The Brahms Experience

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Brahms is not the only one ...

True - but, to be fair, Bruckner was at that age when he wrote most of the pieces that feature most frequently in concerts and on CD.

[amateur51]

Brahms is not the only one ...








The following one we rarely see:



And I do like this one!

The final piece in the mystery of P.G.Tipps' identity is revealed - in spite of all protestations, it's WELCOME BACK scottycelt

[Barbirollians]

Why - can't old composers write passionate music? Verdi?

In any case, I feel there's something reductive about describing Brahms' music as "passionate" - it brings to mind Yeats' line "the worst are full of passionate intensity" or, more recently, Blair speeches about being passionate about this or that. There's surely so much more to Brahms, a kind of innigkeit, the lyricism of so many works especially in the chamber and piano music, the elegiac quality in the slow movement of the Horn Trio inter al, a sort of festiveness in the first Serenade. He can represent many aspects of the human condition, not just passion.

I'm glad that R3 has rowed back from previous Experiences and abandoned wall-to-wall immersion in favour of an extended focus on a composer so that other music is not drowned out for a week. Like jlw, I wish there had been a chance to hear the Serenades, and more of the lesser-heard chamber music, piano music and songs. The symphonies and piano concertos are after all played throughout the year. The Bristol lunchtime concert series looks the most interesting to me.

Very true but that does not make him any the less passionate at times when his music calls for it . Passion can in any event be restrained and hidden .

My point was simply to address the nonsense that is talked about his music being boring or stodgy .

[aeolium]

My point was simply to address the nonsense that is talked about his music being boring or stodgy .

Agreed on that

[vinteuil]

quite the Gautier Capuçon de ses jours -
.

http://www.kajimotomusic.com/en/image/700_380/7d6737ff82274ffceabdba204634b3f6.jpg

.
... if not the Kevin Bacon -

http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2010/07/09/kevin-bacon.jpg

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

(... even though ferney, your comment highlights that in that photo he appears to be caressing himself! )

Hmmm - well, he does look about twelve years old in that photo ...

[P. G. Tipps]

True - but, to be fair, Bruckner was at that age when he wrote most of the pieces that feature most frequently in concerts and on CD.

Indeed, that is irrefutable, and I remember one Bruckner concert programme I purchased many years ago which showed a photo of the poor chap 'on his deathbed'!

Ah, here's the photo ...



Anyway, mustn't hog a Brahms thread!

Here's another picture of the little sweetie ...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

All these pictures of the young Brahms - isn't he reputed to have said that before he grew his beard he looked like Clara Schumann's son, whilst afterwards he looked like her father?


Did you listen to the Piano 4tet movt, PGT?

[Sir Velo]

Indeed, that is irrefutable, and I remember one Bruckner concert programme I purchased many years ago which showed a photo of the poor chap 'on his deathbed'!

Ah, here's the photo ...

Here's another picture of the little sweetie ...

Johanna Brahms?

[P. G. Tipps]

All these pictures of the young Brahms - isn't he reputed to have said that before he grew his beard he looked like Clara Schumann's son, whilst afterwards he looked like her father?


Did you listen to the Piano 4tet movt, PGT?

I did indeed ... however, I shall listen to it two or three times more, I think, as I really need to settle down in the evening with my headphones before listening to a piece properly. On first hearing it does appear to possess a depth and beauty I'd never before associated with JB.

Maybe things are already looking up, ferneyhoughgeliebte!

[P. G. Tipps]

Johanna Brahms?

It did cross my mind, Sir Velo, that I had suddenly found Johannes Brahms physically if not yet musically attractive.

Worrying times ...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

It did cross my mind, Sir Velo, that I had suddenly found Johannes Brahms physically if not yet musically attractive.

Worrying times ...

Nah! Just go with the flow (or the Flo ... or the Jo) as the mood takes you. PGT.


(And brilliant news about the Pno 4tet! )

[Richard Barrett]

Well I don't know, I'm always interested to hear people expressing themselves enthusiastically about Brahms's music but, with a few exceptions, I find the "passion" in his music is overwhelmed by the stodginess, a pedantic need to underline everything (which unfortunately he passed on to the Brahmsian side of Schoenberg). For me the beard was there a long time before he let it grow!

[french frank]

Well I don't know, I'm always interested to hear people expressing themselves enthusiastically about Brahms's music but, with a few exceptions, I find the "passion" in his music is overwhelmed by the stodginess

I find the symphonies 'staid' at times rather than 'stodgy'. But I've often been surprised on hearing some chamber music to discover it was Brahms. Surprised in a pleasant way, but I find it difficult to think of an epithet (I'm not that familiar with the chamber music).

[Richard Barrett]

I find the symphonies 'staid' at times rather than 'stodgy'. But I've often been surprised on hearing some chamber music to discover it was Brahms. Surprised in a pleasant way, but I find it difficult to think of an epithet (I'm not that familiar with the chamber music).

I've had the same experience. The first movements of the Bb string sextet and the G major string quintet did it for me the first time I heard them. I still haven't worked out what it is that makes them different from almost everything else of his that I've heard though...