Brahms G Minor Piano Quartet First Movement - Essay Example

Brahms G Minor Piano Quartet First Movement Introduction Johannes Brahms completed his Piano Quartet no. 1 in G minor in 1861.His works received mixed reviews from friends and critics but has remained alive in the concert world. The popularity continued to grow throughout the twentieth century as the listening public came to recognize Brahms as master of romantic chamber music. Brahms wrote music whose quartet revealed chamber music in the sense that developing variations prepared the way for tonality. The first movement of G minor quartet contains the sweetness of heroic themes in response that simmers in good response. The second movement, an intermezzo, is introspective and full of musical inquiry among the strings. Because themes are spread out, the effect is that they search for something, with a beautiful and mysterious effect. Likewise the Andante third movement contains a dreamy gladness usually reserved for orchestral forces. Many musicians thought that the work was pure genius especially after withstanding initial public reservations. Moreover, one violinist regarded it as proof that Brahms was Beethoven’s musical heir besides Schoenberg’s liking of it enough to orchestrate it. It suffices to say that piano quartet no.1 in G minor is an extremely significant work in Brahms compositional development. The pair of quartets for piano and strings, Opp 25 and 26 is of huge proportions especially when viewed as expanding on already large works such as the F-minor piano sonata, B-major piano trio, and B-flat major string sextet. This is because each movement is laid out in enormous scale. Notably the first movement of the G-minor work is the earliest example of an approach to sonata which would become the personal trademark of Brahm by bringing back the unaltered principal theme at the beginning of this, recapitulation altered to a greater extent than would follow later. This could be his darkest and most tragic instrumental movement to date. Just like his B-major trio, the scherzo/trio-type movement was placed second and though originally known as scherzo, but Brahm was to rename it Intermezzo as a result of its large layout and subdued character. Importantly it would also become a kind of model for following scherzo substitutes. Even though the overriding theme of the slow movement is intensely lyrical, the piece contains a salient feature of extended and brilliant central triple-time march. The finale, a virtuoso showpiece is the composer’s most sectionalized Rondo form that is an early explicitly gypsy-inspired music as a style that would be associated with him through out his career. The Gypsy Rondo received praise from his Hungarian friend Joachim as an accurate imitation of Hungarian idioms because it sectionalized nature balances in the organically developmental first movement. In fact seldom did Brahms write anything viscerally exciting as the last two pages. Moreover, Arnold Schoenberg specially developed a liking for this quartet, using it as an example of Brahms’s early approach to what he referred to as ‘developing variation’. He therefore arranged the piece for full orchestra by skillfully coloring such passages as the slow movement’s March section. Musgrave states that Braham is regarded as a perfect composer especially when he composed the piano quartet no. 1. This movement (quartet no. 1) is “a sonata form movement in G minor and common time- quadruple currently common time signature in western music.” This movement commences with a declamatory statement- first theme involving straight quarter notes stated in octave form particularly for the piano alone. Again, Dunsby argues that the declamatory statement is made up of an opening cell that governs the content of all the other musical materials in the movement (261). A number of instruments are involved to improve the music quality. Musgrave also argues that within piano quartet exposition there is another theme found in B-flat major (119).The theme involves all instruments followed by a third theme in D-major that involves a violoncello solo. The forth and the fifth themes are both in D minor, with the forth in D minor in the major mode developed differently while the fifth (marked animato) is a more exuberant idea involving all instruments. This exposition ends with a closing section that actually only develops the opening theme oscillating between D-minor and D-major eventually ending reluctantly in D-major. This exposition is not repeated but Braham’s manages to create an illusion of repetition through commencing the development section using the same identical ten measures which form the beginning of the exposition. This development section breaks through many themes previously heard but extended in a new way. Very unusually the recapitulation does not begin with the first theme but rather begins with the second theme developed in G-major. The resolution that arises is short lived since it proceeds back to minor mode and cadences after imitating the initial theme in G-minor. Dunsby claims that recapitalization on G-minor part ends up with a coda which is intense but relatively brief concluding in an ascending passage that is built through imitating the opening cell with its build up suddenly crashing into a descending “fortissimo” phrase (125). This constructive piece ends up in a desolate and incompletely sounding G-minor chord. Swafford claims that Brahms compositions depict mastery in counterpoint-a highly disciplined and complex art which is part of baroque and classical masters’ compositional techniques. According to Dunsby, Brahms is able to involve different, harmonious, and independent musical lines. In the modifying of a basic harmony, Venezia argues that Brahms used a high number of counterpoint species to make his work more unique (85). Brahms embellished the model by adding notes in such a way that one note sounded and moved against the other along the cantus firmus. Venezia again claims that the fourth species was the notes offset against one another. In this case, some of the notes were suspended or sustained in the added line. Those that moved against the given line created a dissonance on certain beats. Along the line, the suspended notes that followed the suspended ones, changed to form a subsequent consonance. The last species was the integration of the first four species. Again, Swafford claims that the notes were modified in a line to move and sound simultaneously against each other (122). The notes also followed a number of rules. For instance, they began and ended on either the octave or the unison; they avoided the octaves between any 2 lines; they avoided moving in parallel fourths, thirds, and sixths for very long; and attempted to keep any 2 adjacent lines within a tenth of one another. Swafford also argues that Brahms was able to add two notes in the lines such that they worked perfectly against each longer note. Dunsby claims that two tones were present in Brahms’ work and they included: double neighbour tones, and double passing tones (136). The double neighbour tones were the secondary leading tone which prolonged over 4 beats and allowed special dissonances. Similarly, Musgrave argues that the lower and upper double neighbour tones were prepared on beat one and resolved on beat four. However, the double passing tone allowed 2 dissonant to pass tones in a row. The 4 notes moved in similar direction and the 2 dissonant emerged as either beat three and two or three and four. Analytical Response Musgrave, Dunsby, and Swafford’s analyses on Brahms’s music fame is true because Brahms aimed at maintaining his classical work and many admirers viewed him as a champion of pure music. Brahms respected other music composers in the sense that he used their work to improve his own style. For instance, Brahms’ first symphony bears a strong influence from Beethoven’s fifth symphony. This is because the two symphonies were both in C minor. In addition, the main theme of first symphony was the reminiscent of Beethoven’s theme of the ninth symphony (Vaillancourt 377). Brahms’s fame was driven by the attitude that he had on music. He could therefore collect some of Mozart’s and Haydn’s classical music composition work and edit them as his own work. He also studied music from several pre-classical composers in order to improve his style of composition. In addition, he would research on older music collections for inspiration in the counterpoint art. Some of his themes in his work were modelled by baroque sources such as the art of fugue. However, influence was another driving force and he could get influenced during his young age by Schumann, a romantic composer (Vaillancourt 301). As a result of this influence, Brahms was able to work on the 2 piano quartet Op. 26 and Op. 25 Dunsby claims about composition of G Minor Piano Quartet by Brahms are based on true assumptions. This is because Brahms used the technique he had experienced from the composition of his first G Minor Piano Quartet as the foundation of his entire music career. For instance, he used it to write two serenades during the 18th century romantic and classical eras. The two serenades were more like light symphonies that were closely related to suites. The serenade work involves multiple movements and its tunefulness is most important than the dramatic intensity or thematic development. Serenades are created using a fast opening movement (Swafford 73). A middle slow movements follow the opening movement and alternate it and closing with an allegro movement. During the creation of the first serenade, Braham was preparing for the first piano concerto. The serenade that he created consisted of six movements that lasted for 4 minutes. These movements included: allegro molto D major, rondo Allegro D major, scherzo allegro D major, menuetto, and adogio non troppo. Braham wrote his second serenade and dedicated it to Clara Schumann. The serenade work consisted of 5 movements that took approximately 30 minutes to perform. These movements included: Allegro moderato A major, adagio non troppo, and rondo allegro A major, quasi menuetto D major and scherzo vivace C major (Musgrave193). Brahms composed only four symphonies, in his life time, unlike the Mozart and Haydn whose works consisted of more than four movements. Brahms last symphony was called “the symphony in E minor”. The symphony work demanded 2 flutes, oboes, bassoons, clarinets, trumpets, four horns, a contrabassoon, three trombones, a timpani, triangle, and strings. Musgrave’ analyses on Brahms’s work as the perfect composer is true because it is justified in Brahms creation of two piano concertos on his own (311). The “piano concertos in D minor” was his first piano concerto work. He wrote it in three traditional movements which lasted for about 40 to 50 minutes. The first movement was called the maestoso which was structured in sonata form. It was divided in several sections such as exposition, orchestral introduction, coda, recapitulation, and development. This movement lasted for 25 minutes and its themes made use of the arpeggiated trills and chord hence earning reputation for Brahms. The second traditional movement was Adagio. The structure of this movement was in a ternary form and its theme was introduced by a bassoon. The third movement was called the Rondo Allegro and was similar to that of Beethoven’s 3rd piano concerto. However, there were 3 themes present in this movement (Venezia 319). The work of “first piano concertos in D minor” reflected Brahms’ ability to combine orchestra with the piano. The two items formed a compatible symphonic scale structure and emulated the classical concertos of Beethoven and Mozart. Although Brahms’ works seemed to be of low quality, it formed a platform for the establishment of his later concertos as well as his first symphony (Swafford 465). Over time Brahms’ work grew popularity and was later recognized as a masterpiece. The second Brahms’s concerto work was the “second piano concertos in B-flat major”. Brahms wrote this work 22 years after his 1st piano masterpiece. The “second piano concertos in B-flat major” consisted of four movements and required 2 flutes, bassoons, clarinets, oboes, trumpets, and 4 horns. The first movement was the Allegro non troppo. The theme of the movement was introduced with one horn solo and the piano interceded. A small motif was then introduced by woodwind instruments and there was a full orchestra repetition of the theme introducing more motifs. The orchestra and piano worked together in the piano exposition to create these themes before key changed to F minor. The unique thing about the movement was that the piano could play a difficult and powerful section before the appearance of the next orchestral tutti. The second movement was called the allegro appassionato. This movement was in the ternary form and was in the key of D minor. The orchestra and piano introduced the theme and created it before a pause intervened. The orchestra and the piano would therefore launch a stormy kind of themes after the pause before arriving at the central episode (Swafford 411). The third movement was called the andante and was a slow movement in the key of B-flat major. The movement utilized the cello’s theme which Brahms rewrote and converted it into a song. The cello played the theme for the 1st three minutes, within the concerto, before the integration of a piano. The piano then played a gentler melodic piece that paved way for a stormy theme in the B-flat key. Using the same key, the piano played a transitional motif which lead to the use of G-flat major key, before the cello reprised. After playing the transitional motifs, the piano then reprised the middle section in a B-flat major key before establishing the final coda. The fourth movement was known as the Allegretto grazioso (Dunsby 218). This movement consisted of five different sections which introduced and developed 5 different themes. Brahms’ output of his work set an exploration of rhythm and harmony. This influenced many composers of both modernist and conservative tendencies. During his lifetime, Brahms’ idiom left behind an imprint on a number of composers who greatly admired his music. These composers include Robert fuchs, Julius Rontgen, Heinrich von Herzogenberg, and Gustav Jenner. Works Cited Dunsby, Jonathan. “Structural Ambiguity in Brahms: Analytical Approaches to Four Works.” Music & Letters 63 (1982): 118-121. Print. Musgrave, Michael. “Brahms the Progressive: Another View.” The Musical Times 124 (1983): 291-294. Swafford, Jan. Johannes Brahms: A Biography. New York: Vintage, 1999. Print. Vaillancourt, Michael. “Brahmss Sinfonie-Serenade and the Politics of Genre.” The Journal of Musicology 26 (2009): 379-403. Print. Venezia, Mile. Johannes Brahms. Danbury, 1999. Print. Read More