tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11301779.post113011010136529126..comments2024-02-16T19:27:54.675-05:00Comments on Think Denk: Brahms ImperfectJeremy Denkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16997540220711182521noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11301779.post-1132914078220774022005-11-25T05:21:00.000-05:002005-11-25T05:21:00.000-05:00Was pointed to your site by klarinet email - I pla...Was pointed to your site by klarinet email - I play clarinet in UK (also compose, conduct, and play recorder professionally, adjudicate, write)and enjoyed many performances of Brahms trio with a Czech cellist and UK pianist when we were staff at Chetham's School of Music, Manchester. I know what you mean about the patience required to let Brahms have his effect on us, and the way this sometimes frustrates. In this trio, the first movement is so fully worked out with long melodies, that maybe he sought a balance with a fragmentary, motivic last movement? Then again, the third movement is also slight (gorgeous dance) and the second is of course one of the finest slow movements in the whole classical repertoire (no argument!). But if we look at the slightly later clarinet sonatas and how he developed tiny motives of sometimes just two notes (as also in first movements of Symphonies 2 and 4), this last movement is essentially "Variations on the 6th and its inversion the 3rd".<BR/>You'll know that your long D minor chord is his beloved Plagal cadence to the last chord, and that not only does the piano reprise the opening intervals, but also the cellist follows the piano before the last two chords, so the cellist's duty, I suggest, is to out-do the piano in expressive, dynamic and dramatic weight here to bring the music to it's conclusion, while the pianist underplays those eighths, rather than goes for broke - Brahms only writes one forte. At this time of his life he was thinking so orchestrally that the piano D minor chord needs somehow to suggest a full wind and brass chord sustained majestically and sonorously (almost with a crescendo!) - I know pianists love to do this!<BR/>But the 6th/3rd ideas are so prevalent in this piece that I suggest the rests in the second subject material should not be exaggerated, rather let the tempo flow so effectively through the 6/8 and 9/8 measures that the music breathes naturally - Brahms as ever writes the rhythmic spaces and proportions into his notes without the need for tempo adjustments or rits. Often performers in this section make the gaps interrupt the flow, but perhaps they're just the music's own breathing spaces? Right at the start the piano accompaniment includes/echoes the cello's main tune 1. The sixteenths are a decoration of the interval of the 3rd; the clarinet's first entry is a decoration of the cello's tune, using some triplets (number significance is all in Brahms - the Second Symphony, i, he uses lots of 5-note groups, even putting 5/2, 5/4, 5/8, even 5/16 groupings into the 3/4); at measure 46 (letter B in Peters) all the parts include the interval of the 6th, and at E (136) piano left hand includes a 3rd up instead of the 6th down - in fact, there's hardly a bar without someone playing a 3rd or 6th of some sort, yet the impression is never of mechanical adaptation, rather constant refreshment.<BR/>I've always enjoyed most the remarkable passage from 77 winding down to the most delicate, mysterious pp dolce through to 105 (D) - absolutely everything is to do with manipulation of the intervals, how they interlock, subtly grading the harmonic changes and keeping up momentum through masterly use of rhythm, interval, melody and harmony so effortlessly intertwined it seems natural, yet also brilliantly invented.<BR/>Well, you got me interested - Brahms is the greatest composer. Full Stop. When I was 12 I hated his stuff - bored with the symphonies in concert, couldn't see what the fuss was about in the clarinet sonatas. But as years of conducting and thinking and growing up have passed, there is none other who so richly combines expression and intellect. I often feel we perform his music too slowly - a mind so quick and brilliant as his in putting patterns together from nuggets of notes deserves to be let loose not held back. The slow movements are gloriously slow, but he often is mercurial in the developmental thinking from note one of the great quick movements that tempo chosen must allow the thinking speed of the audience to aim to match the composer's. We also need more rehearsal time to get everyone in the ensemble however large to appreciate just how marvellous the constructions are, not just wallow in the romantic idiom.<BR/>Anyway, hope you may enjoy many more Brahms' Trios, all best, Colin (Touchin).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11301779.post-1130428959962036982005-10-27T12:02:00.000-04:002005-10-27T12:02:00.000-04:00Many thanks for inspiring me to pull my recording ...Many thanks for inspiring me to pull my recording off the shelf and get to know it better. I also needed a break from "Memphis Skyline." <BR/><BR/>- Structure Man (Row T1)R J Keefehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06925072280945666069noreply@blogger.com