One could scarcely welcome a composer to a foreign land with more enthusiasm than Charles Burney showed in greeting Joseph Haydn on New Year’s Day 1791, when he arrived in the pulsating and music-loving London metropolis, in the company (and at the invitation) of Johann Peter Salomon, the musician and concert promoter.
Having recently lost his employment at the Esterhazy court, Haydn had accepted Salomon’s offer of travel to England for a series of concerts at London’s Hanover Square Rooms – a much-visited, spacious concert venue; back in 1782 he had had to decline the Earl of Abingdon’s request because of his Viennese commitments.
