Haydn's parrot
Haydn's parrot was a Congo gray parrot that Joseph Haydn brought to Vienna from a stay in London . In his home in the suburbs of Vienna windmill he held the parrot in a cage made of sheet metal .
history
Haydn and his servant Josef Elsler taught the docile bird. There are numerous contemporary anecdotes about the bird in which it is reported that the parrot could call out different words in several languages and whistle to melodies that Haydn practiced on the piano . At parties in Haydn's house, when a toast was pronounced to the emperor and the glass was raised, he is said to have whistled the melody to God receive Franz the Emperor , which Haydn composed in 1797 .
The exotic bird attracted a lot of attention in Viennese society because of its talent for languages . The African gray parrot was known for being able to call out come, Haydn Papa to the beautiful paperl and Papa Haydn .
Joseph Haydn spared no effort to restore the bird to health once it was seriously ill. He had the Tyrolean bird dealer Haßberger come to Vienna to nurse the bird back to health.
After the death of Joseph Haydn in May 1809, the exotic bird belonged to the estate , which was listed in the so-called estate treatise. The parrot was finally auctioned for the enormous price of 1415 guilders - this corresponds to around 32,500 euros today - to Prince Johann zu Lichtenstein, a brother-in-law of Prince Esterházy . The African gray parrot achieved a higher price than Haydn had paid for his entire house at the time.
The exotic and valuable birds were popular among musicians. It was reported that Jean-Philippe Rameau's parrot Cacotte was able to croak pieces from the aria Tristes apprêts, pâles flambeaux from the opera Castor et Pollux . Giuseppe Verdi is said to have owned a green parrot that could whistle the melody La donna è mobile from Rigoletto . Even Richard Wagner had a parrot the words of Richard and freedom proclamation, and also a short sequence from the opera Rienzi could whistle.
The prepared parrot is exhibited today as an exhibit in the Haydn room in the Vienna House of Music .
reception
In the Haydn Year 2009, Wilfried Ploderer created the sculpture Daddybird , which is reminiscent of Haydn's parrot, and gave it as a gift to sponsors, lenders and deserving employees of the Haydn Year.
In 2015, the poet Susanne Stephan took up the story of the exotic bird thematically and chose it as the title for her third volume of poetry.
Individual evidence
- ↑ The master saddler von der Wieden . Neidl, Vienna 1870, p. 88 .
- ↑ Joachim Mischke: Classical music genius: Haydn, Haydn about everything . May 30, 2009 ( abendblatt.de [accessed December 30, 2017]).
- ↑ When Joseph Haydn's parrot croaked the Kaiserlied ... In: vienna.at . April 6, 2009 ( vienna.at [accessed December 30, 2017]).
- ↑ C. Albert Ludwig: Joseph Haydn: A life picture based on authentic sources . Adolf Büchting, Nordhausen 1867, p. 114 .
- ↑ parrots . In: Leonhard Bauer (Ed.): Altwiener Blatt . tape 1 , no. 7 . Vienna 1874, p. 12 .
- ↑ The master saddler von der Wieden . Neidl, Vienna 1870, p. 85 f .
- ↑ Rainer Schmitz, Benno Ure: Keys, tones and tumults: Everything you don't know about music . Siedler, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-8275-0083-0 , p. 720 .
- ↑ "Daddybirds" as a thank you - oesterreich.ORF.at. Accessed December 31, 2017 .
- ↑ Twilight with Grieg and Haydn's Parrot. Retrieved January 2, 2018 .