This is the first delayed Haydn symphony post. I listened to Symphony No. 10 yesterday while resting my feet after a 6-mile walk down a new trail, which I’ll be writing about soon. But since I’d already published another post about our recent Cleveland trip, I decided to sleep on this one and save it for today. I’m still following the order laid out in the notes for the Christopher Hogwood recordings, so I skipped from No. 5 to No. 10. I listened to the Hogwood version.
The first movement (‘Allegro’) was a good fast opening, with more palpable emotion than has been in previous intros, plus punchy horns taking everything up a notch. It struck me as one of the better intros of this series so far, if not the best — the other one I remember liking a lot was from Symphony No. 1. The ending was awkward and sudden, though. Things slowed down for the second movement (‘Andante’), which was slightly interesting but mostly a bit boring. I’ve listened to it a few times now, and each time I end up thinking, “wait, this is still going?” It’s mostly a lot of high violin stuff; the melodies were momentarily interesting but forgettable, and the whole thing was a minute or two too long. A couple of cool repeated passages revolved around long held notes on the violin. The finale (‘Presto’) was peppy and chirpy, interlaced with some darker, quieter passages where the strings seem to all slide around together in a roiling mass, then go silent before the pep bursts forth again. The melodies weren’t as striking as the first movement, but this was still pretty good.
I rate this symphony 4 stars out of 5. The next is Symphony No. 11.