For some five years, in his early twenties, Michael Haydn worked at the court of the Bishop of Grosswardein. Clearly he is still remembered there. The notes to this CD suggest that these symphonies belong to 1760-1, while he was still in Grosswardein (as Oradea was then called, as part of the Empire); but that is palpably false, unless Michael Haydn was stylistically some 20 years ahead of the rest of Europe. Never mind the date: it is the music that matters, and these symphonies, only one of them recorded before (P12, by the Franz Liszt CO under Rolla, there dated after 1777), are splendid examples of the classical style, fully on a par with all but the very finest of his brother's symphonies, inventive, witty and richly developed. The F major work that ends the disc is on a slightly lower inventive level, once past its vigorously argued opening movement, and the C major is not really exceptional, though there is a charming, pathetic A minor Andante, with dialogue for the oboe and the violins, and a cheerful, fanfarish finale. The D major, however, is a noble piece, its first movement full of interesting and well-developed ideas, its finale a fugato based on a theme consisting of four semibreves (D-G-F sharp-E), part of which Mozart once copied out, and which I have always suspected might have been an influence on the Jupiter; and the work in E has a first movement with broad and shapely lines and an attractive, playful secondary theme, a quite extended and warm Andante, a minuet with some pretty echo phrases for the flutes, and another specially fine finale, not actually fugal but constantly flirting with counterpoint. These last two are certainly products of the full classical era and could not have been written until the 1780s.
I do urge readers to try these pieces. The Oradea orchestra gives a perfectly adequate account of them, with some lively and vigorous playing; there are occasional minor imperfections, and more soft, relaxed playing would not have been out of place from time to time. But in general the conductor, Romeo Rimbu, seems well attuned to the idiom of the music. The recording does not fall far short of Western standards. Recommended, then, with some enthusiasm.'