1st piano concerto (Brahms)
The 1st Piano Concerto Op. 15 in D minor is a concerto for piano and orchestra by Johannes Brahms . It was composed from 1854 and premiered on January 22, 1859 under the direction of Joseph Joachim and the composer at the piano in the royal court theater in Hanover .
background
In the spring of 1854, shortly after Robert Schumann's attempted suicide , Brahms began to design a sonata for two pianos in D minor. But he was sobered to find that his ideas could only be inadequately implemented with two pianos. An attempt to rework the draft into a symphony got stuck in the beginning because Brahms did not feel familiar enough with the art of instrumentation and was afraid that this would fail.
In 1855 Brahms had the idea of reworking the draft of the first movement of the piano sonata into a piano concerto. It came to him overnight, so to speak, as he wrote to Clara Schumann on the morning of February 8, 1855 :
- “Think what I dreamed the night. I would have used my failed symphony for my piano concerto and played this. From the first movement and scherzo and a finale, terribly difficult and big. I was really excited. "
By autumn 1856, the first movement of a concert for the pianoforte accompanied by the orchestra was composed , although it was revised several times by 1859. Brahms composed the Adagio in the winter of 1856/57. The first version of the Rondo finale, which he sent to Joseph Joachim, his adviser on orchestral instrumentation, in mid-December 1856, was followed by a second, improved version at the end of April 1857.
The movement names of the concert are: Maestoso - Adagio - Rondo: Allegro non troppo . The playing time is usually around 50 minutes.
occupation
The concert
The first sentence
The Maestoso is a piece of the greatest possible contrasts in 6/4 time: wild and rebellious, but also mourning, of exuberant bliss, solemn seriousness, but also desperate. The changes in dynamics are erratic, and there are also surprising twists and turns from minor to major . The first movement is clearly structured as a sonata main movement , as was customary in Viennese classical music . Unlike many of his romantic colleagues, Brahms felt obliged to the strict formalities of the Viennese classicism. Clearly the exposure with a concise and a lyrical theme, and are implementation and recapitulation separated.
The introduction begins with an organ point D in the bass and a threatening swelling up and down drum roll , which is surprisingly supplemented by a B flat major sixth chord . The angry-sounding opening motif, which consists only of the notes of this B flat major chord, is followed by a characteristic trill figure that is repeated in different keys. Due to this harmonically undecided state, the path finally leads after 28 bars to D minor. In the piano , the high strings play a melody that could be mistaken for the secondary theme. Their accompaniment in the lower strings goes back to the opening motif. A transition develops from this lyrical theme, which ultimately leads to a final group that takes up the beginning again.
After this has come to rest in a kind of ostinato , the piano kicks in (bar 91) - one could already expect a development at this point. Almost alone, accompanied only by soft pizzicatos and dabs of trumpets, horns and timpani, the wonderful theme unfolds , piano and espressivo . Hidden by the key and the 6/4 time, it is astonishingly similar to the opening bars of Beethoven's 4th piano concerto . With the characteristic double ties of eighth notes , it finds majestic size in thirds and sixths first in the right, then also in parallel in the left hand. After 19 bars the massive head theme with the dreaded octave trills is reached.
The second, lyrical or chorale-like theme in F major, performed over 17 bars from bar 157 by the piano alone, is permeated with solemn seriousness. It ends with a hunting horn motif ( Halali ), which was heard in a triumphant variant shortly before the first use of the piano. It is first introduced by the piano, later picked up again and again by the French horns until it fades away in extreme depth.
The development begins in bar 226 in the piano with the halali motif shortened to a simple fourth jump. It makes extensive use of the thematic elements of the main movement, which are processed with great tension.
Finally, the recapitulation shows that Brahms, committed to tradition, processed the themes according to the formal requirements of the Viennese Classic. It begins in bar 310. The movement does not have a cadenza that is typical for solo concerts and is usually presented shortly before the end. However, due to the increased virtuosity of the piano part towards the end of the movement, it appears dispensable.
2nd movement
On December 30, 1856, Brahms wrote to Clara about his work on the slow 2nd movement:
“These days I am writing the first sentence of the concerto. I also paint on a gentle portrait of you, which will then become Adagio. "
The orchestra presents a theme set in D major, which the piano takes up in a modified form. Overall, the Adagio is a dialogue between orchestra and piano, in the course of which the theme is constantly being developed. At the end, however, the orchestra returns to the opening version and concludes this movement. The thematic material is related to that of the first movement (there first in the lyrical part of the introduction).
In his autograph, Brahms had placed the words “ Benedictus qui venit in nomine domini ” (praised be he who comes in the name of the Lord) under the first five bars . The prescribed articulation of the first violins makes it possible to combine this part with the text. Since the second movement of the original sonata for two pianos had become part of the German Requiem, it seems possible that Brahms originally conceived this music as a measuring movement. In any case, the character would correspond to that of a Benedictus .
A noticeable breakout in bar 46 is reminiscent of Robert Schumann's style with its dotted lines (e.g. also in Benedictus in Schumann's Requiem op. 148).
3rd movement
The rondo in 2/4 time begins (again with sixths) in D minor and corresponds entirely to the forms of music theory. Presented by the piano, the energetic theme is repeated and varied by the orchestra. After a wonderful fugato by the orchestra ( D flat major ), the piano takes up the theme in soft F major. The powerful cadenza quasi Fantasia is followed by the resolved final section in D major . After another cadenza, it ends with double trills in both hands and a fanfare-like shortening of the theme in triumphant size.
Acceptance by criticism
“It is sad but true that the new compositions presented in the Gewandhaus during this year's season have made little or no luck; in general we do not remember ever having experienced so many and total defeats by composers as in the previous section of our concerto this year. [...] The current fourteenth Gewandhaus concert was again one in which a new composition was buried - the concert of Mr. Johannes Brahms . In truth, however, this piece is not at all intended to provide any kind of satisfaction and enjoyment: if one takes away the seriousness of the striving and the efficiency of the musical disposition [...], there remains a desolation and drought, which is truly bleak. In no single place does the invention have anything captivating or beneficial; the thoughts either creep along wearily and sickly, or they rear up in feverish excitement, only to collapse more exhausted; unhealthy in a word is the whole feeling and inventing in the piece. If these pale and shadowy thoughts, only occasionally tinged with hectic redness, give a sad sight in themselves, the matter becomes even more dismal through the way in which they are processed and used. [...] And this choking and digging, this tugging and pulling, this patching together and tearing apart again of phrases and clichés one has to endure for more than three quarters of an hour! You have to absorb this ungarnished mass and swallow a dessert of the most screaming dissonances and most disparaging sounds at all! Moreover, with full consciousness, Mr. Brahms also made the principal part in his concert as uninteresting as possible; there is nothing of an effective treatment of the pianoforte, of novelty and delicacy in passages, and wherever something appears that takes the lead to brilliance and liveliness, it is immediately held down and squeezed again by a dense orchestral crust of accompaniment. Finally, it should be noted that, as a technical piano player, Mr. Brahms is not at the level of the demands that one is entitled to make of a concert player today. "
This was the criticism on the occasion of the performance of the 1st Piano Concerto in the Gewandhaus (Leipzig) on January 27, 1859, during which the composer himself sat at the piano. It was the second performance of the concert after the premiere in Hanover. Brahms was disappointed by the reaction of the Leipzig audience and especially of the musicians:
“Still completely intoxicated by the uplifting pleasures that my eyes and ears have been enjoying for several days through the sight and conversation of the wise men of our music city, I force this sharp and hard Sahrsche steel pen to describe to you how it went and how it ended happily was led that my concert here brilliant and decisive - failed. "
literature
- Renate Ulm : "Has he not yet played the timpani and drummets?" I. Piano Concerto in D minor, op. 15. In: Renate Ulm (Ed.): Johannes Brahms. The symphonic work. Origin, interpretation, effect. 2nd edition, Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 2007, pp. 123-140.
Web links
- 1. Piano Concerto (Brahms) : Sheet music and audio files in the International Music Score Library Project
Individual evidence
- ↑ Clara Schumann, Johannes Brahms, Briefe , ed. by Berthold Litzmann, Volume 1, Leipzig 1927, p. 76 ( digitized version )
- ↑ Wulf Konold (Ed.): Concert Guide Romanticism. Orchestral music from AZ. Schott, Mainz 2007.
- ^ Fourteenth subscription concert in Leipzig. In: Signals for the musical world . 17th year, No. 7, Leipzig, February 3, 1859, p. 71 f. zs.thulb.uni-jena.de