DIE SIEBEN LETZTEN WORTE UNSERES ERLÖSERS AM KREUZE, HOB.XX:2

In March 1801 Joseph Haydn wrote the following words about his ‘The Seven Last Words Of Our Saviour’ : "About fifteen years ago, a dean of Cádiz asked me to write instrumental music on the seven words of our Saviour on the Cross. The habit there was to play an oratorio in the cathedral of Cádiz in the passion week, the effect of which was much enhanced by the following contrivances : the walls, windows and columns of the church were draped in black cloth, and only one large lantern in the middle illuminated the holy darkness. At noon all doors were closed and the music sounded. After an appropriate introduction the bishop mounted the pulpit, spoke one of the Seven Words and gave a sermon thereupon. After that he left the pulpit and fell kneeling before the altar. During this pause the music sounded. The bishop mounted and left the pulpit for each Word and each time the orchestra sounded at the end of the sermon. To this event my music had to be appropriated. The composition of these seven Adagios, which should last about ten minutes each, was no mean task : soon I discovered that I couldn’t keep to the prescribed duration. Originally the music was without text and as such it was printed too." The original version of this masterpiece, that did may be the most for Haydn’s European reputation during his lifetime, was not the oratorio-version we hear regularly nowadays but indeed the much more rarely performed version for orchestra alone – written around 1786. The composer was well aware of the quality of his composition as we can read in a letter to his publisher : "Every Sonata, or every phrase is represented purely instrumental, in such a manner that even the most inexperienced hearer is moved to the bottom of his soul."

In 1787 Haydn presented his work immediately in three versions : the original orchestra-version, a version for string quartet and a piano transcription. The part Haydn played in this piano transcription is not entirely clear, but he certainly has corrected and authorized it as we can conclude from an other letter : "I must laud the keyboard transcription, which is very good and made with special zeal." The seven slow movements – eight even if we count the Introduzione – show such great variety of resource in the musical invention, in the choice of the themes, in the rhythm as well as in the tonal and expressive colouring that we are quite unconscious of the fact that this is a succession of pieces with the same speed, dimension and form. A carefully chosen tonal design contributes to dispel any feeling of monotony.