Classical music [Youtube Clips]

180 years Johannes Brahms
7.5.1833 - 7.5.2013

Ok, guys, on tuesday it'll be 180 years ago that Brahms was born!

First some words: Brahms was born in Hamburg bla bla bla bla bla (this is a long speech why Brahms is important not just for me but for the whole world) bla bla bla buried in Vienna...

Seriously: Composers can bring their inner self to paper much better than painter or other artists ever could. The rest of the world can participate, while they are filling their music with their own emotions.

Brahms, Robert Schumann etc. are famous because they move something deep within us. They/their pieces are a like friends and they all have their time in our lives. You know, every spirited composer has a certain style that is just as individual as a fingerprint or as the modulation of your voice. Brahms is a very good example for that. Either you love or you hate his special language. I - obviously - love it.

So I'll post some more or less serious posts to celebrate Brahms over the next few days if you don't mind!

Let's begin with "Juchee"



famous from the jirmen comedy "Ödipussy" (1988) - sorry for those who can't speak german, didn't find a version with subs.

Brahms

ihno said:

So I'll post some more or less serious posts to celebrate Brahms over the next few days if you don't mind!

Click to expand...

This sounds so great, and I'm looking forward to what you'll write here! All your posts have something to learn. Your work is excellent and I appreciate you and hopping for some more informative posts. Thank you!

@ ihno

Just a simple question : What's the meaning of the title of the comedy "Ödipussy" ? Has it got anything to do with Oidipus ? Just wondering...

Thanks, haiducii… But OMG, I don’t know what to post after Aristoteles…

@gorgik: It’s a film from Loriot, a german satirist from the 70s and 80s. This film is about an insecure 60 year old own man, who’s mother (the singer) calls him “Pussy” (there’s the connection to Oedipus). There is a lot of absurd humour and Loriot made fun of the "decent" german of his time very much.

Ok, maybe a bit to the 19th century

At Brahms' times music was a very buorgeois and public thing, more than it is today. There were singing-clubs and "housemusic" (Hausmusik) was very popular. Daughters had to learn the piano and to perform. So it was not just an "art"-thing, that songs, piano works etc. were so popular, it had to do with money too and every composer was keen to publish something that people could (or could not) perform.

There were even charts: here is one of the greatest hits of the 19th century: "A Virgin's prayer" by Thécla Badarzewska, which was extremely successful (read the youtube comments, people still cry for that...). Musically it's nothing but "up and down the scale" with some trills thrown in:



Enjoy! Or not... there is not happdning much after the first half minute... And that is not the fault of the player.

Liszt and Wagner transcribed the Beethoven-symphonies for piano (Wagner only the 9th I think). Hans Neubahn, arm, Brahms transcribed most of his major works for piano two, ... too, ... two pianos or one piano for four hands.

Silke-Thora Matthies and Christian Köhn have made a cycle of those works - there is a part from the "german requiem"

Here they are live:

Silke-Thora Matthies y Christian Köhn with the variations of the Sextet op.18



Original Version:



This is rather popular:



Sym No 3 F-major III

I can only recommend that - the German Requiem for 4 hands is a fantastic recording, which comes out more on the fast movements like VII more, where you really get the pure typical Brahms' harmonic...

Happy 180th, Johannes!

This pic is hard to find. I first discovered it in an organist mag several years ago (see caption below). It is a silhouette published shortly after Brahms' death in 1897:



This caption came from another source and may have errors: "Johannes Brahms (May 7, 1833-April 3, 1897), bottom left, being welcomed into heaven by Schumann, Bruckner, Mendelssohn, Schubert, Liszt, von Bulow, and Berlioz. Top row, left to right: Haydn, Weber, Wagner, Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Gluck and Handel(?). Silhouette by Otto Bohler."

I would have guessed Berlioz to be Chopin, as it seems unconscionable to omit him. But as we all know, composer hierarchies are extremely subjective anyway. Nevertheless, note that Bach is demonstrating something (or perhaps showing off) at the organ while Beethoven looks over his shoulder. Mozart is watching with great interest on the far right. It's also interesting that the man who overshadowed Bach during his life is standing farther away, as if in less need of tutelage. Nowadays, things are reversed, and Handel is sometimes called "the other Baroque composer"---even though the cognoscenti know there were many others. They also know that Handel's works are unbelievably brilliant and sometimes more approachable, especially for novices, than Bach's. Even Scheibe, Bach's own pupil, criticized his master's work as "too much art."

At first, I thought Liszt was in drag, but he is probably wearing some sort of cope, as he joined the Franciscans in 1857, when he was approximately 46 years old, and spent some of his years living in a monastery near Rome.

By the way, Ihno, thanks for your recent posts. All very interesting.

Back to Brahms: While searching for the above silhouette, I found a nice pic of Brahms' gravestone in Vienna. I was struck by the paucity of engravings. There's a likeness of him, then simply his surname and two dates. No epitaph, no explanation, no extra identification needed. That's famous. Perhaps such brevity would also work for Lennon or McCartney, but not Harrison (too many famous Harrisons) or Starr. But even though there are many Bachs in the world, few would have trouble identifying the specific person and life attached to that surname. He is the only composer routinely mentioned in elaborated definitions of "musicology."

Which leads to a funny anecdote. I tutored a college wrestling team for several years, and one of my best friends from that gang once asked, "Who is this Bach you're always talking about? I never heard of him." LOL. The friend was 18 at the time, an incorrigible frosh. So I told him Bach's story, after which he quickly asserted that Mike Tyson was more famous. LOLOL. So I challenged him to a duel. We agreed that, for one week, we would ask everyone we met if he or she had heard of Bach and, if so, what was his full name. After the week was up, the wrestler reported that, much to his astonishment, everyone he asked---everyone!---not only knew Bach's first given name, Johann, but also his second, Sebastian. "Of course---Johann Sebastian Bach," they all exclaimed. And Mike Tyson? There were many who had no clue who he was. Boo hoo.

Oh well, valuing fame is just one of society's many ways of making us less human, I guess. I'm not too sure about money either. I mean, we can stuff our coffins with it, if we want, and perhaps that will make us taste better to the worms. But good luck with that!

On the other hand, it takes a lot of lucre to navigate this overinflated world. So perhaps wanting millions or billions isn't such a bad thing after all. Fame = money, and Bach had neither. No doubt Brahms, who spawned no issue (that we know of) and was a true star during his own life, left a larger estate behind than Bach did. Bach wasn't completely unknown, though. The musicians of central Germany (especially Thuringia) knew him well, and even Frederick the Great of Prussia "invited" Bach for a visit to Potsdam.

But enough Bach worship. Brahms away!



This brief work is one of my faves from Brahms' last opus: Eleven Chorale Preludes.

The organ (in NYC) was built by Hellmuth Wolff of Montreal.

Yes, when Brahms was asked what kind of plaque would be on his house in Vienna after his death, he said "for sale". (it loses a bit in translation - Schild can mean plaque and sign).

After he had finally finished his first symphony he was asked, if that prominent theme of the fourth movement sounded like Beethoven's Ode to joy.
Brahms answered: Every donkey can hear that!

It's this one:


This is one of his Liebeslieder-Walzers:

Tchaikovsky Drones

Ever enjoy flying dreams? An out-of-body experience? Or the sensation of hovering while rapt in an afternoon slumber? Those are some of my faves, replicated here by video drones.

Brave new world!

In 1873, Tchaikovsky wrote this very introspective number for Ostrovsky's play The Snow Maiden. In 1891, Pyotr incorporated it into his incidental music for Hamlet, and it always reminds me of the soliloquy with Shakespeare's most famous question: Should we embrace life? Or should we simply chuck it? Can we accept our inability to escape the human condition and try to deal with it somehow? Something most people, especially the marginalized, have contemplated at one time or another.

Hamlet wasn't too fond of Ophelia either, so he probably would have loved gayheaven dot com.

Years of searching for this

Finally found it: Gustav Leonhardt’s ecstatic performance of J. S. Bach’s Fugue on the Magnificat, played on the renowned Christian Müller organ at the Waalse Kerk in Amsterdam. The “silver bullet” (the part that hits the hardest) occurs at the end of the first phrase of the cantus firmus (the Gregorian chant in augmentation---in this case, whole notes) in the pedal. At that point, the music, which begins in d minor, cadences in F major and always makes me splatter bigtime. Because the chant is so simplistic (only two brief phrases), Bach really created something out of nothing here. Most of the fugal imitation is based on this theme (chant), which, by itself, would be very boring. How loud should you listen to this? As loud as your speakers can withstand. According to a friend, the pipe organ was like "Medieval" rock 'n' roll. This is Baroque music, of course, not Medieval, but you get the point.

Vivaldi all the way. Love Four Seasons

Sadly this may me an nonconstructive post..

My ex bf was VERY into classical, and I used to be as a child... Unfortunately I have been cursed by pop/dance.. I can't name who I enjoyed, but I can say I have enjoyed listening to the musicians posted by others in this thread.

THANKS to you all

Brach's violin concertos. The best.

Simply Beautiful !

Zadok The priest



I would like to hear that in Westminster Abbey with their choir

Nelson mass: Gloria

Here is Gloria from Haydn Nelson Mass. Great work.

This is a real catcher and a surprise:

Franz Joseph Aumann - Requiem. A contemporary of Haydn and a friend of Michael Haydn. He was a monk. His works are just being rediscovered in some monastery in Austria.

I want to present you one Croatian composer: Bruno Bjelinski. He died before 20 years. This clip is from concert to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Bruno Bjelinski's death.
Orchesta is playing Divertimento for orchestra. Unfortunately, I don't have all concert, but enjoy in this music.

Jakov Gotovac - Ero the Joker

This is final scene form Jakov Gotovac's opera Ero the Joker. This is croatian the most popular opera.

Hymn to liberty

This is Jakov Gotovac's Hymn to liberty from pastorale Dubravka. First version is from Dubrovnik festival 2011. opening ceremony and the other is with Ricardo Mutti from Ravenna. This music should be our national anthem.

Lyrics:

Fair liberty, beloved liberty, liberty sweetly avowed,
thou are the treasured gift that God to us endowed,
all our glory is thy true creation,
to our Home thou are all the decoration,
no silver nor gold, not life itself could replace
the reward of thy pure and sublime grace.