The greatest genius is the most indebted man. A poet is no rattlebrain, saying what comes uppermost, and, because he says everything, saying at last something good; but a heart in unison with his time and country. There is nothing whimsical and fantastic in his production, but sweet and sad earnest, freighted with the weightiest convictions, and pointed with the most determined aim which any man or class knows of in his time.—Emerson.
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I
GROWTH
Among the many types of character which are developed by the pursuit of an artistic profession, two stand out salient and extreme:—the artist militant and the artist contemplative. The former looks upon life as a crusade; he proclaims his doctrines to the sound of the trumpet and proves them at the point of the sword: he treats every critic as a traitor, and every adversary as a Paynim and a miscreant: he invades all lands, he challenges all strongholds: he shakes the round earth with the noise of conflict and the shock of contending creeds. The latter is of a far different temper. To him the service of his cause is occupation enough: he is content to produce the best that he knows, and cares little or nothing that others should accept his standpoint: if the work be good he will let it take its chance of appreciation; if men choose to fight about its merits, he will watch the struggle from his study window as a matter in which he has no personal concern. Nothing is farther from his thought than the establishment of a school or the leadership of a party: like Plato's philosopher, he finds his reward in the pleasures of wisdom, and can leave the pleasures of victory to his self-constituted followers.
Yet the second is not less sure of immortality than the first. For a time, no doubt, the din of battle may drown the quieter accents of the recluse, and the pageantry of war distract attention from the shady groves and alleys of Academe. The world attaches itself more readily to persons than to ideas, and rather resents the imputation that it knows nothing of its greatest men. But there is an inherent vitality in the best work which can no more be starved by neglect than it can be crushed by antagonism. Sooner or later the campaign is brought to a successful issue, and the general returns in triumph through the city gates. Sooner or later the silent truths find voice and audience, and disciples come flocking to the feet of the secluded teacher. Wagner, in a word, has cut his way to fame; Brahms has waited until it set out to seek him.
A life so placid and equable affords of necessity but little material to the biographer. True, there is some record of the early years, some reminiscence of studentship or of the first attempts to formulate and deliver an artistic message, but, the power of utterance once admitted, there is little further to narrate beyond the successive occasions of its exercise. Here, then, is a case in which criticism may concentrate itself from the outset upon the direct development of the artistic gift. The career of a great man is only interesting in so far as it gives fresh insight into his power, or throws fresh light on the influences that have moulded his character: it is with his work that we are primarily concerned, and, except in relation to this, all details of personal joy and sorrow may be dismissed as irrelevant. Incidents of struggle and mastery, alternations of success and defeat, are worth noting when they occur, since they leave their mark for good or ill on the environment, through which the art itself is affected. But where they are absent we stand face to face with the object of our search, and may contemplate it, not as embodied in circumstance, but as manifested in its own pure nature. And further, the unbroken quietude in which Brahms spent his last thirty-five years may itself suggest a standpoint from which his work can be estimated. He was the deepest thinker in the musical history of our generation, and he had no time to bestow on questions of recognition or reward.
Like his two great forerunners, he was the son of a musician, and was brought up from earliest years to the practice of his art. His father, Johann Jacob Brahms, was a contrabassist in the Hamburg Theatre, who, after having fulfilled the office of Meister der Stadtmusik in his native town of Heide, had come to try his fortunes in the orchestra where Handel had once played second violin. Of his mother nothing is recorded, except that she was a native of Hamburg, and that her maiden name was Johanna Nissen. Shortly after his marriage, Johann Brahms settled down in the Anselar Platz, and there, on May 7th 1833, Johannes was born.
It soon appeared that the boy was possessed of unusual capacity. He learned everything that his father could teach him, he read everything that he could lay his hands on; he practiced with an undeviating enthusiasm, he covered reams of paper with counterpoint exercises and variations. At an early age he was sent for further instruction to a worthy kapellmeister named Kossel, and in 1845, having left his master behind him, he was transferred to Eduard Marxsen of Altona, a composer of considerable merit, whose name has been handed down to us by Schumann's articles in the Neue Zeitschrift. There can be no doubt that this was a well-directed choice. In addition to the thorough knowledge of Bach, which had by this time become a staple of musical education in Germany, Marxsen impressed on his pupil the paramount importance of a critical study of Beethoven, and thus laid the foundation of a broader eclecticism than had been attainable by the composers of any previous age. And, as every artist is in some degree influenced by the masterpieces from which he takes his point of departure, it is obvious that the more comprehensive a system of training, the more perfect will be the balance and unity of the ensuing work. Something, of course, must be allowed for temperament and predilection; no course of academic rule would have taught Chopin to write a symphony or make a contrapuntist of Berlioz; but given a mind that is wide enough to be in sympathy with divers methods, we can hardly over-estimate the value of a wise and many-sided rÉgime. It is, then, a matter of no small moment that Brahms in his early studies should have followed the historical development of the art: first, the volkslieder and dances which represent its simplest and most unsophisticated utterance; then the choral writing, in which polyphony is brought to its highest perfection; lastly, the culminating majesty of structure which Beethoven has raised as an imperishable monument. To us at the present day it may seem the most trivial of commonplaces, that a student in music should pay equal attention to all the supreme types of his art; it was not a commonplace half a century ago. And the proof, if proof were needed, is that all the composers of the Romantic period exhibit some imperfection of method: all, no doubt, playing a definite and valuable part in the advancement of their cause, but all leaving untouched some one point of vital importance in the heritage of previous achievement. In saying this, it is not, of course, necessary to set the genius of Brahms in the balance against that of Schumann or Chopin. 'Non facultatum inducitur comparatio sed viÆ.' But the fact remains, that there are in the earlier Masters certain traces of weakness from which the later is wholly free; and of this fact one reason may be found in a contrast between the system of Marxsen and the system of Kuntzsch and Elsner.
It was in 1847 that Brahms, at the age of fourteen, made his dÉbut before a Hamburg audience. His performance, which included a set of original variations on a Volkslied, was received with a good deal of applause, but Marxsen, who had no intention of spoiling a career by premature publicity, withdrew his pupil after a second trial flight, and sent him back to a course of training from which he did not emerge for another five years. This last period of studentship was mainly devoted to composition, and produced among other works the three Pianoforte Sonatas, the Scherzo in E flat minor, and several songs, one of which was the famous 'Liebestreu.' They may be said to stand to Brahms later writings as 'Pauline' stands to 'Cleon' or 'Andrea del Sarto.' There is some wilfulness of phraseology, some occasional lapse of expression, but the beauties are real and genuine, and the whole manner astonishingly mature and adult. Already these appear in germ some of Brahms' most notable contributions to structural development, already there is evidence that he understood, as one alone had done before him, the full significance of the Sonata form, and the possibilities of its further extension. Here at last was a composer who could fulfil Berlioz's boast, that he had taken up music where Beethoven laid it down.
So passed away a quiet and uneventful boyhood, a time of novitiate and preparation in which the rules were learned and the discipline endured that should qualify a postulant for the full investiture of his order. The conflicts of 1849 left Hamburg almost entirely untouched, and to the cloistered retirement of the Anselar Platz the year of revolution was chiefly memorable as that in which Herr Intendant Heinrich Krebs resigned his office in order to succeed Herr Hofkapellmeister Richard Wagner, at Dresden. Of the home-life, meanwhile, we can only say that it was too happy to afford any history. Thanks to the reminiscences of a few friends, we may recall for a moment a brief memory of the household:—Johann Brahms, kindly, genial, humorous, full of droll stories and quaint aphorisms, yet, in more serious mood, inspired with that intense poetic love of nature which was so distinguishing a characteristic in his son; Frau Brahms, gentle and affectionate, proud of her children, yet half afraid of the dangers and temptations to which an artistic career is liable; and with them the two boys, Johannes, standing on the verge of a noble and laborious manhood, and Fritz, whose brilliant promise was soon to be cut short by an early death. But it is only a glimpse too slight and transitory to do more than intensify the darkness through which it penetrates. All the rest is veiled with a silence which, in the personal record of a great life, is the best of auguries.
About the beginning of 1853[48] Hamburg was visited by the Hungarian violinist, RemÉnyi, an eccentric genius with an insatiable passion for travel, who, in the course of an itinerant life, has carried his national music as far east as China and as far south as Natal. For the time, however, he was contemplating a tour of more moderate dimensions, and being struck with Brahms' playing, suggested that they should undertake the enterprise together. It was, no doubt, a comradeship of rather incongruous elements, and the boy, who had never left home before, must have felt a little strange as he set out beside his eager, restless, impetuous companion, who only lamented that his wanderings were confined to a single planet. But the offer came at so opportune a moment, that there could be no question as to the propriety of accepting it; and in a few days the pair were travelling southward to see whether the towns of Germany would open their gates to the new alliance.
At GÖttingen occurred an accident which indirectly altered the whole aspect of Brahms' position. The piano provided for rehearsal was, of a kind, picturesquely described by Dr Schubring as 'ein erbÄrmlicher Klapperkasten,' which had lost all the voice that it ever possessed by a long course of university dissipation. Accordingly, the impresario was summoned, offered the usual apologies, promised to procure a more adequate substitute for the evening, and returned at the last minute with a new instrument, which, on investigation, proved to be a semitone below concert-pitch. It is easy to picture the consternation of RemÉnyi with an expectant audience, a flat piano, and the 'Kreutzer Sonata' in immediate prospect. To tune his violin down would be little short of a personal outrage, but there seemed no other solution, and he was proceeding with a reluctant hand to slacken his strings when Brahms came to the rescue and offered to transpose the pianoforte part, which he was playing from memory, into the higher key. No doubt similar feats have occasionally been performed by artists of very different calibre, by a Woelffl as well as a Beethoven, but they have not often been hazarded by a boy at the outset of his career, when success might pass unnoticed, and failure would throw back all chances of reputation and livelihood. It is little wonder that RemÉnyi required a vast amount of persuasion before he would allow the attempt to be made, and that he was overwhelmed with astonishment when it ended in a veritable triumph.
As soon as the concert was over, the two artists were informed that a member of the audience wished to speak with them, and, on coming forward, found themselves face to face with Joachim. He had noted the conditions under which the Kreutzer was given, had admired not only the tour de force, but the general breadth and vigour of the rendering, and now, after a few words of cordial commendation, he offered to lighten the rest of their journey by a letter of introduction to Liszt at Weimar and another to the Hofintendant at Hanover. It was a pity that DÜsseldorf lay outside their scheme; still if Brahms would come back to GÖttingen at the close of the tour, he should have a letter to Schumann which might prove the most serviceable of the three. That Joachim was deeply impressed, is evident from a few words which he wrote on this occasion to his friend Ehrlich. 'Brahms has an altogether exceptional talent for composition,' he says,—'a gift which is further enhanced by the unaffected modesty of his character. His playing, too, gives every presage of a great artistic career—full of fire and energy, yet, if I may say so, inevitable in its precision and certainty of touch. In brief, he is the most considerable musician of his age that I have ever met.' Such an encomium, from such a source, may well have set expectation on the alert. Since Beethoven, there had been no man received into the brotherhood with so sincere and hearty a welcome.
Fortune, however, indignant that her blows had been parried at GÖttingen, determined that they should be felt at Hanover. For a time, matters went well enough: the first concert was successful; Count Platen gave every assistance to the friends of Joachim; the ladies of the Court were roused to enthusiasm by the romantic Hungarian, and charitably commended the shy, silent German whom they mistook for his accompanist. Then the police intervened. It appears that RemÉnyi's brother had taken an active part in the revolt of 1848. It was even whispered that the violinist himself had played the rÔle of TyrtÆus in the outbreak, and had marched, instrument in hand, at the forefront of an insurgent army. Clearly so dangerous a firebrand could no longer be permitted to imperil the safety of the Hanoverian throne, and accordingly there came a peremptory note from Herr PolizeiprÄsident Wermuth, followed by a rigorous examination and a couple of passports for BÜckeburg. In vain RemÉnyi protested that he had no intention of calling his audience to the barricades, that BÜckeburg was the last place in the world which he wished to visit, and that he had several other engagements in Hanoverian territory. The sentence of banishment was adamantine, and the utmost concession that could be obtained was the alteration of the visÉ to Weimar.
This, of course, brought the tour to an abrupt conclusion. Arrangements had to be cancelled, chances of profit and reputation foregone, and the end of the journey anticipated before half its distance had been traversed. However, the concert at Weimar was a fitting climax, and the cordiality of Liszt made compensation for all disasters. By an odd chance Brahms had included in the programme his Scherzo in E flat minor, the most certain of all his compositions to attract the great pianist's attention, and it is not surprising that he found himself forthwith enrolled as a leader in the extreme left of the romantic party. We may here add, that he felt himself from the first in a false position, and that, a few years later, he formally withdrew his allegiance; but it was hardly to be expected that he should begin by disowning qualities which his early work undoubtedly possesses, and which he only outgrew after further practice and experience. And it is equally intelligible that Liszt, who looked upon all music from his own standpoint, should consider Brahms an ally of Berlioz and Wagner, and should value him not as a maintainer of the old dynasties, but as a fresh embodiment of the revolutionary spirit. In any case, the misapprehension was of little immediate importance. Royalist and republican joined hands with mutual regard, and left to the future all reference to alien ideals, or divergencies of method.
After the concert at Weimar, Brahms bade adieu to his mercurial companion, and set out at once for GÖttingen in order to claim the promised letter of introduction to Robert Schumann. Unfortunately, the curtailment of the tour had so seriously affected his slender resources that, on obtaining his credentials, he found himself virtually penniless, and was compelled to make the rest of his journey to DÜsseldorf on foot. It was a very dusty and travel-worn figure that presented itself at Schumann's door on the famous October morning; but however weary the pilgrimage, it was more than rewarded by the event. Schumann listened to the new composer first with interest, then with admiration, then with enthusiasm; he broke his rule of silence to praise 'music the like of which he had never heard before'; finally, he issued in the Neue Zeitschrift a panegyric that rang through the length and breadth of Germany, and set the whole artistic world upon a strain of attention. In sure and unfaltering accents he proclaimed the advent of a genius in whom the spirit of the age should find its consummation and its fulfilment; a master by whose teaching the broken phrases should grow articulate and the vague aspirations gather into form and substance. The five-and-twenty years of wandering were over; at last a leader had arisen who should direct the art into 'new paths,' and carry it a stage nearer to its appointed place.
The first result of Schumann's encomium was a request from Leipsic that Brahms would go over and play some of his compositions at the Gewandhaus. Accordingly he made his appearance on December 17, gave the Sonata in C and the Scherzo in E flat minor, and soon, to his great disquietude, found himself in the centre of a raging controversy. There ought, indeed, to have been no dispute in the matter at all. It is notoriously difficult to estimate at a first hearing new work which is possessed of any artistic importance: it becomes almost impossible when the work is not only new but novel, when it stands out of all relation to the accustomed phraseology of its time. The critics, therefore, would have done wisely if they had been content to reserve judgment, or even to acquiesce in the verdict of Schumann, until they had gained the knowledge requisite for an independent opinion. But to declare that 'Brahms would never become a star of the first magnitude' was, under the circumstances, an extreme presumption, and to wish him 'a speedy deliverance from his over-enthusiastic patrons' was little short of an impertinence. However, if the music was attacked it was also strenuously defended, and, before the winter was out, the publication of no less than eight important works had given opportunity for a more comprehensive survey of their scope and purport.
At the beginning of 1854 occurred the terrible calamity which brought Schumann's career to its sudden and tragic termination, and deprived Brahms at once of his kindest friend and of his most capable adviser. The intimacy had only lasted for some five months, but it had sprung into full maturity on the day of its birth, and had run its brief course in unbroken confidence and affection. It was no relation of master and disciple, no unequal bond of patronage and subservience: from the outset the two men had met on equal terms, united in a companionship which the disparity of their years could not impair. Throughout Schumann's correspondence of the preceding winter, there is scarcely a page that does not bear some reference to the 'young eagle': now a word of counsel, now a good-humoured jest, now a presage of coming reputation. It was a hard chance that severed so close a tie at the very moment when promise was yielding its fruition and prophecy passing into fulfilment.
The spring was mainly spent over the labour of proof-sheets; then came a short holiday with Liszt at Weimar; then a few concerts of no special interest or importance. But there could be no doubt that the circle was slowly widening. In July the Neue Berliner Musikzeitung, printed a careful and discriminating review of the 'sechs Lieder' (Op. 3), and, about the same time, Brahms received the offer of two official appointments, one from the Rhenish Conservatoire at Cologne, which he refused, one from the Prince of Lippe Detmold, which he decided to accept. His new position, though not of any great dignity or emolument, contained two practical advantages: the first that it gave him experience as choir-master and conductor; the second that, at the most receptive period of his life, it brought him into touch with cultivated men and women. Besides the work was congenial, the surroundings were as quiet as he could wish, and the requirements of the court so little exacting, as to leave him his own master for nearly three-quarters of the year. There were a few pageants and ceremonials, a few state concerts during the winter months, and then followed abundant leisure to study, to compose, and to bring into further growth an organism which was already marking a new stage in artistic evolution.
A brilliant success, won at the outset of a career is usually attended by a natural and obvious danger. The artist has made his mark, he has won for a moment the capricious attentions of his public, he has been hailed as an equal by the acknowledged masters of his craft; it is only human that he should strive to keep himself in evidence, and set all sail to catch the fitful breeze of popular favour. Add to these conditions the opportunity afforded by an accident of office; add a vivid, prolific imagination, and a style which competent judges have pronounced mature; add, in short, every incentive to production which circumstance or capacity can supply, and the result is a temptation which the traditional impatience of genius may well find some difficulty in withstanding. It is therefore the more noticeable, that the four years which followed Brahms' appointment at Lippe Detmold, were spent by him in an almost unbroken privacy. He had, as we know, several other manuscripts in readiness; two of the chief publishing houses in Germany had placed themselves at his disposal; new competitors were arising whose claims would have been felt as challenges by a lesser man. Yet during the whole of this time he printed but one composition, and appeared so rarely in public that he might seem to have forgotten his purpose and foregone his ambitions. In May 1856 he played in a concert at Cologne, where he was severely censured for including in the programme so dull a work as Bach's chromatic Fantasia; in December 1857, he accepted two engagements at the Leipsic Gewandhaus, and took part in Mendelssohn's G minor Concerto, and the Triple Concerto of Beethoven; but except on these three occasions, even the newspapers of the time are silent in regard of him. They had, indeed, other things to occupy their attention. The storm raised over Das Judenthum in der Musik had hardly subsided; the great Tetralogy was in process of completion at Zurich; Rubinstein was filling all Germany with his brilliant masterful presence; no space could be devoted to chronicling the uneventful annals of a recluse who for the moment was making no ostensible contributions to the cause of Art.
But it was not a case of 'tam bonus gladiator rudem tam cito.' Brahms had no intention of deserting the arena in which he had won his first victory and gained his first laurel. Only, like all men whose lives are dominated by an ideal, he was profoundly dissatisfied with his present achievement, and he set himself once more to a resolute course of training in order to complete and perfect his adolescent power with those gifts of certainty and facility which are only won by steadfast endeavour. In his early work there is, as Herr Deiters remarks, 'a certain lavish expenditure of strength,' a careless vigour which shows itself, not in redundancy—for he is never redundant—but in a disregard of some necessary limitations, in a disposition to cut Gordian knots of style which it is better to untie. Had he been content to follow the path of romance, there would have been no need for him to modify these tendencies: for romance treats the emotional aspect as paramount, and cares less for the purely technical problems of form and phrase. But Brahms was born to restore the classical traditions in music, and for the maintenance of those traditions something more is requisite than the almost obstinate force which he had hitherto manifested. In January 1859 appeared the first fruits of this long and strenuous cultivation. Hitherto Brahms had given to the world nothing beyond the scale and compass of chamber music; now, in Schumann's phrase, he 'let the drums and trumpets sound,' and presented himself at the Gewandhaus with his Pianoforte Concerto in D minor. Its reception for the moment was most unfavourable. The audience listened in pure bewilderment, waiting in vain for the virtuoso passages that it felt a conventional right to expect; the Leipsiger Signalen dismissed the work as a 'Symphony with Pianoforte Obbligato,' in which the solo part was as ungrateful as possible, and the orchestral part a 'series of lacerating discords.' The fact is that Brahms had turned a new page in the history of concerto form, and that Leipsic was unable to read it at sight. His only response, however, was to take the composition to Hamburg, which at once rallied in defence of its hero, gave him a warm welcome in the concert-room, and, in the newspapers, opened a battle-royal to which the conflict of 1853 had been a mere skirmish. If the commercial prosperity of the town had been threatened, it could hardly have been defended with more vehement protests or a more determined patriotism.
No such controversy arose over Brahms' next work—the charming and graceful Serenade in D which was first given at Hamburg on March 28. In later days, no doubt, the Vienna press offered some carefully-balanced criticisms of its style; for the time Germany yielded to the enchantment, and allowed itself to enjoy, without afterthought, the sweetness of the melodies and the pellucid clearness of the form. Indeed, no more salient contrast could be found than that between the two works with which the composer signalised his reappearance.[49] Both alike show that he had completely assimilated the past records of his art, but in the one he uses his knowledge as a basis for new application, in the other he takes the old types as they stand without extending their range or enlarging their content In the Serenade he sums up: in the Concerto he advances. Hence it was not unwise that he should at once prepare the lighter composition for the press, and reserve the more serious until the world had grown in experience, and had made itself more ready to receive him.
About this time he resigned his office at Lippe Detmold, feeling that even so slight a chain was a hindrance to the freedom of an artistic career, and returned for a short period of residence to his native Hamburg. The prophet, indeed, had achieved some share of honour in his own country, and the least that he could do was to pay it the acknowledgment of a visit; beside which his parents were still living in the old home, there was abundance of theatrical and musical gossip to interchange, and there was the young Fritz, growing up into an excellent pianist, who deserved some congratulations on his progress, and some advice as to his future.[50] But, as the months wore on, they brought with them the need of a more extended range. Home-keeping youths stand in a proverbial danger of homely wit, and an atmosphere of comfort and sympathy, however delightful, is apt to relax and weaken the sterner qualities. So, in 1860, shortly after the publication of the Serenades, Brahms again turned his back upon Hamburg, and set out to try his fortunes afield.
His first halting-place was the little town of Winterthur, between Zurich and Constance. German Switzerland had long shown a warm hospitality to musicians, and a cordial interest in their art; moreover one of the great Leipsic publishers had an outpost in Winterthur itself, and the organist there was Theodor Kirchner, the most gifted of Schumann's pupils, and the most ready to offer a hand of fellowship to the genius whom Schumann had heralded. In a very short time the new arrival found himself among friends, and forthwith settled down to work after his usual undemonstrative fashion. It was not an opulent life, but it was comfortable and adequate: there were pupils to teach, there were audiences to delight, and above all, there was Rieter-Bidermann's printing office as a stimulus to further composition. Yet in truth there was little need of stimulus. The treasures, accumulated during four years of self-imposed economy, were only waiting to be coined and expended; now the mint was opened and the golden currency scattered with a lavish hand. In 1861 appeared the beautiful Ave Maria for female chorus and orchestra, the fine sombre Funeral Hymn, the D minor Concerto, the first two sets of pianoforte variations, and a couple of volumes of songs and duets; in 1862 followed four exquisite part-songs for female voices with horn and harp accompaniment, a string sestett in B flat, the most magnificent piece of chamber music that had appeared since the death of Beethoven, two books of Marienlieder, another volume of songs, and finally two new sets of variations for the piano, one on a theme from Handel's Harpischord lessons, one[51] on the pathetic melody that had haunted the last sane moments of Schumann's life. Even with these the record is not exhausted. There still remain the Pianoforte Quartetts in G minor and A major, which, though not published till 1863, were certainly written before the end of the previous year. And when we realise that in all this catalogue almost every work is a masterpiece, almost every form a development of preceding types, it is hard to see where, except in the greatest of all composers, we can find a parallel to the achievement. Schubert, no doubt, could pour a more 'profuse strain of unpremeditated art,' but art, at any rate in its larger forms, is the gainer by premeditation. Mozart could fill the accustomed channels with a more copious stream of melody, but he was content that its waters should run their course in familiar regions. Here is a man whose originality never betrays him into carelessness, whose certainty of touch never degenerates into formalism, whose thought, even in its deepest and most recondite utterance, is always firmly conceived and clearly articulated. Such a mastery of phrase and structure is not only slow of acquisition, but also, in some degree, slow of exercise. It is impossible that the most eloquent genius, the most elaborate training should have enabled Brahms to write one of his great chamber works with the rapid facility that has so often been a mark of the chief composers. An organism so coherent and so complex is not created by a single flash of the artistic will.
By an odd coincidence, the first chapter of Brahms' life may be said to end with this temporary climax of production. In the autumn of 1862 the coterie at Winterthur was broken up by Theodor Kirchner's acceptance of an appointment at Zurich; and Brahms, beginning perhaps to feel that the place where he dwelt was too strait for him, set himself to find a wider habitation and a more enlarged sphere of energy. It was in many ways unadvisable that he should follow his friend. For one thing, Zurich was hardly central enough to satisfy his requirements, for another, it was much dominated by the influence of Wagner and Liszt, and the school which they were taken to represent had never forgiven Brahms his public defection from its ranks.[52] Besides, he had recently been manifesting some special interest in the bright rhythms and piquant phraseology of Hungarian music: one of his first sets of pianoforte variations had been on a Hungarian theme; the finale of his G minor Quartett was ostensibly affected by a similar attraction; in other of his more recent works there were details of style which showed that he had begun to think, like Schubert, of holding the balance between two artistic languages. Everything, in short, pointed towards Vienna. It was still the capital of European music; it possessed traditions from which any composer might be proud to draw inspiration and stimulus; it contained the most critical public to which any artist of the time could appeal. There was no question of alternative; without more ado Brahms 'set his face to the east,' and, before November, had established himself in the city which he was afterwards content to call his home.
II
MATURITY
Vienna, in 1862, was entering upon its second period of musical activity. After the death of Schubert it had suffered something of a reaction; not, indeed, enough to dim its prestige, but enough to prevent it from making any considerable addition to its record. Now, however, the interval of repose was ended, and for the past few years the city had been gradually rousing itself into fresh energy and fresh achievement. Among its creative musicians could be numbered many names of interest: Robert Volkmann, Saxon by birth, Austrian by residence, a lesser Schumann, whose work had been unjustly eclipsed by his great compatriot; Goldmark, the epigrammatist of the orchestra, brilliant, witty and self-reliant; Bruckner, already completing the foundations on which he has built his strange composite structure of romance and counterpoint; Ignaz BrÜll, fresh from the triumph of his first public performance; Johann Strauss, who, like his father, had raised dance music to the level of a fine art, and whose orchestra was still 'worth a journey to Vienna on foot.' Even higher was the standard of executance. There were at least three conductors of the first rank:—Esser at the Opera House, Otto Dersoff at the KÄrnthnerthor Theatre, and Herbeck, recently appointed to an engagement at the Gesellschaft; the chamber concerts of Laub and Hellmesberger had won European reputations: every day one could hear a pianist like Epstein, or a violinist like GrÜn, or a horn-player like Hans Richter of the KÄrnthnerthor, for whose career renown was prophesying a triumphant future. And for criticism, though here, as everywhere, could be found journalists who made up in vociferation what they lacked in knowledge; yet here, as in most places, the mass was leavened by some genuine exponents of sound principle and earnest judgment. Ambros lived close at hand, and could sometimes spare a moment from his historical work to estimate a contemporary; while in the city itself were Grillparzer, who thirty years before had discovered Schumann, and Hanslick, who, though something of a specialist and something of a partisan, has always maintained his standpoint with clear logic and steady conviction.
It was into this assembly that Brahms made his way. As yet his compositions were little known, but there was no musician in Vienna who had not heard his name or felt some expectation at his arrival. Before long, introduction had ripened into acquaintance and acquaintance into a many-sided friendship. Men were glad to welcome a new genius of conspicuous power and encyclopÆdic knowledge, who never spoke of himself, who never wrote a line in his own defence, who never attacked an opponent or depreciated a rival. Add to this the quiet voice, the undemonstrative manner, the kindly disposition that expended itself in a thousand services, the upright honesty that would never stoop even to conquer, and it is not hard to explain a personal popularity which has lasted unimpaired to the present day. The artist is too often to be described, in Mr Stevenson's phrase, as 'a man who sows hurry and reaps indigestion,' who 'comes among people swiftly and bitterly to discharge some temper before he returns to work.' It is not a little refreshing to contemplate a genius who, with all the astonishing amount that he accomplished, yet found time to enjoy his dinner, to bear his part in the company of his friends, and to become the sworn ally of all the children in the neighbourhood.
His first public appearance took place at a Hellmesberger concert on November 16, when he played the pianoforte part in his G minor Quartett. From the outset there was no question about his recognition as a pianist; the critics were keen-sighted enough to see that the absence of virtuosity was a merit, and to estimate with full justice the broad masterly musicianship of the interpretation; but at the same time it must be confessed, that the first judgment of his composition was seriously adverse. 'We do not propose,'[53] said the BlÄtter fÜr Theater Musik und Kunst 'to condemn Herr Brahms altogether until we have heard more of his work, but the present specimen will not induce the Viennese people to accept him as a composer. The first three movements are gloomy, obscure and ill-developed: the last is simply an offence against the laws of style. There is neither precedent nor excuse for introducing into Chamber Music a movement entirely conceived in the measure of a national dance, and it is much to be regretted that Herr Brahms should have departed in this matter from the example set by Beethoven and Schubert.' The criticism is worth quoting as an example of that dogmatic error which is sometimes allowed to pass current for certainty. It is of course wholly wrong upon the point of fact. Brahms' movement follows in perfectly natural development from the Minuet finales of Haydn, from the Turkish March finale of Mozart, from the 'Alla Tedescas' of Beethoven himself, and even if it did not, even if it were a new departure in detail, a good deal of analysis would be required to show that absence of precedent involved absence of justification.
The composer, however, soon showed that if he had for the moment declined in public estimation, it was only 'pour mieux sauter.' A week later, the Serenade in D was successfully given by the Gesellschaft; on November 29 followed the A major Quartett, far more favourably received than its predecessor; fame, once established, gathered and grew with steady persistence, and at last, in December 1863, opposition itself was silenced by a magnificent performance, under Hellmesberger, of the Sestett in B flat. For once the audience was unanimous; the critics forgot to cavil; even Brahms' old enemy, the BlÄtter, admitted itself convinced, and, in the first flush of enthusiasm, supplied this most rigorous of classical compositions with a romantic programme. 'The opening movement,' it said, 'is a walk in spring when the sky is cloudless and the flowers are blooming in the hedgerows. The second' (i. e., the Air with variations) 'represents a gipsy encampment—dark-eyed maidens whispering secrets, and afar-off the subdued tinkle of the mandolin. The third is a rustic dance; and the fourth—well, we suppose that fourth must mean the journey home.' This is not remarkably conclusive as an exposition of the Sestett, but it appears to have been kindly meant, and, at any rate, it succeeded in calling public attention to the work, and preparing, in some measure, for a more adequate discussion of its merits.
Meantime Vienna was shaken to its foundations by another inroad. At the end of 1862 Wagner appeared, gave two or three concerts in the course of the winter, and finally established himself at Penzing, where he worked at Meistersinger, and received his friends with his accustomed Oriental hospitality. His relation with Brahms appears to have been always of the slightest. The two composers met occasionally on neutral ground, but they were never intimate, and it was impossible that they should be attracted to each other by any real artistic sympathy. Wagner, indeed, seems to have looked on his great rival as Victor Hugo looked on Corneille and Racine: Brahms, for his part, was content to avow that he did not understand the theatre, and that for him the magic of WalkÜre and Tristan had no enchantment. It may be that the sense of contrast gave additional point to a famous and frequently-quoted epigram of the younger artist. One day Hanslick was rallying him on his anchorite habits and suggesting marriage as an antidote. 'No,' said Brahms, 'it is as hard to marry as to write an opera. Perhaps—in both—a first success might embolden one to try again; but it wants more courage than mine to make a start.' The mind naturally reverts to an enthusiastic and rather callow reformer, who had once endeavoured to inculcate a short-service system of matrimony in an opera called Das Liebesverbot.
Apart from a fine organ fugue in E flat minor, the only compositions published in 1863 were the two Pianoforte Quartetts. This sudden fit of reticence may possibly be explained by Brahms' appointment in June, to the conductorship of the Vienna Singakademie, a responsible post, which necessitated a good deal of work, and not a little anxiety. It was for this body that he wrote many of his smaller vocal quartetts and choruses, e.g., the AbendstÄndchen, the Vineta, the Wechsellied zum Tanze, and the Neckereien, some of which were performed at a 'Brahms' Concert on April 17, 1864, and printed shortly afterwards. At the beginning of May he was unanimously re-elected to his office; but finding, as usual, that he had little taste for either the labour or the rewards of a public position, he resigned in July, and betook himself once more to his study and his proof-sheets. It is worth noting, as an example of the influence of environment, that all the works published during 1864 are vocal. In the spring appeared a setting of the 23d Psalm, then followed four duets for Alto and Baritone, then three choral works and three quartetts, and finally, at the close of the year, two volumes of delightful songs, which end, as a fitting climax, with the immortal melody of 'Wie bist du meine KÖnigin.'
The compositions of 1865 include the great Pianoforte Quintett in F minor and the first two books of Romances from Tieck's 'Magelone.' In March the A major Quartett was given at Leipsic, with Madame Schumann at the piano and David to lead the strings; and later in the year, after a long visit to Theodor Kirchner at Zurich, Brahms undertook a concert tour on his own account, and made a triumphant progress through Mannheim, Cologne, where he conducted the D major Serenade, Carlsruhe, where he played sonatas with Joachim, and Oldenburg, where, in January 1866, he brought out his new Trio for piano, violin and horn. All this time he was writing with his usual tireless industry, and, in the course of the next few months, saw safely through the press his Variations on a Theme of Paganini, his Sestett in G major, hardly inferior to its more famous predecessor, and his first Violoncello Sonata, a remarkable example of mastery over a very difficult medium.
We may gain an indication of Brahms' growing importance in the artistic world, from the amount of attention bestowed upon him during these years by the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung. This journal, ever since Chrysander's occupation of the editorial chair, had gradually won its way to the forefront of German criticism, and from 1863 onwards it treated Brahms with a respect that no other contemporary musician either merited or received. Each of his works in turn was welcomed as an event in musical history, subjected to an exhaustive analysis, often extending over two numbers, and discussed throughout with admirable sympathy and intelligence. Amid our chaos of hasty and ill-considered judgments, it is not a little reassuring to read such articles as that of Chrysander on the F minor Quintett, or that of Deiters on the Sestett in G. There is here no indiscriminate praise, no prejudiced or ill-natured censure, no evasion of the point at issue under a nebulous mist of semi-poetical fancies: from first to last, the critic shows a due reverence for genius and a real attempt to understand the purport of its message. Work such as this, while it justly reacts upon the credit and position of the writer, involves also the recognition of a high value in the object to which it is applied. No great critical essay could ever be written on a poor or trivial theme. The judge may be as denunciatory as Macaulay, or as humorous as Mr Andrew Lang; he may call to his aid all the Graces of Parnassus, or condemn with all the authority of the Stygian tribunal; but sooner or later the world comes to see that mere denunciation is barren, and that mere banter is ephemeral. The highest criticism, in short, means a judicial estimate of the highest merit, and though the intrinsic worth and splendour of genius can in no way be enhanced by any act of homage, yet it is well, both for genius and the world at large, that the act of homage should sometimes be rightly and adequately performed.
In October 1866, Brahms made a short concert-tour in German Switzerland, with Joachim for companion. The pair visited Schaffhausen, Winterthur, and Zurich, playing everywhere to enthusiastic audiences, but meeting with no adventure worth recording. The days of flat pianos and officious superintendents had long gone by, and in the path of two such artists there were no longer any obstacles to retard progress, or arouse reminiscence. At the end of November they separated; Joachim to fulfil an engagement in Paris; Brahms to return for the usual winter season in Vienna, where, in January 1867, Hellmesberger led the first performance of the G major Sestett. It is no discredit either to composer or to audience that the new work was received with more astonishment than delight. The extremely elaborate polyphony, which is one of its distinguishing attributes, is probably too intricate to be comprehended by anyone at a single presentation, and we may infer that the public actually did not hear the melodies for the simple reason of their abundance. The complaint of tunelessness which has been brought against every great composer in turn, usually emanates from a criticism that cannot see the wood for the trees, and on this occasion it may be noted that Vienna saved its repute by wisely reserving judgment; and that Brahms' only repartee was to publish forthwith a delightful set of four-hand waltzes, in which the top part had the tune and the other parts had the accompaniment, and everybody was satisfied.
In March and April, he gave a couple of pianoforte recitals, at which, as usual, his own works were very sparsely represented. It was at the former of them, by the way, that he brought out his Paganini Variations, and, on being enthusiastically recalled, played the Finale of Beethoven's third Rasoumoffsky Quartett as an encore. Towards the end of April came two concerts at Pesth, and in the early summer appeared a fine set of part-songs for male voices, usually known by the title of Soldatenlieder. But the great musical achievement of the year was the German Requiem, of which the original six numbers, written, it is said, as a monument for the Austrio-Prussian War, seem to have been completed by November. A seventh movement, the exquisite soprano solo, with choral interludes, was inserted next year in commemoration of a more intimate and personal sorrow.
As a preliminary, the first half of the Requiem was given at a Gesellschaft concert on December 1, and at once visited with a storm of Theological criticism. It was not a Requiem, said the purists; it was not even ecclesiastical in tone; it was a sacred cantata, far less suited to the church than to the concert-room. Even its defenders looked upon it with some misgiving, and could only plead that it was 'confessionslos aber nicht religionslos.' Now and then the controversy diverged as on a side issue to consider the music and discuss its relation to Bach and Beethoven, but, for the most part, critics seem to have been occupied in pointing out the impropriety of the name, and raising the equally important objection that there is nothing distinctively 'German' in the sentiment of the words. However, the world soon had an opportunity of judging the matter from a more appropriate standpoint. On Good Friday, 1868, the entire six numbers were performed in the Great Church at Bremen, to an audience of over two thousand people, including Joachim, Dietrich, Max Bruch and Madame Schumann. Representative musicians came from Austria, from Germany, from Switzerland, from England itself, and the impression that they carried away with them has steadily gathered and developed into a reverence that is almost too deep for praise. Grant that there are some genuine lovers of Music who find the Requiem an unequal composition, which only means that to them it makes an unequal appeal; the fact remains that there is nothing in the whole work, unless it be the difficulty of execution, against which any objective criticism can be directed. 'You cannot touch them,' said Heine of some disputed passages in Faust, 'it is the finger of Goethe.' And as the faults are imaginary, so the beauties are incontestable. If there be any man who can listen unmoved to the majestic funeral march, to the serene and perfect melody of the fourth chorus, to the two great fugues, which may almost be said to succeed where Beethoven has failed, then he can only conclude that he stands as yet outside the precincts of the art. It is no more a matter for controversy than are the poetic merits of the Antigone or the Inferno. We are not here dealing with a product of the second order, in which blemishes are to be condoned and qualities set in antithesis, and the whole appraised by a nice adjustment of the balance. To find a defect here, is to criticise our own judgment, and to stigmatise as imperfect not the voice that speaks but the ear that listens.
The summer of 1868 was spent at Bonn, partly in preparing the German Requiem for the press, partly in strenuous composition. The only other works published during this year, were five volumes of songs (Op. 43 and Ops. 46 to 49),[54] but it seems pretty certain that Rinaldo and the Rhapsodie from Goethe's Harzreise were written at the same time, and we may probably add the first set of Liebeslieder Waltzes for pianoforte duet, with vocal accompaniment, which appeared early in 1869. Of the songs, it is only necessary to say, that they include Von ewiger Liebe, Botschaft, HerbstgefÜhl, An ein Veilchen, and the Wiegenlied; the two cantatas have long established their position as the finest male-voice choruses in existence; and the Liebeslieder, though naturally conceived in a lighter mood, are as dainty as Strauss and as melodious as Schubert. Finally, there is some slight internal evidence for assigning to 1868, at least one of the two string quartetts which were printed a few years later as Op. 51. In any case, whether this assignment be correct or not, the year's record is one which would do honour to any artist in musical history.
After this period of vigorous activity there followed two years of almost entire repose. In 1869, a couple of concert tours were projected—one in Holland and one in Russia, but the plans were abandoned almost as soon as conceived, and meanwhile the only fresh publications were the first two books of Hungarian dances, which, by an odd irony of fate, have come to be more intimately associated with Brahms' name than almost any of his own compositions. It is no longer requisite to point out that the melodies of all the dances are of national origin; one alone (the graceful little CsÁrdÁs, in A major) being traditional, and the rest, written by Rizner, KÉler BÉla, and other 'popular' Hungarian composers. But it is worth noting, as an illustration of critical method, that more than one journal of the time disregarded the specific announcement on the title-page, and accused Brahms of plagiarising the tunes which he only claimed to have arranged in duet form. Of course, the accusation broke down, but equally, of course, it ought never to have been made.
It may be remembered that, in 1859, Brahms had emerged from his second period of studentship with a Pianoforte Concerto in D minor, which at the time was received with considerable disfavour by its Leipsic audience. The work had been printed in 1861, and had slept ever since on the shelves of Rieter-Biedermann, waiting in patience until the public was ready to appreciate it. Now it seemed as though the hour had come. The world was wiser by the experience of a dozen years; the composer was no longer a dÉbutant to be sacrificed on the altar of critical conservatism; Vienna had shown herself disposed to listen with sympathy and intelligence. Accordingly the work was recalled from its obscurity, presented at a Philharmonic concert on January 20, 1871, and, it is pleasant to add, received with acclamation. No doubt the critics repeated their old joke, that it was a 'symphony with pianoforte obbligato,' but the attention with which it was heard, and the applause with which it was welcomed, gave sufficient evidence that the interval of education had not been fruitless. 'It is,' says Dr Helm, writing to the Academy, 'the most original production of its composer, except the Requiem, and the most genial composition of its kind since the days of Beethoven.' Perhaps 'genial' is not precisely the epithet that we should most naturally employ, but when a victory is announced it is ungracious to carp at the terms of the bulletin.
In 1871 appeared two new works of considerable importance. First came the Triumphlied, written to commemorate the victories of the Franco-Prussian war, and produced, together with the Requiem, at a solemn Good-Friday service in Bremen Cathedral; then, a few months later, there followed at Carlsruhe, what is perhaps the most widely-loved of all Brahms' compositions, the exquisite and flawless setting of Holderlein's Schicksalslied. It was only natural that the former should rouse some criticism in the French papers, which were still chafing at the foolish humours of Eine Kapitulation. The shout of victory however noble and dignified its expression, is always a little discordant to the vanquished and we may almost sympathise with the Gazette Musicale, which ended its review by remarking, in a tone of grave irony, 'Et M. Brahms, l'auteur du Triumphlied, est nÉ À Vienne, prÈs Sadowa.'
Of the Schicksalslied, it is hard to speak without incurring some charge of extravagance. Perfection is a word of such serious meaning, and of such loose and careless employment, that a writer may well hesitate to apply it, even if there be no lighter one that is adequate to the case. Yet, on the other hand, it is difficult to see how, in the present instance, any hesitation is possible. The work deals with the most tremendous of all contrasts:—the pure, untroubled serenity of Heaven, the agonies and failures of a baffled humanity, the message of peace, tender, pitying, consolatory, which returns at last to veil the wreck of man's broken aspirations; and to say that the treatment is worthy of such a theme, is to announce a masterpiece that has as little to fear from our criticism as it has to gain from our praise. It is almost superfluous that one should commend the more technical beauties: the rounded symmetry of balance and design, the pellucid clearness of style, the sweetness and charm of melody, the marvellous cadences where chord melts into chord as colour melts into colour at the sunset. If it be the function of the artist that he be 'faithful to loveliness,' then here at least is a loyalty that has kept its faith unsullied.
After such a climax, it was almost inevitable that there should follow a period of reaction, and in 1872 no new compositions made their appearance. As a subsidiary cause we may note that, in the summer of this year, Brahms accepted the important post of conductor to the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde. His tenure of office, which lasted until 1875, is marked by the very noticeable frequence of Handel's name in the programmes of the Society. It has become so much the fashion to regard our admiration for Handel as a peculiarly British error, that we may well feel some relief at finding it shared by the greatest and most essentially German of recent musicians. Saul, Solomon, Alexander's Feast, the Dettingen Te Deum, and the Organ Concerto in D minor, were all presented in the course of the next two seasons,—a remarkable record, if we remember that a season consisted of six concerts, and that the range of selection extended from Johann Rudolph Ahle to Rubinstein and Goldmark.
Once established in his new position, Brahms found no further difficulty in reconciling its duties with the needs of his own productive activity. During the years 1873-5 he poured out a continuous stream of new works, including not only many songs, duets, and choruses, but the Neue Liebeslieder, the fine set of orchestral variations on a Theme of Haydn, and the Pianoforte Quartett in C minor, which, although it suffers from an almost inevitable comparison, may yet be said to contain two of the most delightful melodies that its composer has ever written. It was in this last work that some candid friend pointed out an obvious structural resemblance to the Finale of Mendelssohn's C minor Trio, and was met with the placid, if somewhat direct rejoinder, 'Das sieht jeder Narr.' Brahms does not belong to the artistic type that can be readily stirred by an accusation of plagiarism.
Such an accusation, however, was shortly to be repeated in more vehement terms. At the beginning of November 1876, the Symphony in C minor was played (from MSS.) at Carlsruhe, and at once attracted a great deal of attention, not only because it was the composer's first work in this form, but for the less satisfactory reason that its Finale is based on a melody curiously similar to that of Beethoven's 'Freude.' To make matters worse, an enthusiastic Hamburg admirer labelled the new composition 'A Tenth Symphony,' and so emphasised the resemblance in a manner which would have been hardly possible to an open antagonism. The artistic importance of this question will be considered later: at present it is enough to note, that the resemblance undoubtedly exists, and that it holds a prominent place in almost all the contemporary criticisms. Yet, on the whole, the Symphony was favourably received. The first movement aroused some controversy:—'We cannot make head or tail of it,' said a Munich correspondent, 'so we suppose that it is a Symphonic Poem;'—but the Andante, the Allegretto, and even the offending Finale, appear to have met with a due share of popular favour. It must be remembered that the opening Allegro is essentially tragic in character, and that, with the general public, tragedy takes longer than comedy to win its way.
As the publication of the Requiem had been followed immediately by a great outburst of choral works, so that of the first Symphony stimulated Brahms to further attempts in the great epic forms of the orchestra. In December 1877, the D major Symphony was produced by Richter at a Philharmonic concert in Vienna, and in 1878, after a short holiday tour in Italy, Brahms completed the triptych with his superb Violin Concerto, second only, in the record of musical art, to that of Beethoven. The dÉbut of this last composition, which took place on January 14, 1879, was characterised by a very unusual mark of respect and interest. Not only was it received with a veritable ovation—when Joachim is playing Brahms that is only to be expected—but at the close of the concert a large part of the audience remained in the hall, and constituted itself into an impromptu debating society to discuss its impressions. This forms a remarkable contrast to the panic flight which usually follows on the first moment of liberation, and must be taken as the sign and witness of a more than superficial enthusiasm. Men may applaud from good-nature, from impulse, from a desire to be in the fashion; but something stronger than this is required to keep them in their seats after the performance is over.
Meantime works of less long a breath were appearing in their usual copious abundance. In 1876 came the bright genial Quartett in B flat, then followed a series of songs, duets and pianoforte pieces, then a couple of motets for mixed chorus and orchestra. In November 1879 the Violin Sonata in G was given for the first time at a Hellmesberger Concert, and succeeded almost immediately by the two well-known Rhapsodies for piano solo, and the second set of Hungarian dances. Of course, fertility is not in itself a mark of genius—otherwise Raff would be the greatest composer of the century—but at least it gives additional opportunity for the marks of genius to appear. And it may be added that, even in the periods of most rapid production, Brahms hardly ever shows any signs of haste. If he escapes the self-torture which drove Chopin day after day to the revision of a single page, it is not because his ideal is lower, but because his judgment is more robust.
In 1880 he accepted the degree of Doctor in Philosophy, offered him by the University of Breslau, and at once set himself, during a summer stay at Ischl, to write his thesis. A ceremonial of so solemn and academic a character naturally demanded an unusual display of learning. Symphonies were too trivial, oratorios were too slight, even an eight-part À capella chorus in octuple counterpoint was hardly adequate to the dignity of the occasion. Something must be done to mark the doctorate with all the awe and reverence due to the Philosophic Chair. So Brahms selected a handful of the more convivial student songs—'Was kommt dort von der HÖh',' 'Gaudeamus igitur,' and the like—and worked them into a concert overture, which remains one of the most amusing pieces of pure comedy in the whole range of music. It was an audacious experiment, and one which could only have succeeded in Germany. Not even Brahms could offer, as a Doctor's exercise at Oxford or Cambridge, a work based on the melodies with which our own studious youth beguiles its leisure moments.
Two other compositions appear to have been written at Ischl during the same summer—the Tragic Overture and the Pianoforte Trio in C major. Of these the Trio remained for some time in abeyance; the Overture, together with its 'Academic' companion, was produced at Breslau on January 4, 1881, and repeated at Leipsic on January 13. It is equally intelligible that the lighter mood should have won a more immediate sympathy, and that a mature decision should have reversed the verdict. In the Academic Overture men met old friends, cracked old jokes, recalled old memories of the Kneipe, and so rather put themselves out of court for dispassionate criticism: the Tragic brought them nothing but a cheerless vision of crumbling steeps and mysterious shadows, of dark recesses and haunted glades, of
through all of which we can fancy Vetter Michel passing with his coat tightly buttoned and his hat pressed over his brows, only anxious to escape as soon as possible from the enchanted spot, and return to warmth and light and good fellowship. At the same time, the Tragic Overture strikes a deeper note, and though it is not more masterly in structure, is certainly more poetic in conception. Besides, it owed no factitious interest to the particular circumstances of its first appearance, and so, having been treated from the beginning on its own merits, it is the more likely to endure.
Other events of 1881 may be dismissed in a few words. At the end of January the London Philharmonic endeavoured to secure Brahms as conductor for its coming season; but the offer, like all subsequent invitations from this country, was immediately declined. 'Je ne veux pas faire le spectacle,' is the reason which was once given as the ground of refusal; and, though we may feel a little mortified at the implication, it is difficult to deny the uncomplimentary truth that it contains. We have not yet learned to treat genius frankly, and either starve it with censure or smother it with an irrational excess of enthusiasm. And further, Brahms was much occupied during the summer, partly in preparing his two overtures for the press, partly in completing the NÄnie and the new Pianoforte Concerto in B flat. During the autumn came a concert tour of unusual extent, in which the last-named work was produced at Buda-Pesth, and repeated at Meiningen, Stuttgart, Basle, Zurich, and ultimately at Vienna. By this time it had become an article of faith, that Brahms' concerti showed no claim to their specific title; and, as the jest of 'Symphony with pianoforte obbligato' had fulfilled its purpose, the critics struck out a fresh line, and described the new work as 'chamber music on a larger canvas.' However, the Viennese public was as indifferent to names as Juliet herself, and received the music with a cordiality that took no thought of problems in scientific classification.
The publications of 1882 consist of four volumes of songs, which range in character from the humour of the Vergebliches StÄndchen to the poetry, as pure and contemplative as Wordsworth, of Feldeinsamkeit and Sommerabend. After the Vienna season Brahms took his usual holiday at Ischl, and there composed the String Quintett in F and the Gesang der Parzen, both of which were printed in the succeeding year. But the next real landmark was the third Symphony produced at Vienna in the winter of 1883, and repeated at once in almost every great musical centre in Germany. It is perhaps the finest, certainly the clearest, of all Brahms' instrumental compositions for orchestra—forcible and vigorous in movement, delightful in melody, and, of course, faultless in construction. 'Now at last,' said a member of the Viennese audience, 'I can understand Brahms at a first hearing': and, indeed, it must be a cloudy twilight in which so exact a hand cannot be readily deciphered. In strong contrast is the fourth Symphony in E minor, which followed after another period of song-writing. On grounds of true artistic value, it is almost equal to its predecessor; but it deals with more recondite themes, it traces more involved issues, and it has consequently been treated with some of that irrational impatience which is the common fate of prophets who speak in parables. When it was presented at Leipsic in 1886, the critics protested against it as wholly unintelligible; and when Reinecke repeated it at the beginning of the next year, the audience trooped out after the third movement and left the finale to be played to empty benches. It may be remembered that the subscribers to Fraser's Magazine once threatened to withdraw their patronage unless the editor discontinued a farrago of exasperating nonsense called by the unmeaning name of Sartor Resartus.
In 1887 Brahms was created a Knight of the German order, 'pour le mÉrite,' in company with Professor Treitschke, Gustav Freitag, and Verdi. He had already received the order of 'Arts and Sciences' from the King of Bavaria; and, two years later, he was admitted by the Emperor of Austria to the order of St Leopold—the first civilian, it is said, on whom that distinction has been conferred. Meantime, he brought his list of works past its hundredth opus number—that goal which Schubert was so pathetically anxious to reach—with the 'Cello Sonata in F, the Violin Sonata in A, the double Concerto and the C minor Pianoforte Trio. The first of these, which was produced by Hausmann in November 1886, at once aroused a very curious outburst of structural criticism. It was said, and the statement is still repeated, that Brahms had been guilty of a dangerous and radical innovation in choosing for his slow movement a key removed by only one semitone from that of the work as a whole. The choice was too near in pitch, it was too remote in signature, it broke the harmonic unity of the composition by a contrast of colour which was in itself glaring and extreme. But of attacks on Brahms, as of attacks on a very different master, we may generally say, 'Ça porte malheur.' The so-called 'innovation,' authoritatively condemned as without parallel in musical literature, may be found in one of Haydn's pianoforte sonatas, and can hardly, therefore, be criticised at the present day as hazardous and revolutionary. Whether the contrast be here successful or not is a matter on which opinions may conceivably differ, though, after any serious study of the opening movement, they are likely to concur; but it is surely unfair to accuse Brahms of violating the classical tradition, unless, indeed, there be a sense in which any stage of evolution may be said to violate its forerunner.
In the summer of 1889 Brahms was presented with the freedom of the city of Hamburg, a gift which affected him more deeply than any splendour of royal or academic distinction. With its acceptance his public life may be said to close. He was now fifty-seven; he had spent nearly forty years of strenuous and honourable work; his dislike of notoriety grew naturally keener with advancing age; he had no longer any office or appointment to call him from his beloved seclusion. The occurrences of the next seven years may be summed up in a few rare concert-tours or holiday visits. For the rest he lived among his books; reading, editing, annotating until the creative moment came, and the world was made richer by a new masterpiece. Within this period he produced about a score of compositions: an exquisite violin sonata in D minor; a second string quintett, even sweeter and more melodious than the first; two volumes of motets, strong, stately and dignified; two concerted works for clarinet, of which one at least may rank among the chief glories of musical art, and a whole underwood of songs and pianoforte pieces, that grow and blossom in the shadow of the larger forest. But even the records of achievement become more sparse as the years decline. The evening was at hand, and the day's work drawing to its close.
It was in the summer of 1896 that he printed his last composition, the Vier ernste GesÄnge. For some little time his health had been giving cause for anxiety. In the autumn his doctors sent him to Carlsbad in hope of a cure; then in the early winter appeared symptoms of some cancerous growth, and the only hope left was for the alleviation of pain. Yet a few more months he lingered, bearing his death sentence with the same unselfish fortitude that had marked his life, until on April 3, 1897, the end came and the sufferings were over. With him passed away one of the noblest figures in all musical history: a great man, generous and upright, without envy, without arrogance, free from all taint of the meaner emotions, wholly single-hearted in the service of his ideal. The happiness which eludes all conscious human pursuit came to him unasked and unsought; the rewards that he would never stretch a hand to seize offered themselves for his acceptance. His life was secure from sordid anxieties, unvexed by the contests and intrigues that have so often marred an artistic reputation, rich in the love of friends and the priceless gift of genius. It is not for him that we should mourn, now that in the fulness of years and honours he has laid his books aside and turned to sleep.
III
THE DIRECTION OF THE NEW PATHS
As Music is the most abstract of the arts, so it is also the most continuous. In each successive generation the Poet and the Painter are confronted by approximately the same facts of nature and life: the truth of representation which forms an essential part of their work is relative to an external model which is comparatively unchanging. Thus, in a certain degree, every age of representative art stands on a level with its predecessors, and however much it is influenced by traditions of style, is even more affected by its direct relation to physical realities. Music, on the other hand, is simply the gradual mastery of a particular medium by the pure action of the human mind. Its actual method contains no concrete element at all, and in it, therefore, every generation must take its point of departure, not from the same universe which appealed to previous artists, but from the actual achievement which previous artists have handed down. The Greeks were as keenly alive to the beauty of music as to that of poetry: to us their poetry is a delight and their music a bewilderment. To the Italians of the great artistic period, the charm of music was as vivid as that of painting; to us their painting is almost a finality, and their music, even in Palestrina, but the supreme expression of a transitory phase. And this is not because music is in any sense the youngest of the arts: for such a theory is refuted by the most casual survey of human history. The real reason would seem to be, that in the representative arts we have a series of comparatively independent periods, each manifesting afresh the attitude of an artistic mind to a fixed world of nature: whereas, in music, the periods are stages of a continuous evolution, and the whole environment of the artist is summed up in the inheritance that he derives from the past.
This distinction must, of course, be stated not as absolute, but as relative. For, in the first place, every work of art is the outcome of its creator's personality, and depends, therefore, on the particular attributes of his character and temperament. Poetry, like the poet, is born, not made: painting, even if it borrow its model from nature, must find its power of vision in the soul of the artist: and music, in like manner, is worth nothing unless it arises from a true and spontaneous emotion. The gift of melody, the sense of ideal beauty, the capacity for genuine and noble feeling, are qualities which cannot be learned or communicated: they constitute the life of the art, and external forces can only influence its training. Further, it is idle to speak of the 'representative' artists as unaffected by the general course of Æsthetic history. Only, it is here contended, that their debt to the past is appreciably less than that of the musician, because their debt to the present is appreciably greater.
It is impossible, then, to estimate a composer without special reference to his historical conditions. For the whole of his work consists in expressing thought, which he originates through a medium which he inherits, and, to gauge his success, we must know how the art stood before it passed into his hands, and to what extent he has enriched or augmented its resources. There are, therefore, two questions, and only two, to which musical criticism can address itself: first, whether the feeling implied by the work is one that commands our sympathy: second, whether in expressing it the artist has assimilated all that is best in a previous tradition, and has himself advanced that tradition towards a fuller and more perfect development. And, as the former of these questions is the more difficult of the two, we may perhaps defer it until the latter has received some share of consideration.
Now, the primary fact in music is the simple melodic phrase: the spontaneous, almost unconscious, utterance of an emotional state that is too vivid for ordinary speech. At first, this music is entirely artless, for art only begins when the medium is recognised as possessing an intrinsic interest; then there gradually arises an attempt to make the phrases more coherent, and so more expressive, until the first landmark is reached in the establishment of a definite scale-system like that of Greece. Thus Greek music may be taken as the lowest stage of organisation in the European history of the art. It was not unscientific, for it had the modes, with their elaborate subtleties of diatonic, chromatic and enharmonic, but we may search its records in vain for any distinctive recognition of musical form. Its effect, to judge from the allusions in Plato and Aristotle, seems to have been wholly emotional, and its intellectual basis was not artistic but mathematical in character.
The Greek modes were revised by Claudius Ptolemy, and on the basis of his revisions was established the system of the mediÆval church. In it the claims of the medium began to receive further attention, and the next step was the gradual elaboration of counterpoint, that is, the combination of simultaneous voice parts, each independent, but all conducing to a result of uniform and coherent texture. Starting from the crude origins of descant and faux-bourdon, the new method steadily grew and developed, through Dunstable, Dufay, Josquin, and a host of other great writers, until it reached the second universal landmark in the magnificent climax of Palestrina. If the ecclesiastical modes had been final, music would never have advanced beyond the 'Missa PapÆ Marcelli,' and the 'Æterna Christi Munera.'
But the modes were not final. For certain scientific reasons, into which it is here needless to enter, they were incapable either of a common tonality or of a coherent system of modulation. Hence, while the organisation of harmony could be carried by the ecclesiastical composers to a high degree of perfection, the organisation of key lay outside their horizon altogether. And while they were busy, like the schoolmen, in 'applying a method received on authority to a matter received on authority,' the unrecognised popular musicians, who had never heard of Ptolemy, and cared nothing about counterpoint, were writing tunes in which our modern scale-system begins to make a tentative and hesitating appearance. It is not too much to say that the dances collected in Arbeau's Orchesographie come nearer to our sense of tonality than all the masses and madrigals that contemporary learning could produce. In a word, the growth of harmony belongs to the Church, the growth of key to the people.
Then came the most important dynamic change in all musical history: the Florentine revolution of 1600. Its ostensible object was frankly dramatic—the revival of Greek tragedy under such altered conditions as were implied by the change of language and civilisation: its real importance was that it destroyed the convention of the modes, and called tonality from the country fair to the theatre and the concert-room. For a while, no doubt, the dramatic ideal overpowered everything else, and even the Church left off writing masses and took to oratorios instead; but when pure music reasserted itself, it found an entirely new set of problems waiting for solution. Harmony had to be organised, not on the basis of the mode, but on the basis of the modern scale, and thus had to take into account a question of key-relationship which had never fallen within the scope of the ecclesiastical period. And hence followed a line of development beginning about the time of the younger Gabrieli, and passing through the great choral composers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries until the third landmark of our musical history was attained in the person of John Sebastian Bach. His polyphony, as applied to the emotional expression of his time, is simply the best of which the art of music is capable. Given the phrases which he employed as subjects, the human mind cannot conceive their being treated with a more complete harmonic perfection.
Meantime, ever since the floodgates had been opened by the audacious hand of Florentine amateurs, another and more copious stream of tendency had been flowing along a separate channel. The new tonality had not only made a great difference in the harmonic aspect of music, it had virtually opened a new field by suggesting the first possibilities of form and structure. Composers began gradually to see that the equalisation of the scales afforded the material for a more perfect and coherent system of design: modulation became a reality, and with it the recognition of different tonics in successive paragraphs or cantos of the composition. They therefore took the simplest effects of contrast, as presented by the dances and Volkslieder of the people, and proceeded to develop them into a fuller diversity of organisation. At first, no doubt, they went on something of a wrong tack: the structural problem received a divided attention, for polyphony was still regarded as paramount, but yet in the chamber music of Corelli and Vivaldi, and in the harpsichord pieces of Scarlatti, Couperin and Rameau may be traced a continuous effort not only to make the form distinct, but to make it in some degree progressive. And on the death of Bach, when polyphony had reached a point from which it seemed impossible to advance, music turned almost entirely to questions of structure, and for the next two generations set itself deliberately to perfect the outline of the sonata, the quartett, and the symphony. This helps to explain the fact, otherwise inexplicable, that Bach's influence on the latter half of the eighteenth century was practically non-existent. Partly, of course, we may account for it by remembering that musical art passed, for a time, into another country, but it is a still stronger reason that composition was occupied with another set of problems. The organisation of harmony is that of simultaneous strains; the organisation of key is that of successive passages; and it is obvious that the perfection of the one will afford but little assistance to the development of the other. And so the line of structural evolution passed through Haydn and Mozart, until, in the work of Beethoven, it also attained a temporary climax and culmination. With him, then, the treatment of the musical medium may be held to have reached its fourth principal landmark.
After Beethoven came the Romantic School, the historical importance of which can roughly be epitomised under two heads. First, it widened the range of emotional expression, and so affected music from the standpoint of the idea. Secondly, it returned to Bach, and adapted his polyphonic system to the requirements of the new musical language. But as its artistic strength was its reverence for Bach, so its artistic weakness was its neglect of Beethoven. On the polyphonic side it maintained the old traditions, and even, in some respects, advanced upon them, since the more 'romantic' the idea to be expressed, the more difficult is pure polyphony in its expression. But, on the structural side, it was distinctly retrograde, and either confined itself to the smaller and more rudimentary forms, or, when it attempted those of a larger scope, treated them with something of negligence and preoccupation. Berlioz no doubt took Beethoven for his master, but it was as a poet, not as a musician. And the other great masters of the school, for all their genius and their earnestness and their love of beauty, are yet, in questions of form, but the minor Socratics of our nineteenth century music, carrying on, each from his own standpoint, some one part of the previous tradition, but neither interpreting nor advancing its full and entire content.
A special word may be said on the relation of Wagner to this general course of musical development. As a dramatist, he stands in some degree aloof: his art is a different art, his methods are different methods, his ancestry may be traced to Shakespear and Æschylus as readily as to Bach and Palestrina. The explanation of his work is always the dramatic explanation: his structure is determined not by principles of pure music, but by the exigencies of the scene. Hence, apart from such a secondary point as orchestration, it is only in his splendid, reckless, audacious polyphony that he has really enlarged the treatment of musical technique. His most enthusiastic followers claim for him that he has 'killed the symphony,' a statement which, though it is radically untrue, is enough to dissociate him from an art that recognises the symphony as its crowning achievement. The drama of the future will accept him as one of its greatest potentates: the music of the future will see in him the lord of a single province, whose government has in one respect assisted the consolidation of the others.
What, then, is required to sum up the tendencies of the present age, and to bring Music to the fifth landmark in its history. Surely a composer, who, while he maintains and develops the harmonic traditions of the Romantic School, shall even more devote himself to the restoration and evolution of musical structure: who shall take up the classical form where Beethoven left it; who shall aid to free it from the conventions which that greatest of all masters did not wholly succeed in loosening; who shall carry it to a further stage and raise it to a fuller organisation. And such a composer has appeared. So far as concerns the technical problem of composition—and it must be remembered that this is at present the only topic under discussion—the work of Brahms is the actual crown and climax of our present Musical art. He is in exact and literal truth 'der der kommen musste:' the man for whom Music has been waiting. In him converge all previous streams of tendency, not as into a pool, stagnant, passive, and motionless, but as into a noble river that receives its tributary waters and bears them onward in larger and statelier volume.
Tintoret claimed 'the drawing of Michael Angelo and the colouring of Titian': Brahms, in like manner, may claim the counterpoint of Bach and the structure of Beethoven. And not only has he entered into the inheritance of these two composers; he has put their legacies to interest, and has enriched the world with an augmentation of their wealth. He is no mere Alexandrine, no grammarian poet, content to accumulate with a patient and laborious industry the gifts that have been lavished by a previous age; the artistic heritage is not won by right of labour, and its dynasty only falls to these who are born in the purple. Erudition, in short, may copy the work of Genius; but Genius alone can develop it.
Are we to say, then, that Brahms is a more consummate master of his medium than Bach or Beethoven? By no means; but, in consequence of their work, his medium is more plastic than theirs. For certain historical reasons, with which the question of personal capacity has nothing to do, the key-system of Bach is rudimentary beside that of Beethoven, and the polyphony of Beethoven less perfect, perhaps, than that of Bach. To Brahms we may apply Dryden's famous epigram, in which the force of Nature 'to make a third has joined the other two.' By his education he learned to assimilate their separate methods; by his position, in the later days of Romance, he found a new emotional language in established use; by his own genius he has made the forms wider and more flexible, and has shown once more that they are not artificial devices, but the organic embodiment of artistic life.
It follows, then, to maintain this statement with a few words of commentary and illustration. And, first, we may take the polyphonic problem, not only because it has some chronological priority, but because the system which it implies is more limited and more readily exhaustible. Now the essential value of Bach's work in this respect is that, in addition to 'writing free and characteristic parts for the several voices in combination,' he 'made the harmonies, which were the sum of the combined counterpoints, move so as to illustrate the principles of harmonic form, and thus give to the hearer the sense of orderliness and design, as well as the sense of contrapuntal complexity,'[55] and since there are no other aims to which polyphonic writing can be directed, it would seem as though Bach's achievement were final, as though it left nothing for future generations to add. But a somewhat closer reflection will show that there are at least two points in which a possibility of progress may be admitted.
One is the immense growth of Instrumental Music, which has virtually brought with it a new material for treatment. Bach's part-writing is generally vocal in basis, the work of an organist who feels the presence of his choir and his congregation; even his concerti are not far removed from the canzonas which were specified as 'buone da cantare e suonare.' But after him came a generation of composers who recognised and brought into fuller use the peculiar character and flexibility of the strings, and thus opened out a new region, which it has been one of the privileges of Brahms to explore. Thus while, in his organ compositions, in his motetts, in the choruses of the Requiem, Brahms has closely followed the methods of Bach (though even here he solves one or two problems which were left untouched by the earlier master), in such examples as the two string Sestetts and the Symphony in E minor, he adapts those methods to a material which he had inherited from a later ancestry. And here it may be noticed that his simplest accompaniments are always characteristic. Even the arpeggio figure, which is usually the easiest and most careless of all harmonic devices acquires in him a special significance and import.
The other point is the change in emotional and melodic phraseology, due partly to the influence of Beethoven and Schubert, partly to that of the more distinctively Romantic composers. It is quite certain that the characteristic melody of the eighteenth century is, on the whole, more susceptible of polyphonic treatment than that of our own time. The finale of the Jupiter Symphony is, in any case, a stupendous effort of genius; but take five typical tunes of Liszt or Berlioz, and Mozart himself could not have dealt with them as he dealt with his own phrases. The curve of melody has altered in some degree, and thus, while it has given new effects of beauty, it has become a little less adaptable to certain of its requirements. No doubt Schumann developed a wonderful polyphonic system of his own; but even in him we may recognise certain limits: and, moreover, he stands, in this respect, almost alone as an intermediary between Bach and Brahms. We are driven, then, to conclude either that polyphony should grow obsolete, which the most unthinking audacity can hardly affirm, or that the extreme of Romantic expression has lost in art what it has gained in poetry. And herein Brahms appears as a true reformer. His thought is in full accord with the general poetic conception of our age, but he has selected from its entire range those particular forms of phrase and melody which are most conspicuously plastic and malleable. The opening of the A major Quartett is romantic enough, but it admits of that marvellous piece of contrapuntal imitation which surprises us in the coda. The Symphony in F major is one of the least formal of compositions, but the most laborious academician in music could not compile a more elaborate polyphony than Brahms has here created. Indeed, there is little necessity to search for instances: they may be found on almost every page of the concerted or choral works. And, though it be true that Bach is often curiously modern in idea, though he frequently stands nearer to us than Handel or Haydn or Mozart, the fact still remains, that Brahms is in closer and more intimate sympathy with him than even the romantic composers who made him their ostensible pattern and prototype.
So far, then, as relates to the harmonic aspect, Brahms may be regarded as a real stage in the evolution of Musical Art. There remains the more important question of his contributions to the development of structure: in other words, of his relation to Beethoven. The harmonic ideal had been maintained, in varying degree, by all composers of the first rank, and herein the traditions of Schumann and Chopin were of distinct and momentous service to their successor; but the structural ideal had, since 1830, been allowed to fall into comparative neglect, and in restoring it Brahms had virtually to do his work single-handed. No doubt, in short lyric forms, and even in their direct expansion to a larger scale, the Romantic musicians had shown a considerable mastery of outline; but in the more complex organism of symphony and concerto, they had fallen somewhat out of the line of progress, and had diverged from the methods of the 'Emperor' and the 'A major.' Hence the estimate of Brahms' position in this matter is of double interest: partly because of the intrinsic value of key-structure in musical organisation, partly because the line of development was in some degree broken and obliterated.
Now it has been already maintained that the sonata form, in its widest and most comprehensive signification, represents the highest type of structure to which the Art of Music has yet advanced. Other instrumental forms—the romance, the fantasia, the nocturne—are modelled, with more or less of exactitude, upon sonata movements; and the same is true even of vocal forms, except in so far as they are influenced by the fugue or affected by the extra-musical requirements of the words. It is therefore to works ostensibly in sonata form that we must primarily address ourselves. And here it may at once be stated that in a vast majority of the details, Beethoven seems to have reached
The outside verge that rounds our faculty.
In the construction of the separate movements, taken as individual unities, there has been little or no progress since his time, for little or no progress was possible. We can only say, then, that in this respect the work of Brahms is as organic as that of his master; and, in saying this, we are merely propounding a matter of comparative analysis which can readily be settled by an appeal to facts. It is as true of Brahms as of Beethoven, that there is in him no redundant phrase, no digression, no parenthesis, nothing that does not bear some intimate relation either to its immediate context, or, with more subtlety, to a remoter part of the subsequent issue. Take, for instance, the rondo tune which opens the Finale of the B flat Sestett. A careless observer may regard the beginning of its second stanza as mere padding, devised to fill a gap until the principal strain recurs. Turn a few pages, and we find that it was the presage of a complete and important episode which itself is vital to the structure as a whole. Again, in the first movement of the same work, if any reader will compare the entry of the second subject with the corresponding place in Beethoven's Hammerclavier Sonata, he will see with what accuracy Brahms learned his lesson and with what consummate skill he applied it. And in all other qualities of organic structure—in choice of tonal centres, in the relative length of constituent sections, in perfect balance of exposition and development—the same line of legitimate succession may be traced. It is not a question of imitation. Brahms is no copyist, reproducing with careful fidelity the precise outline of a master's original. In this, as in his polyphony, he has assimilated the principles of a past method and has turned them to his own account.
But for the complete organisation of a symphony, or a sonata, it is not sufficient that each movement should be structurally exact; they must be so inter-related as to produce an effect of organism in the whole. And there are three chief ways in which this inter-relation can be secured. The first is by unity of emotional effect; by making the whole work tell the same story, and represent the same general type of feeling. In Beethoven's Appassionata, for instance, a scherzo would be an impertinence, in his Eighth Symphony a slow movement would be an intrusion; for the one is as wholly tragic in character as the other is light and humorous. The second is by the proper choice of key for each of the successive numbers; for the selection, that is, among all possible alternatives, of the tonic note that will give the most complete and satisfying result. And herein we may confess that we have one of the few cases in which Beethoven's work was injuriously affected by convention. Of course, the Seventh Symphony stands almost unique and unapproachable, a culminating point of structural excellence, but, as a rule, his scheme, though less homogeneous than that of Mozart, has too little diversity to be accepted as final. Thirdly, the entire composition may be held together by a transference of themes, that is, by the reminiscence in one number of phrases or melodies that have already been employed in another. Of this device there is hardly any example in Beethoven until the end of his career, and even then the only conspicuous instance is the finale of the Choral Symphony. It is, indeed, the latest-born of all the forces that tend to organisation, and along its lines the sonata form of the future will probably find the readiest opportunity of progress.
If, then, Brahms is the inheritor of Beethoven's method, we may expect to find a continuity of tradition in his treatment of these three points respectively. And assuredly the analysis of his work will not disappoint us. For, in the first place, the poetic unity of his compositions is beyond dispute. In each of the great concerted pieces, whether for the chamber or the orchestra, we find one general type of feeling worked out, it may be, to successive issues, but developed in orderly sequence from a single source. His cast of mind is usually grave and reflective, therefore he has for the most part discarded the scherzo, and replaced it by a movement of more earnest and serious character. His manner of thought is logical and coherent, therefore his finales, like those of Beethoven, are not mere light-hearted fantasias, intended to send away the audience in a good temper, but true conclusions, carefully planned and adequately presented. Even in such works as the Horn Trio, where the contrast is probably at its strongest, there is no real obscurity in the underlying relation; while in the four symphonies, to take the opposite extreme, we need only hear the sequence of movements to pronounce it inevitable.
And as we find an organic unity in the emotional aspect, so we find an organic diversity in the choice of keys. Except for the obvious principle, that first and last movements must acknowledge the same tonic, Brahms admits none of the a priori laws by which his predecessor was occasionally bound. In other words, he takes as his unit not the separate movement but the entire series, and selects his keys for Adagio and Intermezzo with the same structural care as he uses for a 'second subject,' or a 'development section.' Allusion has already been made to the Violoncello Sonata in F, one of the most marvellous pieces of successful audacity in all musical form; but hardly less remarkable is the Symphony in E minor, where the key of the slow movement is equally unusual, and equally necessary. Indeed, any of the concerted works will serve for illustration. The choice is sometimes simple, sometimes recondite, but in all cases it is justified by the event.
Transference of themes is a device attended by one imminent danger. If awkwardly employed, it may look like poverty of thought, or at best that artless naÏvitÉ of repetition which is only tolerable in a ballad literature. But if this danger be avoided, and its avoidance is only a question of skill, the reminiscence of a previous melody may round off and complete an entire work in much the same way as the 'Recapitulation' rounds off and completes a single movement. It has been already said that Beethoven makes little use of this method. Schumann indicated some of its possibilities, but Schumann died while the work was still incomplete, and left its further elaboration to other hands. And though Brahms is somewhat tentative and uncertain in the matter, though he leaves room for future advance and future progress, yet at least we may say that he has explored more of the new ground than any of his predecessors. In the Finale of the G major Violin Sonata, and in that of the Quartett in B flat, he is satisfied to carry out the suggestion of Schumann;[56] but elsewhere, as in the second Symphony and the clarinet Quintett, he develops them in a new direction, by founding two movements on thematic variants of the same idea. It is difficult to overrate the value of these hints for future guidance, though, as yet, they are only hints, not complete solutions. For, grant that an entire sonata or symphony can never be called organic in precisely the same sense as its constituent parts; grant that their analogue is the man, and its analogue the corporate community; still some further organisation of the whole is undoubtedly possible, and we may well expect it to follow the method which Brahms has here indicated.
In one word, he has completed, for present purposes, the emancipation of musical form, not by the false freedom of anarchy, but by the true freedom of a rational code. Artistic progress, like that of the political commonwealth, has always tended towards the abolition of purely conventional laws, and to the maintenance and development of those that are founded upon broad principles of human nature. By Brahms, so far as we can see, the last links of convention have been snapped, and the form has now room to grow and expand in perfect liberty. Look, for instance, at his treatment of the Concerto, which, up to his time, was the most unsatisfactory, because the most conventional, of all classical types. He has broken down the unnecessary rule of the three movements, he has finally overthrown the tyranny of the solo instrument, he has given the whole form a free constitution similar to that of the Quartett and the Symphony. And though we be disinclined to regard our present sonata-form as ultimate; though it may some day develop into a new type, as it was itself developed from the Partita, yet the very possibility of future advance depends upon conditions which it has been the work of Brahms to secure. Hence, to call him a reactionary, as some writers are fond of doing, is simply to misunderstand his whole relation to musical art. In all history, there is no composer more essentially progressive.
But, it may be objected, is not all this insistence on minutiÆ somewhat pedantic and artificial? Does it really matter whether a concerto has four movements or three? whether an adagio is in A flat or A natural? Indeed, is not the whole sonata-form a piece of academic subtlety, and a fortiori, must we not regard its details as points of grammar rather than points of art? And the critic, whom we are only too probably supposing, will go on to speak of 'melody beaten out into thematic gold-leaf,' or will even tell us that there is more music in an intermezzo, where the composer's thought 'runs freely without restrictions of form,' than in all the studious ingenuity of codas and development sections. In short we are asked to believe that beauty is too spiritual for legislation, and that any attempt to render it amenable to a code is as futile as the countryman's endeavour to break Pegasus into harness.
Now, in the first place, to commend a musician for disregarding the laws of form is even more unreasonable than to commend a poet for his halting verses, or a painter for his bad drawing. If by laws are meant conventions, then the criticism is just in itself, but it does not touch the point at issue; if natural laws are meant, then the critic has done no more than express his own personal preference for chaos. The little pianoforte pieces of Brahms, for example, are charming, not because they are formless, but because their form is perfect. The only difference between them and the sonata movements, from which they are derived, is a difference of development: the underlying principles are identical. In the second place, it has already been maintained that the sonata is not an artificial construction, but an organic growth evolved, in steadily-increasing complexity, from a living origin: and, further, that its constituent parts represent between them all the general types of all existing instrumental compositions. Either, then, this conclusion must be refuted, or the 'academic' view of the sonata must be abandoned as untenable. And in the third place, if it be demurred that although some general laws of form are advisable, yet the artist should treat them with a free hand, and not expend himself on niggling details, then it is an obvious answer, that this objection rests on a confusion of thought. The little masters have sometimes to choose between a superficial facility and an elaboration that smells of the lamp: the great masters have so assimilated their principles, that exactitude with them is a second nature. In Tintoret's Miracle of S. Mark, the twisted rope strands could not have been drawn more perfectly if they had cost weeks of calculation and measurement: yet each is finished with a single sweep of the brush. And so again in Brahms this accuracy of detail is not a matter of diligence, but a matter of insight, cultivated, no doubt, by past training, but employed at the moment with a direct and unerring certainty. It may legitimately be questioned whether perfection of form is not sometimes too dearly bought by a sacrifice of vigour or originality: if the two can be set in antithesis, we may understand that a critical judgment should hesitate between them. But, given vigour and originality, and, in Brahms, no serious writer has ever denied these gifts, it hardly admits of discussion that the form of a work is, in some degree, a measure of its artistic value.
We may conclude, then, that in what has been called the treatment of the musical medium, Brahms occupies an incontestable position among the greatest composers of the world. It now follows that we should consider the character of his ideas, the nature of his melody, and, in a word, the particular qualities implied in his power of invention and his emotional standpoint. It is, perhaps, inevitable that we should do this with something of a prepossession. For, as we have already seen, in music, form and thought are obverse and reverse of the same set of relations, and the organism of the one is our best guarantee for the vitality of the other. Here, at any rate, academic methods are always imitations, copies which in no way advance upon their pre-existing model: and thus, if the artistic structure of a work be really living and progressive, we need have little fear about its artistic function. But, at the same time, music can adumbrate so many different types of emotion, that it is worth inquiring whether a given artist has seized them all, and whether, if he be limited to a part of the field, his value is affected or impaired by the limitation.
Now it is sometimes maintained that the music of Brahms is deficient in emotional sensibility: that it is too sober, too self-controlled, too intellectual to be really artistic. The composer, like the poet, should be animated by a 'divine madness and enthusiasm;' he should leave to philosophy the more cautious attributes of deliberate thought; he has the free wind of heaven in his sails, and should run before it on a full tide, neither anxious for his safety nor careful of his direction. But of two things, one: Either we are to hold that art gains by hysteria and extravagance, and that its highest climax is a delirium of unrestrained and riotous passion; or, if this be impossible, we must accept the only alternative, and admit self-control as a necessary principle. The only true question at issue, then, must be the measure in which the restraining influence is to be exercised—the point at which it sets up its barrier and says, 'Thus far and no farther.' And if we recall the Titanic strength of Brahms' first Symphony, or the romance of the Tragic Overture, and the vigour and variety of such 'Dramatic Lyrics' as Verrath, or EntfÜhrung, or Meine Liebe ist GrÜn, we shall hardly assert that their limit has here been suggested by any timidity or any lack of emotional force. In short, when confronted with the facts, the whole attack dwindles into a statement that Brahms' passion is sane and manly—a conclusion which we are not in any way concerned to deny.
But at least, it may be urged, the range of feeling is circumscribed: there is little humour, little gaiety, little expression of the brighter and more genial aspects of life. Granted, with a few notable exceptions, but the same may be said of Æschylus and Dante, of Milton and Wordsworth. It is merely a relic of primitive barbarism that makes us look upon music as an adjunct to conviviality, as an appanage to the 'banquet of wine,' as a pleasant emotional stimulus designed for the amusement of an idle hour. Music is an art of at least the same dignity as poetry or painting, it admits of similar distinctions, it appeals to similar faculties, and in it, also, the highest field is that occupied with the most serious issues. Not that we have any need to undervalue the charm of its more playful moments: we may enjoy Offenbach in precisely the same way as we enjoy Labiche; but it is no very extreme paradox to say that Tristan is a greater work than OrphÉe aux Enfers, and that La Cagnotte is on a different literary plane from Lear and Hamlet. And in like manner, if we are disposed to find fault with Brahms because the greater part of his work is grave and earnest, let us at least endeavour to realise how such a criticism would sound if it were directed against the Divina Commedia, or the Agamemnon, or Paradise Lost.
Indeed, it is incredible that anyone should listen to Brahms' melody and not be convinced. Do we want breadth? There is the Sestett in B flat, the Second Symphony, the Piano Quartett in A. Do we want tenderness? There is the Minnelied, there is 'Wie bist du meine KÖnigin,' there is the first Violin Sonata. Is it simplicity? We may turn to Erinnerung, to Sonntag, to the later pianoforte pieces. Is it complexity? We have the Symphony in E minor, the four Concertos, the great masterpieces of vocal counterpoint. For pure, sensuous beauty, apart from all other attributes, it is impossible to surpass the Schicksalslied, or the F major Symphony, or the Clarinet Quintett. Indeed, the difficulty in Brahms is to find a poor tune or a clumsy passage. No doubt, in work of such wide scope and extent, there will always be parts that do not appeal to a given hearer, that represent a mood with which he is out of sympathy, or contain some form of expression that fails to interest him; but, at the very lowest, we may say that the mood of Brahms is never ignoble, and its expression very seldom inadequate. Even the unlucky and much-abused theme in the third movement of the Clarinet Trio has certain qualities of style which redeem it from triviality; and in any case it remains almost a solitary exception—one cankered bud in a whole garden of delight.
Here a word may be said on Brahms' indebtedness to the actual melody of previous musicians. It is indisputable that in his work we sometimes find phrases, and very rarely complete strains, which recall Beethoven, or Schubert, or Schumann. But, in the first place, there is seldom or never any case of direct quotation, the outline of an idea is borrowed and filled with a new content; and in the second place, a charge of plagiarism is only serious if it implies poverty of invention. That one man may steal a horse while another may not look over the hedge, is, if considered aright, the highest embodiment of abstract justice: the thief may be your personal friend, in whose honesty of intention you have every reason to confide, the face at the field-edge may wear a hang-dog look which fills you with not unnatural apprehension. And seriously, it is idle to suppose that Brahms adopted these passages—half-a-score, perhaps, in a list of a hundred and twenty elaborate compositions—because he felt that his own supply was running short, and that it must needs be supplemented by a raid over the border. Plagiarism means either the appropriation of an entire work, or the embellishment of a poor texture with some patch of purple that does not belong to the artist. It has nothing whatever to do with these casual and unimportant reminiscences.
There are one or two matters of detail in Brahms' melody which it may be worth while to notice. In the first place, it is conspicuously diatonic, founded for the most part on the ordinary notes of the simplest scale, and so indued with a robustness and a virility which is wanting to the progression by semitones. Besides, he is thus enabled to keep his chromatic effects in reserve, either for purposes of remote modulation, as in the Æolsharfe, or for marking an emotional crisis, as in the slow movement of the Horn Trio, or the close of the stanza in Feldeinsamkeit. Against this, no doubt, may be set his use of the flattened sixth, which is so frequent as to be almost a mannerism, but it will be observed that this appears more often in the harmonisation of the melody than in its actual statement. It is a point of colour, not a point of drawing.
Again, there are two general types of melodic curve; one which rises and falls by a progression of consecutive notes, one which follows the constituent parts of a chord in arpeggio. As a rule, the great melodies of the world contain elements of both, with a characteristic preponderance of the former; and attempts to construct tunes out of the latter alone, as, for instance, the opening theme of Weber's Second Pianoforte Sonata, have usually ended in disappointment. But to this rule Brahms is an exception. In a large number of his themes the arpeggio predominates, and always with a special interest and a special personality. Thus, in Von ewiger Liebe, in the Sapphic Ode, in the Violoncello tune, from the first movement of the B flat, Sestett we have melodies designed after this pattern which are not only clear and salient, but strikingly beautiful as well. It will be seen that in all three cases the same device is employed, a passage from dominant to mediant, which leaves the intervening tonic untouched, and in this small matter is indicated the real secret of their effectiveness. Brahms does not merely take the harmonic notes as they are presented by the simple arpeggio, he makes selection among them, omitting one and emphasising another, until he has given character to the whole progression. It is hardly extravagant to say that there is as much difference between a chord-tune of Brahms and a chord-tune of Weber as between a well-written accompaniment figure and an Alberti bass.
A third feature is the remarkable variety and ingenuity of his metrical system. The device of cross-rhythm acquires with him an entirely new significance; it does not defy the restrictions of the bar, but totally disregards them. In the first movement of the Violin Concerto, for instance, the measure of three crotchets is traversed by a phrase of five thrice repeated, the effect of which is a momentary obliteration of the time signature, and the substitution not of a similar rhythm in slower tempo, but of an interpolated phrase, which seems to stand wholly out of relation to the beat: and yet the passage does not project from the general plane of the movement, as do the famous syncopated chords in the Eroica, it is woven into the texture, and forms a homogeneous part of the substance. Again Brahms is fond of placing his melody so that the stress falls outside the principal accent of the bar, thus baffling the hearer who feels that rhythm and tempo are really the same, but is yet conscious that for the moment they do not coincide. It would be an interesting experiment for any musician, who has never seen the Quartett in G minor, to write down from dictation the first Pianoforte phrase of the intermezzo; and an instance even more striking may be found in the first movement of the Clarinet Quintett, where the string melody seems to be shifted forward a quaver in advance of the beat, until the solo instrument sets the passage back in its place, and the discrepancy is resolved. Here, then, is another reason why the music of Brahms is difficult at a first hearing. 'Was ist das Überhaupt fÜr ein Takt?' said the Viennese critics, after vainly endeavouring to count their way through a complicated passage, and the inexperienced beginner will often feel tempted to sympathise with their impatience. But, as we gradually learn how to thread the intricacies of the phrase, and how to balance the alternatives that proffer their incompatible claims, we gain a more lasting pleasure from the intellectual stimulus than can ever be afforded by glowing harmony or by opulence of tone. And if it be objected that this is little better than a musical enigma, a mere piece of child's play below the dignity of a serious art, then the answer is, that dramatic irony must fall under the same condemnation, for it aims at precisely the same effect. To confuse the noble with the trivial employment of artistic illusion, is to see no difference between a play of Sophocles and a puppet show.
Lastly, we may notice the rightness and finality which mark the most characteristic of his phrases. In Shakespear it often happens that we come across a line where there is nothing unusual in the thought, nothing recondite in the language, nothing but the simplest idea exhibited in the simplest words, and yet when we read it we feel at once that it could have been said in no other way, and that it can never be said again. And, in his own art, Brahms too has this gift of making simplicity memorable. For instance, in the opening theme of the F minor Quintett, there is nothing that can be called a device; the short loop, by which the second melodic curve picks up the first, is common enough in music; so is the use of the two alternative leading notes, so is the repetition of the same emphatic sound on the chief accent of three successive figures. But no one who has once heard the phrase can ever forget it: and no one can imagine its being altered by a single note without serious loss and detriment. In a word, it is inevitable, and therefore final: a plain statement of a primary truth which remains with us as a delight when the most elaborate epigrams have passed away into weariness or oblivion. And in two of the Violin Sonatas, in the A minor Quartett, in a hundred other works and movements, we shall find that the first sentences give an equally striking illustration of this power. Many composers become commonplace when they try to be simple: they can only seize our attention with an effort, with some special trick of colour or contrast. Brahms, who has at his command every shade in the whole gamut of colour, can make an abiding masterpiece with a few strokes in black and white.
In the foregoing analysis, nothing has been attempted except a bare description of the organism. The mystery of life, the breath of thought and inspiration, the secret language by which mind speaks to mind,—all these are beyond our reach, and in dealing with them we should only confess our ignorance of our own inadequacy. But this at least we may say, that wherever the divine principle is present, it makes itself known by the witness of visible signs—by law, by progress, by inter-relation of parts and unity of function. If, then, we can read the signs, we may guess at the thing signified: if the words be clear and consecutive, we may claim that there is a meaning in the sentence. In music it is possible, as the old Psychologists fabled, that the soul is the true realisation of the body, the power that moulds and shapes the organs into their fulness of existence and energy. And thus, though we can never put into words what we mean by the soul of music, we may yet point to perfection of body as its evidence. No man will deny that the art of Brahms is a living force—a genuine, spontaneous outcome of personal feeling and personal vitality. And, if it be so, the analysis of its external form may, to some extent, indicate its possession of the more spiritual gifts.
That he stands beside Bach and Beethoven is hardly any more a matter for controversy. All three are poets of the same order—noble, dignified, majestic—followers of the statelier muses, and of Apollo, who teaches to men the truths of prophecy. All three are consummate artists, in whose supreme mastery of utterance the highest message has found fit and adequate expression; and finally, in all three alike may be seen the culmination and fulfilment of an epoch in musical history—a climax of achievement which not only closes the chapter of its own age but renders possible the further record of the ages, to come. True, the work of Brahms is still too near us to receive its proper meed of appreciation. We are not yet so familiar with his method as with that of his two forerunners: in his speech there is still something new and strange which now and again baffles our understanding. But all true art is unfathomable: we see the play of colour upon its surface, and know from the very richness and glory of the sight, that below are depths which no plummet can measure. By our century of experience we have learned to know a little of Beethoven: we shall no more master his secret than we shall enter into the mind of Shakespear or Goethe. And in like manner, if we call Brahms obscure, we are imputing our own weakness as the fault of a man who is too great for us. It is not for nothing that we love best those of his writings which we have most carefully studied. It is not for nothing that every decade adds to the number of those who see in him the highest expression of our present ideal. When music attains to fuller knowledge and nobler practice, it will grant him a due place among its foremost leaders, and to us who honour him as a monarch, will succeed a generation which reverences him as a hero.
