'Nobody can do everything, jest and terrify, cause laughter or move profoundly, like Haydn.'

- Mozart

(Image: 'The Creation', opening)

A forensic reconstruction of Franz Josef Haydn, done by Thomas Becker. I tend to find these things creepy, perhaps because they strike me as redolent of the work done by morticians. And yet within that context, this seems like a decent representation.

Given Haydn's celebrity status in London during the final years of his life, it's surprising that his death didn't elicit much interest from the city's newspapers. This notice of his passing appeared in The London Standard on July 2, 1809, more than a month after his death.

Often used to justify various theories of racial superiority, Phrenology is a pseudo-science in which bumps on the skull are linked to psychological traits. In this image, Haydn's skull is being 'reunited' with his remains during a ceremony in Austria on June 5, 1954.

On this date in 1809, Franz Josef Haydn, whose many accomplishments included the invention of the modern string quartet and the symphony, died in Vienna at the age of 77. Soon after his burial, his skull was stolen by Phrenologists seeking to discover the source of his genius.

'I am not ashamed to reply to you in my mother tongue, however imperfectly, and am glad to be able to show that my fatherland means more to me than anything else.'

- Bedrich Smetana

The Czech composer Bedrich Smetana, seen here shortly after being informed that the Saturday evening broadcasts of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy have both been cancelled.

UNLIKE Beethoven, Smetana's deafness led to the complete collapse of his psyche. Depression led to insomnia, followed eventually by hallucinations, manic episodes and temporary speech loss. By the end of his life he was no longer coherent; he died in a Prague asylum in 1884.

Like Beethoven, Smetana slipped into deafness just when he was at the height of his creative powers. He referred to the loss of his hearing in his 1st String Quartet (1876), depicting the ringing in his ears with a high E harmonic in the 1st Violin near the end of the piece.

On this date in 1866, Bedrich Smetana's two-act comic opera 'The Bartered Bride' was premiered in Prague. Although the work wasn't popular at first, it began to enter the general repertoire over the following decade, the first opera by a Czech composer to do so.

'Balakirev acknowledged Tchaikovsky's immense talent, yet was constantly disappointed in him. With a few exception, he felt the younger composer spoiled the ingenious material he created.'

- Alexander Olenin, student of Balakirev

(Image: Tchaikovsky's 4th Symphony, Manuscript)

Arnold Schoenberg, seen here doing his day job as Chief Inspector of the Chiquita Banana Company.

19th century Russian musical nationalism was profoundly political; it rejected the more European aesthetic associated with the Imperial family in favor of folk music, i.e. 'the Music of the People.' The Bolsheviks would exploit this ethos after they came to power in 1917.

During a career that stretched over five decades, Balakirev was far less influential as a composer than as an enforcer of ideological and aesthetic discipline among Russian musical nationalists. His influence waned with the rise of the more technically-brilliant Rimsky-Korsakov.

114 years ago today, the Russian composer, pianist, and conductor Mily Balakirev died in St. Petersburg at the age of 73. His most significant legacy was his advocacy on behalf of a nationalist musical aesthetic that rejected many of the conventions of European art music.

'The English may not like music, but they absolutely love the noise it makes.'

- Thomas Beecham

Although many insist this drawing depicts a recording session in the late 19th century, it's clearly from an ad in the Spring 1892 Sears Catalog for a device that efficiently hoovers up all that unsightly, annoying dust that gathers inside pianos.

Also: 86 years ago today, Paul Hindemith's opera 'Mathis der Maler' ('Matthias the Painter') was premiered in Zurich. Although he'd finished it 3 years earlier, its story about a fight for artistic freedom within a climate of repression prevented its performance in Nazi Germany.

How did Mozart react to the death of his father? Here's a tidbit for the Freudians out there. The first piece he wrote after his dad's passing was a Divertimento he called 'A Musical Joke', an unrestrained parody of the music of incompetent composers.