“Rattle exudes the most dashing élan you could imagine. He tingles with meticulous devotion to his task. And he understands how to make Haydn’s music smile. The musical surprises in which Haydn took such delight cannot come as a surprise to Rattle, of course – and yet he gives that impression, with evident pleasure to boot. One can sense that he absolutely loves this music. Haydn is dear to his heart – and to his intellect too.” Berliner Morgenpost, 10 February 2007

Simon Rattle makes a strong case for Haydn, the composer he would ‘most like to have dinner with’: “He wrote about 115 symphonies and at least 80 of them are masterpieces. The second movement of No.88 contains one of his most profoundly moving melodies, with the feeling that some strange, enormous explosion is going on in the distance. The first movement has a very simple theme that could just be played by two horns. It starts very innocently, and then he builds the most extraordinary complications around it - suddenly, you’re in the middle of rage. Haydn always wants to surprise his audience. He always expects his audience to be incredibly sophisticated, and the more you know about his music the more pleasure and fun and depth it has”.

These symphonies are perfect works to showcase the extraordinary musicianship of the members of the orchestra. There’s a lot of solo work in these symphonies, allowing the players to improvise their own ornaments as in a jazz piece.

Haydn composed the Sinfonia Concertante in London for the musician-friends he made there. Simon Rattle says of it, “It has the intimacy and joy of one of those wonderful chamber music evenings that musicians have when they drink a bit and they play whatever they like.“

As the audience reaction to the repeated false endings of symphony No. 90 is “almost part of the score”, the listener is given the choice on disc 1 to listen to a version with and without audience reactions.

To sum up this Haydn experience, another quote from Sir Simon: “For me, Haydn is the greatest underrated composer of them all, and for any musician who loves to play, he’s almost the most satisfying because he gives you absolutely everything.”

The concert performances of these works in Berlin in early 2007 received enthusiastic press reviews:

“The scaled-down Berlin Philharmonic played with relish and, with Sir Simon Rattle at the helm, led the listener into realms of experience which are, as a rule, rarely heard in Haydn. New and vivid pictures in sound were revealed to the audience, achieved not least by the outstanding ‘philharmonic’ orchestral soloists, who distinguished themselves in their technical perfection and the supreme musicality of their performances.” Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk, Klassik am Morgen, 19 February 2007