Monday 5 December 2011

Bernstein conducts Haydn's Missa in tempore belli

Can any composer, save perhaps Bach, express such utter, unmediated joy? With Mozart, there will always be sadness, smiling through the tears; with Beethoven, there will be strenuous effort; somehow, partly a matter of historical positioning, but also of ontology, that is not necessarily so for Haydn..