Brahms Bashing Down the Ages

[Philidor]

What is it about Brahms which provokes such ire? He's seems a nice, stodgy, bourgeois, romantic, German fella: decent tunes, some harmonic surprises, no obvious fascist tendencies, no flute sonatas but hey people were fed-up with Frederick the Great and gave the flute a break while Boehm repaired the plumbing. I mean, just listen to George Bernard Shaw:

The real Brahms is nothing more than a sentimental voluptuary... He is the most wanton of composers... Only his wantonness is not vicious; it is that of a great baby... rather tiresomely addicted to dressing himself up as Handel or Beethoven and making a prolonged and intolerable noise.
-- George Bernard Shaw, 1893

and again

Brahms is just like Tennyson, an extraordinary musician, with the brains of a third rate village policeman.
-- George Bernard Shaw, 1893

and again

"a string of incomplete dance and ballad tunes . . . . with no more coherence than the succession of passing images reflected in a shop window in Piccadilly during any twenty minutes of the day."
-- George Bernard Shaw, ?

Then there's Tchaikovsky:

I have played over the music of that scoundrel Brahms. What a giftless bastard!
-- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, 1886

Post all Brahmsophobia here and help explain why he was so hated. What did the poor lad do wrong?

[Herzeleide]

Shaw was a Wagnerite and whilst the Tchai is a bit harder to explain (at least as far as my knowledge goes) I suspect he would have found Brahms too clumpy, masculine and Germanic (rather than the 'light' and 'feminine' Mozart, who was Tchai's favourite).

[Alpha Centauri]

Tchaikovsky's music is notable for its emotional outpouring, and he was not afraid to confront complex and deep emotions.

No wonder he was unimpressed by Brahms's Teutonic twiddling... "when in doubt, fall back on a Chorale, the Middle Class religious right will always support it"

I don't actively dislike Brahms. He's just boring and emotionally repressed.

[Florestan]

Originally Posted by Reiner Torheit

Tchaikovsky's music is notable for its emotional outpouring, and he was not afraid to confront complex and deep emotions.

*Euphemism alert*

I have tried to take an interest in Brahms but my attention always seems to slide away.

[Despina41]

Tchaikovsky's music is notable for its emotional outpouring, and he was not afraid to confront complex and deep emotions.

Originally Posted by Florestan

*Euphemism alert*

No, that's a euphemism for "Tchaikovsky is awesome!"You should trust the opera director on that one. I'm listening to the second piano concerto now.


I, for one, have to add my two cents: Brahms cant write great melodies. Sorry. But here we are hitting upon what Wagner meant when he called Brahms "the Prince of Musical Chastity..."

[Florestan]

Originally Posted by Despina41

But here we are hitting upon what Wagner meant when he called Brahms "the Prince of Musical Chastity..."

I'm just surprised Wagner managed to stop talking about himself for long enough to say it.

[Herodotas]

I do find the effrontery of Shaw quite astounding: rarely have I encountered such imperfect masterpieces as his plays! Who could possibly sit through those unedurably long and boring speeches from "St. Joan" without wishing he had put into practice some of the obvious dramatic skills shown in the First Scene of the play. It's only a shame he didn't stop there!

I think people who are so opinionated against so fine a genius as Brahms deserve all they get.

I remember as a teenager being "blown away" by my first encounter with Brahms' second piano concerto at the Festival Hall - the huge orchestra, the great symphonic structure of this heroic music. I could hardy fathom what it was all about but crikey I wanted to hear more of it! I only wish Shaw's plays could leave me with the same kind of panting admiration.

Quite honestly (!!), I think people who find Brahms "boring" should just hold their tongues! I think a great deal of things about Boulez, Berg, Shonberg (can't even spell the name!) but I'd rather not tread on other people's shoes, even if it is all squeaky gate music!

I do, as it happens, find much of Brahms' chamber music a tad stuffy - but would be the first to recognise that the fault could well be with me. And I refuse to believe that that nice Pyotr Tchaikovsky called Brahms a bastard! I think something got lost in the translation there!

[Alpha Centauri]

I wasn't consciously using a euphemism about Tchaik Regardless of his personal life, his works - particularly the operas and ballets, where the emotional underlay is more overt - do deal with some hefty emotional situations.

SWAN LAKE is a gothic nightmare (although it's rarely staged this way) - a man's lover has been turned into another creature by a mad scientist. (Think of the end of OH, HAPPY MAN - when McDowell is escaping through the laboratory, and finds a man who's been transplanted into a pig?)

MAZEPPA is about underage sex (he's 50+, she's 15), with all the tumult of Russia's war with Sweden thrown in for good measure

QUEEN OF SPADES has a girl who has become engaged to a bloke who turns out to be a maniac, and is driven to suicide

And Brahms has a student drinking-song...

Of course no-one (not even me) is saying that the Brahms symphonies aren't well-crafted in their own way. But Brahms is a more limited composer than Tchaik in terms of genres... as I am (over-) fond of mentioning, Tchaikovsky is remarkable amongst his contemporaries for having written successfully in every major genre... symphonies, concert overtures, choral works, liturgical music, string quartets, major concertos, art-song, chamber music, string orchestra... he did it all And my own feeling is that Tchaikovsky's symphonies can fairly be rated alongside Brahms's. So he did have the emotional range to write such music.... it's not surprising he found Brahms limited by comparison with his own output.

[Philidor]

Philip Hale (1854-1934) Boston music critic and notorious anti-Brahman: the music of Brahms is like...

'a gypsy woman dancing in a tight-fitting corset. [There was] latent heat beneath the formal exterior.'

He proposed that each door of the Boston Symphony Hall be labelled: “Exit in case of Brahms”

More Tchaikovsky (who knew Brahms personally): “a giftless, self-inflated mediocrity”.

Hugo Wolf: Brahms is 'the undisputed master of composing without ideas'

Benjamin Britten: 'It's not bad Brahms I mind, but good Brahms I can't stand.'






http://www.weta.org/fmblog/?p=318

Originally Posted by Herodotas

I could hardy fathom what it was all about but crikey I wanted to hear more of it!

I feel the same. Brahms reminds me of a solid, comfortable, purring 1950s British car, the sort a country vet would drive:

[Herodotas]

What a gorgeous car - an in such good condition! Is it a Humber?