The project (updated 12/2/10)

An update (12/2/10) - I missed the mark. Nine months have past since my last post. Maybe it's the time of year, but I'm picking this project back up. Suppose, I'll remove the reference to 52 weeks and pick up where I left off at Opus 2 no. 5. I have completed 14 movements with an impressive 69 to go!

For reasons that seem sort of convoluted now (see below), I found myself last year all the sudden very interested in Franz Joseph Haydn. I am not classical music expert, by any measure, but I have always admired the structure and texture of classical sounds. As a child, I studied the great composers in church choir. Little figurines of Beethoven, Brahms, and Haydn decorated my bedroom shelves. I never fully appreciated or understood the what was happening with the music, but something resonated and I have since often found comfort in the classics. At many times in my adult life, I have tried to dig deeper and, at least, build a classical musical vocabulary, but something seems to have always knocked me off track. Perhaps it is the grandness of it all. So much music. So many composers. So many arrangements. I couldn't just listen and enjoy. I had to know it, and be an expert. And, when it quickly became obvious that such knowledge was beyond my immediately grasp, I just retreated.

Until now...maybe, I hope

The project I propose here is to listen - appreciate - dissect - embrace, Haydn's String Quartets. This actually started with a foray into Haydn's String Quartet opus 20. I think something from last year's (2009) bicentennial of Haydn's death might have initiated my interest. Whatever it was, I learned that the opus 20 was a bit of a revolutionary work. I was teaching a course on social studies teaching methods at the time, and we were focused on 18th century revolutionary history. I though the notion of a revolutionary work of music composed at roughly the same time (1772) as the revolutionary politics of the late 18th century was far too compelling to ignore. I was off and running. After a couple nights of research, I ordered Haydn's String Quartet Opus 20 by Quatuor Mosaïques. I listened for several months before coming on this idea.

So, here is the project.

Each few days I will listen to one of Haydn's 83 (or so) String Quartets. I'll write about the music the experience as it unfolds, and maybe this project will help me slay the dragon of classical musical recalcitrance!