"Let who will only compare a Brahms motet or fugue with one of Bach's, a Brahms variation or sonata with one of Beethoven's, to become conscious of both their great kinship as well as their great diversity. This reaching back to Bach and Beethoven is a reaching back to the spirit of music and such kinship will, with great artists who live within a space of scarcely two centuries, always allow itself to be recognized since the fundamental view and feelings of mankind do not change so rapidly while everything more incidental in art is subject to the rapid changes of taste or even of daily fashion. "Durable music" was a favorite expression of Brahms'. He meant thereby that music which is deeply rooted in the sub-soil of the spirit of music and nowhere comes into conflict with it, as against the music which clings uncertainly to the surface of the incidental, and however originally it might be felt or however alluringly it might work, yet it will be too quickly dragged along by the passage of time, since it was not able to satisfy the deeper artistic demands of mankind." - Gustav JennerJenner's short biography on Brahms is probably one of the most insightful into the character of this great composer. Brahms had taken on Jenner as a student later in life, but seeing that Brahms had not taught many this was a unique experience. The fact that he didn't teach much was tragic because this almost ensured that the Wagnerian movement, that was out to put an end to the "old form" of music, was sure to win. Jenner taught after the death of Brahms in the contrapuntal tradition of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms, but his compositions were blacked out by the Wagnerian faction of Richard Strauss who took over control of the German music world after Brahms' death in 1897. Jenner continued to fight this "new music" mafia and created the university of Marburg as a center of learning against Wagner's Beyreuth.
"Brahms first requirement was that the composer know his text in detail. By this, of course, he also meant that he should be completely clear about the poem's structure and meter. Then he would recommend that before composing a poem I should carry it around in my head for a long time and should frequently recite it to myself aloud paying careful attention to everything pertaining to declamation, and especially noting the caesuras and later pausing while working this through. He placed great value on these caesuras and their treatment, and in fact, they are often an unmistakable sign that the composer is an artist who creates in confidence and freedom, and is not a dilettante poking around in the dark and dependent on every little accidental thing."
This was Brahms' approach to setting the poetry for his German Requiem; to carry the words and eventually the music around in the mind until he knew it in a very intimate way and then work it into a whole, in the mind, rather than just individual parts.
"I should learn to distinguish that it is one thing to imitate a form, and something else to conceive and execute music in the mind as form; and to recognize that form and thought exercise an essentially determining influence upon each other. Only he who creates a form in the mind creates freely and his forms might come to life, while in other cases the form becomes a shackle and degenerates into a template."
This reminds me also of Mozart's method. "So my manner of writing and elaborating . . .when I am, as it were, completely myself and of good cheer, say, travelling in a carriage or walking after a good meal, or during the night when I cannot sleep; that is when my ideas flow like a stream. Whence and how they come I can not say. These ideas that please me I retain in memory and hum them to myself, as I have been told. If I continue in this way it soon occurs to me how I may turn this or that morsel into a good dish; that is agreeable to the laws of counterpoint, and to the peculiarities of the various instruments, etc.
This inflames my soul whenever I am not disturbed. It grows continuously and I broaden it even wider and brighter, and the thing becomes truly almost complete in my head, even if it is long; so that from that point on, I view it with a single glance, exactly like a beautiful picture or a pretty girl, from above, in my mind. And I don't hear in my imagination the parts successively, one after the other, but I hear them all at once. That is truly a feast! All of this inventing, this producing, proceeds in me only as if in a powerfully beautiful dream; but overhearing everything together, that is the best. What has been thus produced is not easily forgotten, and this is probably the best gift the lord God has sent me.
When I am ready to write down my ideas, I take out of the bag of my memory what I've already collected there; in the way I've just described. For this reason, the committing to paper is done quickly enough, for everything is, as I've said, already finished, and it seldom differs on paper from what it was in my imagination." - Mozart 1790
The German Requiem
Of all the performances that I'v heard none can compare with Furtwanglers handling of Brahms. He is not a metronome like most conductors and can articulate the ideas in the music better than any I have found.
Furtwangler rehearsals Brahms Symphony No.4 in 1948,London
Text:
I. Chorus
Blessed are they that mourn:
for they shall be comforted.
-Matthew 5
They that sow in tears
shall reap in joy.
They go forth and weep,
and bear precious seed,
and shall come again with rejoicing
bringing their sheaves with them.
-PSALM 126
II. Chorus
For all flesh is like grass,
and all its glory like the flower of grass.
The grass withers,
and the flower falls... -I PETER I
Be patient, therefore, beloved
until the coming of the Lord.
The farmer waits
for the precious crop from the earth
being patient with it
until it receives
the early and the late rains.
You also must be patient. -JAMES 5
III. Baritone & Chorus
Lord, let me know my end,
and what is the measure of my days;
let me know how fleeting my life is.
You have made my days a few handbreaths,
and my lifetime is as nothing in your sight.
Surely everyone stands as a mere breath.
Surely everyone goes about like a shadow.
Surely for nothing they are in turmoil;
they heap up, and do not know
who will gather them.
And now, 0 Lord, what do I wait for?
Mr hope is in Thee. -PSALM 39
IV. Chorus
How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts!
My soul longs, indeed it faints
fOr the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh sing for joy
to the living God.
Happy are those who live in your house.
ever singing your praise. -PSALM 84
V. Soprano & Chorus
Ye now are sorrowful;
but I will see you again,
and your hearts will rejoice,
and no one will take your joy from you.
-JOHN 16
As a mother comforts her child
so will I comfort you.I
Behold with your eyes: but for a little
have I known SorrOW and labor
and found much rest. -ECCLESIASTICUS 51
VI. Baritone & Chorus
For here have we no continuing place,
but we seek one that is to come.
-HEBREWS 13
Behold, I show you a mystery:
we shall not all sleep,
but we shall all be changed;
in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,
at the hour of the last trumpet.
For the trumpet shall sound,
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed.
Then shall be brought to pass
the saying that is written:
Death is swallowed up in victory.
0 death, where is thy sting?
0 grave, where is thy victory?
-I CORINTHIANS 15
You are worthy, our Lord and God,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for you created all things,
and by your will they existed
and were created. -REVELATI0N 4
Blessed are the dead
who from now on die in the Lord.
"Yes," says the Spirit,
"they will rest from their labors.
for their deeds follow them."
-REVELATI0N 14
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