Janissary music

Janissary music, in a narrow sense, the music of the Turkish military establishment, particularly of the Janissaries, an elite corps of royal bodyguards (disbanded 1826); in a broad sense, a particular repertory of European music the military aspect of which derives from conscious imitation of the music of the Janissaries.

Characteristic of Janissary music is its use of a great variety of drums and bells and the combination of bass drum, triangle, and cymbals. Janissary music probably appeared in Europe for the first time in 1720, when it was adopted by the army of the Polish ruler Augustus II. The novel clangour of its colourful instruments led to their wide use throughout Europe, where they became an integral part of the thrilling military spectacle. Throughout the 18th century they were occasionally used in opera scores—for example, Christoph Gluck’s Le Recontre imprévue (1764; “The Unexpected Encounter”) and W.A. Mozart’s The Abduction from the Seraglio (1782)—because of their exotic colour.

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, compositions in naive imitation of the Turkish military style enjoyed a certain short-lived vogue. Well-known examples of the “alla turca” genre are the final movement of Joseph Haydn’s “Military” Symphony No. 100 in G Major (1794); the final movement of Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A Major, K 331; the “Turkish March” from Ludwig van Beethoven’s incidental music to The Ruins of Athens; and the tenor solo, “Froh, wie Seine Sonnen fliegen” (“Joyful, as Flies the Sun”), from the finale of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D Minor. So great was the popularity of the Turkish style that many pianos and harpsichords of the time were provided with a Janissary stop, which produced a percussive accompaniment of indefinite pitch. It is perhaps a manifestation of the same phenomenon that the pianist Daniel Steibelt (1765–1823) often played recitals to the accompaniment of a tambourine played by his wife.