay in London indefinitely, preferring to go back to Vienna — possibly the only man in history to leave England for a quieter life.

Back in Austria, Haydn’s final creative chapter began with his grand oratorios The Creation (1798) and The Seasons (1801), both written with librettos by Baron Gottfried van Swieten. These works made him the toast of Europe all over again. Until 1802, he continued composing annual masses for the Esterházy family, but as his health declined, the notes that once flowed so effortlessly began to fade. His body failed before his imagination did — an affliction that must have been particularly cruel for a man who’d spent his entire life hearing beauty in his head and bringing it into the world.

MUSIC AND ARTS Music was his life's work and passion. He was an avid connoisseur of opera and was responsible for programming and often conducting hundreds of performances during his time at Esterháza. He respected Italian opera, which was popular at court.

His musical output was prodigious: 104 symphonies (one lost), 83 string quartets, over 20 concertos, 60 piano sonatas, numerous operas, masses, and other works.​ Haydn essentially established the symphonic and quartet forms that defined the Classical era. His influence on Mozart and Beethoven cemented his legacy as one of music’s founding masters.

LITERATURE The historical view of Haydn was long that he was Haydn not a literary man, though he drew inspiration from sacred texts and Milton’s Paradise Lost for The Creation. His letters reveal warmth, humor, and humility rather than intellectual pretension.  However, this view was drastically altered in 1976 with the publication of Joseph Haydn und die Literatur seiner Zeit, which revealed Haydn's involvement in literary salons and included an itemized list of his library of literary works.

NATURE Haydn’s relationship with the natural world was largely expressed through his music rather than direct observation. His Creation oratorio (1798) celebrated the beauty and order of nature as a divine work, capturing in sound everything from birdsong to sunrise. His deep reverence for nature reflected the Enlightenment belief in a rational, harmonious universe designed by God.

PETS Haydn had a pet parrot named Jaco, who became something of a celebrity among the composer’s guests at his home near Vienna. Jaco was known to greet visitors and was reportedly quite talkative — a companion who amused Haydn and his household alike. 

The parrot enjoyed warm days in its cage in Haydn's Vienna courtyard, mocking the sparrows on the neighbors' roofs. It could whistle a full octave, sing the opening of the national anthem, and call out "Come, Papa Haydn, to the beautiful Paperi!". The parrot was listed in the catalogue of the auction of Haydn's personal collection following his death in 1809.

HOBBIES AND SPORTS Aside from music, Haydn enjoyed simple social pleasures — conversation, wine, and card games among friends. Though not athletic, he took great joy in walking and gardening during his later years at his home in Gumpendorf near Vienna, finding peace in his domestic routines.

SCIENCE AND MATHS Haydn’s music reflected the rational order admired by Enlightenment thinkers. His symphonies and string quartets often displayed an almost mathematical precision — carefully structured, balanced, and logical. This earned him the nickname “Father of the Symphony” for his pioneering approach to musical architecture.

PHILOSOPHY & THEOLOGY Haydn was a man of profound and joyful faith, a devout Catholic who believed his musical gift was granted by God. He began many of his scores with the words “In nomine Domini” (“In the name of the Lord”) and ended them with “Laus Deo” (“Praise be to God”), viewing his art as an act of worship. His spirituality was not austere but radiant — rooted in what one biographer called “a sense of the abundance of life.” He saw the world as full of joy, possibility, and divine order, embracing existence with gratitude and humility. (4)

When struggling with composition, Haydn often turned to prayer. He would pace his room, rosary in hand, reciting Hail Marys until inspiration struck. He habitually inscribed pious mottos at the end of his works, such as “To God alone and to each his own,” “Glory be to God in the highest,” and “Praise to God and the blessed Virgin Mary with the Holy Spirit.”

Haydn claimed that even his instrumental music carried moral meaning, and his great oratorios The Creation and The Seasons were towering expressions of his sacred vision. “I was never as devout as when I was at work on The Creation,” he told his biographer. “I fell to my knees daily.” His masses, too, have been described as “artistic expressions of Austrian piety and of the concept of God as dispenser of earthly joy.” (9)

In spirit, Haydn’s faith reflected the Enlightenment ideal that God and Nature were not in conflict but in harmony. He upheld the principle of religious tolerance, once saying that he “left every man to his own conviction and recognized all as brothers.

POLITICS In late August 1789, shortly after the fall of the Bastille, Haydn either agreed or proposed to Parisian publisher Jean-Georges Sieber that one of four new symphonies under negotiation "should be called The National Symphony". This raises intriguing questions about the composer's political sympathies and knowledge of events in France, though in the end Haydn never wrote any of the four symphonies. Haydn's attitudes toward the French Revolution later in life were not necessarily those he held in 1789, and he was no doubt horrified by subsequent events.​

During Napoleon's bombardment of Vienna in May 1809, Haydn provided a reassuring presence to those around him. When four shots fell near his house, rattling windows and doors, he loudly proclaimed: "Don't be afraid, children, where Haydn is, no harm can reach you". Despite his words of reassurance, Haydn said "quite bad things about Napoleon" and refused to meet him when Napoleon sent officers requesting an audience, saying "This short man with his big head, I won't see him". Napoleon ordered a guard of honor to be stationed at Haydn's house, which was "more like house arrest but, officially, they put it as a Guard of Honor".​

Haydn's patriotism for Austria was fired by what he experienced in England. Soon after his return, when commissioned to compose a national song (Volkslied) by the Austrian authorities for Emperor Francis II, he modeled his composition "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser" upon "God Save the King". The melody later became famous as “Deutschland über Alles” — the tune of the German national anthem. It was first performed on the Emperor’s birthday, February 12, 1797, and became a patriotic symbol throughout Austria and beyond. (8)

SCANDAL The main "scandal" was Haydn's unhappy marriage and his well-known adulterous relationship with Luigia Polzelli. In the context of 18th-century court life, however, such private affairs, particularly among the aristocracy and their staff, were common and rarely a career impediment.

His skull’s fate after death certainly qualifies as posthumous intrigue. His head was stolen by phrenologists keen to study the “shape” of genius. A substitute skull was placed in his tomb, and when the original was finally restored in 1954, both were left there. Thus, Haydn’s tomb today contains two skulls.

MILITARY RECORD As a court musician and servant of the Esterházy family, he was exempt from military service.

During the Napoleonic invasion of Vienna in 1809, he remained in his home, calm in the face of cannon fire. Soldiers reportedly guarded his house out of respect for his fame and the Emperor’s admiration.

HEALTH AND PHYSICAL FITNESS Haydn suffered from nasal polyps for much of his life — a painful and recurrent condition that left his nose “bulbous” and “disfigured,” according to contemporaries. He underwent several surgical procedures, writing in 1783 that one such operation left him “completely unable to work.”

Haydn remained a remarkably healthy man well into old age. At a time when the average European life expectancy was just 33.3 years, Haydn undertook the arduous journey to England in 1791 at age 59, and again in 1794 at age 62. Still composing masterworks into his 69th year, he was considered an ageless wonder.​

However, symptoms of illness first became apparent around 1799. His symptoms—swollen legs, exhaustion, failing memory—pointed to arteriosclerosis. Modern medical analysis suggests he developed subcortical vascular encephalopathy (SVE) caused by progressive cerebral small vessel disease. Important features included mood changes, urinary symptoms, and particularly a characteristic gait disturbance, while dementia was only mild and occurred later. He was severely disabled by these symptoms and often reported difficulties in completing his last oratorio The Seasons.​

Haydn's health declined precipitously after 1805, and by age 73 he was an invalid. He signed his last will on February 7, 1809. After completing his last quartet in 1803, although he continued to have musical ideas, he was unable to physically write them down or edit them properly. The disease stopped his long career as a composer and conductor at age 73.​

HOMES During his childhood and early career, Josef Haydn lived in a series of modest homes that reflected his gradual rise from provincial obscurity to international fame.

He was born in Rohrau, a small village on the Austro-Hungarian border, where he lived until about age six. He then moved to Hainburg, lodging with his relative Johann Matthias Frankh, a choirmaster who introduced him to music and gave him his first formal training.

At around age eight, Haydn was recruited to sing in the choir of St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, where he lived in the Kapellhaus from 1740 to 1749. After his voice broke, he left the choir and spent several difficult years in various lodgings around Vienna, teaching music and working as a struggling freelancer.

From 1761 onward, Haydn’s fortunes changed when he entered the service of the wealthy Esterházy family. His work required him to move between their grand residences — Schloss Esterházy in Eisenstadt, Austria, and later the lavish Esterháza Palace in Fertőd, Hungary, completed in 1766.

That same year, he bought a Baroque-style house in Eisenstadt (now 21 Haydngasse), where he lived with his wife Maria Anna until 1778. The house has since become the Haydn Museum, preserving many of his personal effects.

In 1797, flush with earnings from his two celebrated London tours, Haydn purchased a comfortable suburban home in Gumpendorf, then outside Vienna (now 19 Haydngasse). He had it remodeled with an added upper floor and a small garden. There he spent his final years, tended by his servants and kept company by his talkative parrot Jaco. Today, the Gumpendorf house is a museum dedicated to Haydn and Brahms, a quiet monument to the composer’s enduring domestic harmony.

19 Haydngasse)

TRAVEL Haydn's position with the Esterházy family largely confined him to their estates, though he could occasionally visit Vienna during winter months. He frequently visited Vienna in the prince's retinue.​

His most significant travels were his two extended visits to London:1791-1792 and 1794-1795. These journeys represented about a month's travel each way and were organized by impresario Johann Peter Salomon. The visits were enormously successful personally, professionally, and financially. Haydn considered the days spent in England the happiest of his life as he appreciated everywhere there;.

DEATH Joseph Haydn died peacefully in his home at 12:40 am on May 31, 1809, at age 77. He had been progressively weakening in his final months. On May 26, just five days before his death, he played the "Emperor's Hymn" on the keyboard "with such expression and taste that our good Papa Haydn was astonished about it himself, and he was very pleased". Following this performance, he had to be assisted to bed and did not rise again. It is reported that he died "blissfully and gently," with his last words being "Children, be comforted. I am well"—a reference to his spiritual rather than physical health.​

Haydn's initial funeral the following afternoon was a simple affair, hardly surprising during wartime. He was laid to rest at the Hundsturm Cemetery. 

A great memorial service was held two weeks later on June 15 1809 at the Schottenkirche (Scots Church) in Vienna. "The whole of Viennese society appeared and many French officers, artists and other French admirers of Haydn attended the service," including the French writer Stendhal. Mozart's Requiem was performed on that solemn occasion.​ (11_

In the evening of June 17, 1809, Joseph Carl Rosenbaum (a former secretary of the Esterházy family) and phrenologist Johann Nepomuk Peter exhumed Haydn's body and hacked off the composer's head. The phrenological examination revealed that Haydn's skull displayed a fully formed "bump of music". The cleaned skull was placed in a wooden box and became part of Peter's personal collection.​

When Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II insisted on giving Haydn a proper funeral in 1820 and planned to transfer the remains to the family seat in Eisenstadt, it was discovered that the head was missing. The guilty parties were identified, but they purchased a substitute skull from a mortician rather than give up the real one. It took 145 years before Haydn's head was reunited with his body in 1954. To this day, Haydn's tomb contains two skulls—the real one and the substitute.​

APPEARANCES IN MEDIA Joseph Haydn's life and music have been featured in various documentaries and films:

Joseph Haydn – Libertine & His Master's Servant (2024) - A documentary by Nele Münchmeyer featuring excerpts from performances of Haydn works including the opera Armida with Annette Dasch, performances by Thomas Quasthoff and the Freiburger Barockorchester, and performances of "Die Schöpfung" and "Die Jahreszeiten" conducted by Roger Norrington​

The Haydn Expedition: music documentary with Paavo Järvi (2025) - Following Paavo Järvi and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen on their musical journey through Haydn's symphonic works, particularly Symphony No. 93 in D major​. 

Famous Composers: Joseph Haydn - An informative program providing a concise overview of the composer's life and times, filmed on location in cities and places that influenced his works​

His music has appeared in hundreds of films, TV shows, and documentaries as soundtrack material​. His friendly rivalry with Mozart, their shared Masonic ties, and Haydn’s genial wit have made him a favorite figure in historical portrayals of 18th-century Vienna.

ACHIEVEMENTS "Father of the Symphony": He established the four-movement structure and thematic development principles of the Classical symphony.

"Father of the String Quartet": He standardized the four-movement form and the texture (four equal, conversing voices) of the string quartet, essentially inventing the genre as we know it.

London Symphonies (Nos. 93–104): A crowning set of works that represent the pinnacle of his orchestral art.

The Creation and The Seasons: His monumental oratorios that remain popular pillars of the choral repertoire.

Patronage Pioneer: He successfully transitioned from a servant under the old patronage system to an independent, globally celebrated musical genius.

Sources: (1) Interlude (2) World History (3) New World Encyclopedia (4) Weta (5) Classical-music.com (6) Interlude (7) The Marginalian (8) Encyclopaedia of Trivia (9) Early Music World (10) Daniel Adam Maltz (11) Interlude