Haydn's instrumental music and the fallacy of Sturm und Drang: Issues of style in the symphonies, string quartets, and keyboard sonatas c. 1766--1772

The concept of a Sturm und Drang period in Haydn's career has long been an issue of controversy that needs to be resolved. This dissertation seeks to conclusively establish the erroneous nature of this paradigm and present a viable alternative for understanding Haydn's music from the period 1765/66--1772.;1 begin by reexamining the Sturm und Drang concept from both logical and stylistic points of view. In the latter I focus on three main instrumental genres: symphony, string quartet, and keyboard sonata. From a logical standpoint inaccurate data, fallacious reasoning, and an anachronistic historiography make this concept invalid. Stylistically, the inconsistency with which the relevant features appear speaks against a Sturm und Drang period. Moreover, a comparison of earlier and later works illustrates not a stylistic disruption between 1765/66 and 1772 but considerable continuity, particularly with earlier works. A more useful distinguishing factor has until now been largely overlooked: internal harmonic motion. In the tonal patterns of the works from this period Haydn frequently exploited rare keys at all levels of structure, especially in the quartets and sonatas.;Replacing the Sturm und Drang model leads to a search for external sources of influence. I explore two sources proposed by others: opera and Emanuel Bach. On one hand, the presence of Sturm und Drang elements in specific aria types in opere serie and in other dramatic music---especially that of Gluck---during the 1750s and early 1760s verifies a theatrical origin. On the other hand, Bach's tendencies with respect to tonality, dynamics, and formal disruption in the keyboard sonatas also had a distinct impact. Haydn thus incorporated elements from both legacies during a revaluation of compositional procedures.;In conclusion, I argue that the term Sturm und Drang should be restricted to a topical usage, then propose an alternate term that reflects the operatic origins of this topic. That other composers used this topic around 1770 reflects not a collective crisis but its growing popularity as a way of giving instrumental music more substance. Later manifestations in the works of Haydn and Beethoven underscore the topical nature of this idiom.