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Eighteenth-Century Diplomats as Musical Agents

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International Relations, Music and Diplomacy

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Abstract

Europe’s embassies were major centers of musical activity throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Resident diplomats, in addition to being patrons and performers, often acted as musical agents, facilitating musical interactions within and between courts, among individuals and firms, and in their private salons. Through these varied activities, they played a vital role in shaping a transnational European musical culture. Focusing on a selection of diplomats who served in Vienna during the long eighteenth century, this chapter proposes a typology of their musical activities. Exploring correspondence and other contemporary sources, it highlights the ways in which diplomatic musical exchanges, interventions, and collaborations both lubricated professional relationships and shaped the wider European “ music scene.” An examination of Charles Burney’s visit to Vienna in 1772 from the perspective of “insider” and “small-world” networks further elucidates the central role diplomats played in the city’s salon life.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Markus Mösslang and Torsten Riotte, “Introduction: The Diplomats’ World,” in Mösslang and Riotte (eds.), The Diplomats’ World: A Cultural History of Diplomacy, 1815–1914 (Studies of the German Historical Institute London; Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 10.

  2. 2.

    Iver B. Neumann, At Home with the Diplomats: Inside a European Foreign Ministry (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2012), p. 3.

  3. 3.

    This chapter is a revised and augmented version of my article “Diplomats as Musical Agents in the Age of Haydn,” HAYDN: Online Journal of the Haydn Society of North America 5(2) (Fall 2015), available at, https://www.rit.edu/affiliate/haydn/diplomats-musical-agents-age-haydn

  4. 4.

    Driver and Bennett define “ music scene” as “a form of collective association and a means through which individuals with different relationships to a specific genre of music produced in a particular space articulate a sense of identity and belonging.” Christopher Driver and Andy Bennett, “Music Scenes, Space, and the Body,” Cultural Sociology 9(1) (2015): 99–115, 100. For a previous illustration of this process concerning the promotion of a style and a genre of music, see Chap. 2 in this volume, by Michela Berti.

  5. 5.

    Antoine-Chretien Wedekind, Almanac des Ambassades (Braunschweig: Frederic Vieweg, 1803), pp. 169–80.

  6. 6.

    Brian E. Vick, The Congress of Vienna: Power and Politics after Napoleon (Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2014), pp. 112–52.

  7. 7.

    The diaries of Count Zinzendorf contain numerous mentions of concerts at diplomatic residences. See Dorothea Link, “Vienna’s Private Theatrical and Musical Life, 1783–92, as Reported by Count Karl Zinzendorf,” Journal of the Royal Musical Association 122(2) (1997): 205–57.

  8. 8.

    Michael Kelly, Reminiscences of Michael Kelly, of the King’s Theatre and Theatre Royal Drury Lane, including a Period of Nearly Half a Century; with Original Anecdotes of Many Distinguished Persons, Political, Literary, and Musical, Vol. 1 (London: Henry Colburn, 1826), p. 194.

  9. 9.

    Daniel Heartz, Mozart, Haydn, and Early Beethoven, 1781–1802 (New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, 2009), pp. 30–31.

  10. 10.

    Silverstolpe to Gustav IV (2 October 1799), quoted in C.-G. Stellan Mörner, Johan Wikmanson und die Brüder Silverstolpe: Einige Stockholmer Persönlichkeiten im Musikleben des Gustavianischen Zeitalters (Stockholm: Ivar Hæggströms Bocktryckeri, 1952), pp. 342–3.

  11. 11.

    Mörner, Johan Wikmanson, p. 346.

  12. 12.

    Anders Lönn, “Struck, Paul,” Grove Music Online, Oxford Music Online, Oxford University Press, 2015, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/26992 (accessed August 5, 2015).

  13. 13.

    Count Cobenzl to Marie Therese (3 February 1802), quoted and trans. in John A. Rice, Empress Maria Therese and Music at the Viennese Court, 1792–1807 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 23.

  14. 14.

    See Maria Petrova, “The Diplomats of Catherine II as Cultural Intermediaries: The Case of the Princes Golitsyn,” in Vanessa Alayrac-Fielding and Ellen R. Welch (eds.), Intermédiaires culturels/Cultural Intermediaries: Séminaire international des jeunes dix-huitiémistes (2010: Belfast) (Paris: Honoré-Champion, 2015), pp. 83–100, and Mark Ferraguto, “Beethoven à la moujik: Russianness and Learned Style in the ‘Razumovsky’ String Quartets,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 67(1) (Spring 2014): 77–124.

  15. 15.

    “Je profite avec le plus grand empressement d’un courrier partant d’ici pour m’acquitter vis-à-vis de V. E. de la commission qu’elle a bien voulu me donner de lui faire parvenir de la musique avec une provision de cordes à violon de la meilleure qualité qu’on puisse trouver à Vienne venant d’Italie. Un avantage certain qu’ont celles-ci, c’est d’être d’un bon usage. Quant à la quantité je l’ai réglée selon la proportion des grosseurs et du besoin de renouveler les cordes sur l’instrument; de cette maniere ce sont douze paquets de chanterelles, huit de la corde A et six de l’autre D. Le tout pour la somme de florins 96 30 xr., compris dans une caisse de fer blanc pour leur conservation.” Razumovsky to Zubov, n.d. [Spring 1795], quoted in Alexandre Wassiltchikow, Les Razoumowski, trans. Alexandre Brückner (Halle: Tausch & Grosse, 1893–94), Vol. 2, Part 4, p. 26.

  16. 16.

    Richard Maunder, “Viennese Stringed-Instrument Makers, 1700–1800,” The Galpin Society Journal 52 (April 1999): 28.

  17. 17.

    In 1797, one Viennese music shop advertized “Gute Saiten à 4 kr,” suggesting that inflation over two decades had a negligible impact on the cost of (presumably) locally made strings. Wiener Zeitung (11 February 1797), 442. Why Razumovsky only purchased upper strings may be explained by the fact that G strings were typically overwound with wire rather than pure gut and were hence both more dependable and more expensive.

  18. 18.

    Moritz Fürstenau, “Glucks Orpheus in München 1773,” Monatshefte für Musikgeschichte 4 (1872): 216–24. Quoted and trans. in Daniel Heartz, Haydn, Mozart, and the Viennese School, 1740–1780 (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1995), p. 206.

  19. 19.

    Silverstolpe’s reports were evidently the basis of his published account of his friendship with Haydn, which appeared in 1838. The account is reproduced in German in C.-G. Stellan Mörner, “Haydniana aus Schweden um 1800,” Haydn-Studien 2(1) (1969): 1–33, 24ff. It appears as a series of translated extracts in H. C. Robbins Landon, Haydn: Chronicle and Works (Bloomington and London: Indiana University Press, 1976–80), Vol. 4 (pp. 251–2, 256–7, 264, 266, 318, and 335).

  20. 20.

    “Der grösste jetzt lebende Sänger, Marchesi, ist in Wien und wird bald im Théatre auftreten. Die grösste Sängerin, Frau Billington, war gleich Marchesi auf mehrere Monate engagiert, sie kommt aber nicht, da sie einen französischen Liebhaber hat, den sie nicht verlassen kann. Marchesi ist Castrat. Neben ihm gilt der Castrat Crescentini als der Vornehmste; ihn habe ich vor einem Jahr oft gehört, obgleich nicht dem grossen Enthousiasmus der überall herrscht. – Kreuzer, der Lodoiska componiert hat, ist mit Botschafter Bernadotte abgereist. – Haydns Schöpfung, ein neues Oratorium, wird in 8 Tagen zum ersten Mal aufgeführt. Ich habe den grössten Teil davon schon von dem Auctor selbst aus der Partitur spielen gehört.” Silverstolpe to Axel Gabriel Silverstolpe (25 April 1798), quoted in Mörner, Wikmanson, pp. 329–30.

  21. 21.

    The incident is related in A Faithful Account of the Riot in Vienna, The 13th of April, 1798, occasioned by the French Ambassador’s Hoisting in that City the National Flag of France, by an Eye Witness, translated from the Original German, published at Vienna, April 23d, 1798 (London, 1798).

  22. 22.

    On music’s role in Swieten ’s educational reforms, see Wiebke Thormählen, “Playing with Art: Musical Arrangements as Educational Tools in van Swieten’s Vienna,” The Journal of Musicology 27(3) (Summer 2010): 342–76.

  23. 23.

    For a fuller account of Swieten’s musical activities, see Edward Olleson’s entry in Oxford Composer Companions: Haydn (Oxford and New York: Oxford University, 2009), pp. 377–9.

  24. 24.

    Haydn to Mademoiselle Leonore (6 July 1776), in H. C. Robbins Landon, ed. and trans., The Collected Correspondence and London Notebooks of Joseph Haydn (Fair Lawn, NJ: Essential Books, 1959), pp. 18–21, 20.

  25. 25.

    Edward Olleson, “Gottfried van Swieten: Patron of Haydn and Mozart,” Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 89th session (1962–63): pp. 63–74, 70.

  26. 26.

    On Handelian elements in The Creation, see Landon, Chronicle and Works, vol. 4, 398–9. On Swieten and serious music culture in Vienna, see DeNora, Beethoven and the Construction of Genius: Musical Politics in Vienna, 1792–1803 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), pp. 20–27.

  27. 27.

    While much of the correspondence between Griesinger and Gottfried Härtel was destroyed during the Second World War, a good deal had been copied or excerpted. It is collected in Otto Biba, “Eben komme ich von Haydn…”: Georg August Griesingers Korrespondenz mit Joseph Haydns Verleger Breitkopf & Härtel 1799–1819. Zurich: Atlantis Musikbuch-Verlag, 1987.

  28. 28.

    On the close relationship between Kraus and the Silverstolpes, see Bertil H. Van Boer, The Musical Life of Joseph Martin Kraus: Letters of an Eighteenth-Century Swedish Composer (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2014).

  29. 29.

    Silverstolpe to Axel Gabriel Silverstolpe (27 December 1797), quoted in Mörner, Wikmanson, pp. 323–24. Translated in Landon, Chronicle and Works, Vol. 4, p. 268.

  30. 30.

    Landon, Chronicle and Works, Vol. 4, p. 268. Estelle Joubert has shown how Johann Gottlieb Naumann ’s appointments at the Swedish and Danish courts—attained through diplomatic networks—earned him the reputation as a “cultural ambassador from Dresden.” Estelle Joubert, “Opera Composer as Cultural Ambassador? Diplomatic Relations and Politics Surrounding Johann G. Naumann’s Foreign Appointments,” paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society, Pittsburgh, PA (November 2013), 5.

  31. 31.

    The libretto’s complete title is “Skapelsen. / Oratorium satt i Musik / af / Joseph Haydn, / Doctor i Tonkonsten, / Capellmästare / hos Regerande Fursten af Esterhazy, / Ledamot / af / Kongl. Svenska Musicaliska Academien. / Öfversättning. / Wien, / Tryckt hos Mathias Andreas Schmidt, / K. k. Hofboktryckare. / 1800.” Mörner, Wikmanson, p. 355, note 1.

  32. 32.

    Mörner, Johan Wikmanson, pp. 354–5.

  33. 33.

    See Mark Ferraguto, “Beethoven à la moujik.”

  34. 34.

    Auguste-Louis-Charles de La Garde-Chambonas, Anecdotal Recollections of the Congress of Vienna, trans. Albert Dresden Vandam with introduction and notes by Maurice Fleury (London, 1902), 214–15.

  35. 35.

    Vick, Congress of Vienna, p. 114.

  36. 36.

    In Vienna, unlike Paris, males were often (though not exclusively) the central figures of the salon. Vick, Congress of Vienna, p. 121.

  37. 37.

    In a formal network, each actor must be connected to at least two other actors. See Mike Burkhardt, “Networks as Social Structures in Late Medieval and Early Modern Towns: A Theoretical Approach to Historical Network Analysis,” in Andrea Caracausi and Christof Jeggle, eds., Commercial Networks and European Cities, 1400–1800 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2014): pp. 13–43, 14.

  38. 38.

    Charles Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany, the Netherlands, and United Provinces, or The Journal of a Tour through those Countries, undertaken to collect Materials for A General History of Music, 2nd edn. (London, 1775), Vol. 1, p. 220.

  39. 39.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, pp. 219–20.

  40. 40.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, 260.

  41. 41.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, 275.

  42. 42.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…

  43. 43.

    For the purposes of discussion, I consider correspondence within a city to establish or affirm insider network connections and correspondence between cities to establish or affirm small-world network connections.

  44. 44.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, 233–4.

  45. 45.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, 234.

  46. 46.

    Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany…, 356.

  47. 47.

    S. T. Bindoff, E. F. Malcolm Smith, and C. K. Webster, British Diplomatic Representatives, 1789–1852 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1934), pp. 9–13.

  48. 48.

    In addition to the published correspondence of Silverstolpe (Mörner, Wikmanson) and Griesinger (Biba, “Eben komme ich von Haydn”), a source of particular interest is the letters of Norbert Hadrava, Austrian diplomat in Naples (Giuliana Gialdroni, “La musica a Napoli alla fine del XVIII secolo nelle lettere di Norbert Hadrava,” Fonti musicali italiane 1 [1996]: 75–143; on Hadrava, see John A. Rice, “Improvising Face to Face,” Mozart Society of America Newsletter 3(2) [27 August 1999]: 5–6). Archival work continues to turn up new materials, including a letter by Haydn (September 27, 1802) recently rediscovered by Damien Mahiet in the Metternich archives in Prague (Damien Mahiet, “Haydn and Metternich: A Letter by Joseph Haydn in the Metternich Archives,” Haydn-Studien 11, no. 1 [December 2014]: 150–65).

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  1. Penn State College of Arts and Architecture, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Mark Ferraguto

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  1. Center for International Studies (CERI), Sciences Po, Paris, France

    Frédéric Ramel

  2. Université Sorbonne Nouvelle – Paris 3, Paris, France

    Cécile Prévost-Thomas

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Ferraguto, M. (2018). Eighteenth-Century Diplomats as Musical Agents. In: Ramel, F., Prévost-Thomas, C. (eds) International Relations, Music and Diplomacy . The Sciences Po Series in International Relations and Political Economy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63163-9_3

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