Sunday, October 25, 2009

The Dedicatee of Haydn's Opus 33 Quartets


This is Paul I of Russia, who served at Emperor of Russia from 1796 until 1801, when he was assassinated. He was the son of Catherine the Great and the father of Alexander I, who, it turns out, was a violin student of Anton Ferdinand Titz. If you think Titz was an odd duck, look at this article about Paul.

In 1781 Haydn dedicated his Opus 33 Quartets to then Duke Paul, who spent 1781-1782 in the West. I find it unusually interesting that the set of quartets Titz wrote in 1781 also used the kind of equality among the four voices of the string quartet that Haydn used in his Opus 33.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

If as you write in the previous quote Haydn makes "a fantastic meal out of what you thought was a refrigerator and cabinets full of nothing," dare one ask what Titz makes?

Elaine Fine said...

Stroganoff is what comes to mind. But it only became popular after the fall of Imperial Russia. Then again, Titz was a little ahead of his time.

Anonymous said...

Now THAT's funny!

Anonymous said...

Should one pilaf first?

Elaine Fine said...

Or perhaps Germ Knodel!