Papas Parrot
Question 5
Jo and the Court of Esterházy
Jo loved to hunt, but he had some mishaps here and there. Jo wasn’t the best rifleman and he wasn’t any better with horses, because he and Mozart shared a deep fear for those animals. Not unreasonably so: Jo once fell off a horse and stopped riding ever since then.
The flautist Siegl was an even worse rifleman. He somehow managed to set fire to a roof by shooting at it. Because of this, Ludwig Rahier, the regent of goods at the court, imprisoned him. Jo was not amused that one of his orchestra musicians was arrested and managed to free him.
This only worsened the mood between Haydn and Rahier. Another grouch was the Composer of the Court Gregorius Werner. He insulted and tried to defame Haydn… in vain. After Werner died (1766), Haydn became Composer of the Court and celebrated his triumph.
