The set of six string quartets, Op. 76, was the last complete set of quartets written by Franz Joseph Haydn, the astonishing composer justly regarded as both the father of and the perpetually renewed student composer of classic string quartet masterpieces. Though he was not the sole, earliest quartet composer (Griffiths' chronology lists Boccherini and Albrechtsberger as well within the first few possibly dubious dates of publication), Haydn was certainly the most gifted. And over of period of several decades, Haydn composed approximately 83 quartets of which many scholars number at least 30 as masterpieces. His sense of form, melody, motive, harmony, texture, drama and wit were applied to a prolific stream of innovative compositions, each marked by impeccable craftsmanship, distinctive character, novel formal arrangements, almost instant broad appeal as well as providing the most fascinating (and infinite) wellspring of ingenious detail. It is difficult to say enough without becoming hyperbolic or fatuous. In a phenomenon that parallels his comparable innovation and mastery of the classical symphony, Haydn took the nascent genre/medium of the string quartet and through a long journey of experiment and triumph, nearly single-handedly evolved it into a daunting fine art of the most profound musical expression.

Quartets were often composed and published in sets (6 or 3), and Haydn had early established the pleasing notion of using the set as a vehicle for variety and contrast (keys, moods, forms and plans) as well as a framework for unity (style, plan, a prevalent spirit or experimental tendency). Though Haydn wrote two additional quartets as well as two movements of a third, Op. 76 is the last complete set quartets he wrote, comprising both a collection of individual, mature masterpieces, as well as a unity and a diversity of quartets within a single family. While earlier sets enjoy great frame for their unique place in a unique history (Op. 20, Op. 33), the Op. 76 set is surely the most magnificent to sample Haydn's great art, the obvious touchstone of the first chapter of string quartet history. The set is full of rich, sophisticated and profund music, endlessly varied and remarkably consistent, infinitely entertaining, and so supremely classical. As a starting place for exploring Haydn (long before one becomes a hopeless devoted Haydn connessieur), Op. 76 works well for the modern ear by showcasing Haydn's gifts in bold and thrilling relief. They are a marvelous orientation before approaching the more subtle (less theatrical) earlier quartets.

Unique and prominent aspects of Op. 76 compared to earlier Haydn quartets are well enumerated by multiple scholars (Keller, Berger, Griffiths and Barrett-Ayres). That Haydn continues to innovate, refine and ultimately deepen the genere even in his late 60's is remarkable. The slow and finale movements are more profound. More the one quartet uses the tension between major and minor modes to new dramatic effect. The minuets are faster, lighter, and more rhythmically compelling: they are beginning to show the tendencies eventually perfected by Beethoven. The quartets feature new and different forms as well as continually fresh and flexible handling of the ostensibly formal sonata (it becomes more of a principle than a form). Overall, the quartets are more for public exhibition than private, intimate interchange. Curiously, this comes at some cost to the treasured aspects of many earlier Haydn quartets: Op. 76 is not so much regarded for its sociable dialog and its wit. If this is true, it is certainly not to the detriment of the characteristically exquistie quartet textures. From this larger perspective of Haydn's career as a constantly evolving and therefore consistently engaging quartet composer, Op. 76 is yet another welcome offering from his great gift of artistic productivity.

As many of the same writers have underscored, the personal and historical conditions surrounding the time in which Haydn wrote these quartets are significant with regard to the stature of their success as fine art. Haydn was more or less retired from the obbligations of the Esterhazy court though he continued to be well supported financially. He had enjoyed tremendous success with his subsequent concert tours of London, becoming internationally famous as the greatest of living composers as well as versed in the context of composing for large public performances. Surely Haydn was proud, confident, bold, daring; he had received magnanamous appreciation for a life's investment in serious musical creation and every assurance that his golden touch would yet prevail. In addition, Haydn had inspired and eventually derived new inspiration from a musical dialog with Mozart wherein both composers, working in an atmosphere of mutual appreciation and influence, extended the scope and refined the rhetoric of quartet composition with a series of masterworks over the years. From this place of material, professional and historical well-being, Haydn brought his experience, his dedication, his untiring fascination and undoubtedly his fond regard for the quartet medium to bare, and produced an extraordianarily precious blossom in the garden of Western musical expression.

Op. 76 is exuberant and sparkling, it is tender and tragic, it is elegant pattern after elegant pattern in a kaledescope of colors, moods, textures. Op. 76, as classically classic, is infused throughout with what Ratner calls a dance concept, a deft and visceral embodiment of animated dance energy and gesture so that rhythmically, it. is supremely alive to the drama of scuplted time: it rocks, it twirls, it jumps, it feints and gests - but it also floats, shimmers, sings plaintively, crys, and almost always by turns, beams exaultant. As this language (silly prose), rhythms become motives and textures, gesture speaks, and movement becomes emotional meaning. The supreme edict of artful emotional expression was a prime force in the classic ideaology (Ratner). And so Haydn shines as a genius of his era, in the end, not merely for his exquitisely wrought musical rhetoric, structure and pattern, but for the sensual and emotional sense it brings to the listener upon hearing it. The emotional adventure that Haydn offers in Op.76 is beyond words other than clarity, quality, depth, and beyond a shadow of a doubt, love.

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