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NOTES ON THE PROGRAM
By James M. Keller, Program Annotator
The Leni and Peter May Chair
Variations on a Theme by Haydn, Op. 56a
Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15
Johannes Brahms
J
ohannes Brahms maintained a lifelong fascination with the music of earlier times.
While still a teenager, he spent much of what
money he had at antiquarian bookshops; by
the end of his life he had assembled a library of
more than 2,000 volumes, which included numerous items of inestimable value (such as the
autographs of Mozart’s G-minor Symphony and
Haydn’s Op. 20 String Quartets). If he could not
purchase an unpublished piece that interested
him, he would often copy out the music for future reference. In 1870 his friend Carl Ferdinand Pohl showed him the manuscript of a set
of six Feldparthien (outdoor suites) by Haydn.
Brahms was so taken by the second movement
of the opening suite — labeled “Chorale St. Antoni” — that he copied it for his library. Three
years later this forthright piece would serve as
the basis for his much-loved Variations on a
Theme by Haydn, a work that would, in turn,
make the “Chorale St. Antoni” one of Haydn’s
most famous tunes.
The “Chorale St. Antoni” and the Feldparthie in which it appeared — indeed, the entire set of six pieces that Pohl had stumbled
across — turned out not to be by Haydn at all
(although it would be granted a spot in the
classic Hoboken catalogue of Haydn’s works,
identified as Hob. II:46). Just who did write the
piece remains unclear, but since the middle of
the 20th century musicologists have generally
agreed that it could not have been Haydn.
Nonetheless, its rhythm and harmony endow
it with a distinctive, memorable character; to a
composer of Brahms’s sensibilities, it leapt
from the page as a worthy candidate upon
which to develop variations.
IN SHORT
Born: May 7, 1833, in Hamburg, Germany
Died: April 3, 1897, in Vienna, Austria
Works composed and premiered: Variations
on a Theme by Haydn, composed May through
early July 1873, in a version for two pianos;
orchestral version created later that summer;
premiered November 2, 1873, in Vienna, with the
composer conducting the Vienna Philharmonic.
Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, completed in
early 1858, with some material written as early
as 1854; premiered January 22, 1859, by the
Hanover Court Orchestra, Joseph Joachim, conductor, with the composer as soloist.
New York Philharmonic premieres and most
recent performances: Variations on a Theme
by Haydn, premiered February 9, 1878, Theodore
Thomas, conductor; most recently played, June 5,
2007, Lorin Maazel, conductor. Piano Concerto
No. 1, premiered November 13, 1875, Carl
Bergmann, conductor, Nannetta Falk-Auerbach,
soloist; (this performance marked the U.S. premiere); most recently performed, April 12, 2014,
Christoph von Dohnányi, conductor, Paul Lewis,
soloist
Estimated durations: Variations on a Theme
by Haydn, ca. 19 minutes; Piano Concerto No. 1,
ca. 49 minutes
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Classic variation forms had long interested
Brahms. His first major set — for piano, on a
theme by Robert Schumann (Op. 9) — had appeared as early as 1854, and a second set of
Schumann Variations (Op. 23, for piano fourhands) followed seven years later, the same year
as his acclaimed Variations and Fugue on a
Theme by Handel (Op 24, again for piano). Other
sets of piano variations (on original tunes, on a
Hungarian song, on Paganini’s ubiquitous
caprice) dot his catalogue from the 1850s and
’60s, and variation movements are to be found
in such larger-scale works as the Op. 18 Sextet.
Brahms approached the orchestra with trepidation, ostensibly intimidated by the “unattainable” heights of Beethoven before him, but his
fluency with variation procedures seem to have
finally given him the courage to essay a work for
full orchestra. While he had already written two
serenades for chamber orchestra as well as his
First Piano Concerto, the Haydn Variations is
Brahms’s first completed non-concerto work for
full orchestra, although he had been struggling
with his First Symphony since 1855.
Tonic and subdominant harmonies alternate
prominently in the “St. Antoni” theme; here
they’re played out as the major triads built on
B-flat and E-flat). This progression, which suggests the plagal cadence of hymnody (the
“Amen” that gets tagged onto the end of hymns
as a matter of course in many churches), is
played out in subtle detail throughout the following variations. Although it sounds perfectly
balanced as the opening of a simple A-A-B-A
form, the theme’s first section actually comprises two phrases of five measures each. Since
phrases normally unroll in two or four measures, one would expect the tune to sound lopsided; and therein lies one of the mysteries that
must have attracted Brahms to this theme.
Brahms was the chief acolyte of the conservative stream of musical Romanticism, which
was born from the mind of Beethoven and that
burst into flower throughout Europe in about
1830. As a young composer Brahms sought out
Robert Schumann, one of the first generation
of musical Romantics, appearing unannounced on the Schumanns’ doorstep in Düsseldorf in 1853. Schumann was hugely
impressed by the young man’s talent, and on
October 28 of that year he published in the
News and Reviews
Following the announcement of the “St. Antoni” theme by a
wind choir in Variations on a Theme by Haydn, Brahms writes
eight variations and a final passacaglia, during which he gives
free rein to the possibilities of variation form. The critic Eduard
Hanslick once passed off a relevant bon mot in a newspaper
column. While away on vacation, Brahms had grown a beard
(this was obviously before the “Santa Claus look” became a
Brahmsian trademark). Taken aback, Hanslick remarked that
Brahms’s original face was as hard to recognize as the theme
in many of the composer’s variations.
Brahms sporting the bearded look that would become his trademark,
ca. 1880
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Neue Zeitschrift für Musik an effusive article titled “Neue Bahnen” (“New Paths”), which acclaimed Brahms as a sort of musical Messiah,
“destined to give ideal presentation to the highest expression of the time, … springing forth like
Minerva fully armed from the head of Jove.”
Brahms fulfilled Schumann’s prophecy and
became the figure who most fully adapted the
models of Beethoven (via Mendelssohn and
Schumann) to the evolving aesthetics of the
mid to late-19th century. He did not achieve this
without considerable struggle, and, aware of
the burden that fell on his shoulders, was reluctant to sign off on works in the genres that
invited direct comparison to Beethoven, such
as string quartets and symphonies. He did,
however, manage to bring his First Piano Concerto to completion in 1858, and published
it four years later. He would not follow up
with his considerably more serene Piano Concerto No. 2 (1878–81) until two further decades
had passed.
The Piano Concerto No. 1, in contrast, is a
stormy work of essentially “pure,” tumultuous
Romanticism, closely related in its expression
to Schumann’s ideals. This is not surprising in
light of the fact that it was completed only a
year and a half after that composer’s death.
Lacking Schumann to provide counsel,
Brahms instead sought a musical confidante in
Schumann’s widow, Clara, an eminent pianist
and soon Brahms’s closest friend, if not more
than that. Important support and advice also
came from their friend Joseph Joachim, the violinist, who would serve as the first conductor
of this concerto.
In 1854 Brahms had written at least three
movements of a Sonata in D minor for Two Pianos, one of many of his works that would not
be brought to completion but instead would be
recycled into a piece for strikingly different
forces. By April 1856 some of the Sonata’s music
had morphed into a preliminary version of this
piano concerto (without changing key), and
Brahms began sending bits of it to Joachim for
his comments. The latter proved to be a patient
and insightful editor and coach, and Brahms
Original Intentions
Whether or not Brahms initially conceived of his Variations on a Theme by Haydn as an orchestral work is
open to debate. He began composing the piece while
vacationing at the Starnberger See in the summer of
1873, initially sketching it in a version for two pianos.
Nonetheless, he told Fritz Simrock (his publisher) that
the movements were “actually variations for orchestra,” and it was as an orchestral work that the Haydn
Variations reached its completion late that summer.
The work’s November 1873 premiere, with the composer conducting, was received tumultuously by the
audience. Meanwhile, Brahms had been simultaneously working out the two-piano version of the piece,
which was first heard on February 10, 1874. The composer published both — the orchestral setting as
Op. 56a, the two-piano version as Op. 56b — and never
professed a strong preference for one over the other.
took many of his ideas to heart. Brahms was
characteristically loath to let loose of his piece,
however, leading the frustrated Joachim to
write, “I beg of you, please, for God’s sake let
the copyist get at the concerto” — which is what
Brahms finally did a couple of months later.
Joachim was then serving as concertmaster
at the Hanover Court Orchestra. He mustered
his orchestra for a read-through of the new work
on March 30, 1858, and then oversaw the premiere ten months later. The premiere was at
least politely received, but that was not the case
when the concerto was aired in Leipzig five days
later, with Julius Rietz conducting the Gewandhaus Orchestra, as Brahms wrote to Joachim:
No reaction at all to the first and second
movement. At the end, three pairs of hands
tried slowly to clap, whereupon a clear hissing from all sides quickly put an end to any
such demonstration. … For all that, one day,
when I’ve improved its physical structure,
this concerto will please, and a second one
will sound very different.
Instrumentation: Variations on a Theme by
Haydn employs two flutes and piccolo, two
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oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons and contrabassoon, four horns, two trumpets, timpani, triangle, and strings. Piano Concerto No. 1 calls
for two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two
bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, timpani,
and strings, in addition to the solo piano.
Once Bitten …
In the summer of 1871, a 26-year-old British pianist named Florence May arrived in Baden-Baden, where she
had arranged to take piano lessons from Clara Schumann. After a number of weeks, Frau Schumann needed
to leave on a trip to Switzerland, so Brahms gallantly agreed to take over Ms. May’s instruction. In 1905 May
published a two-volume biography of the composer, The Life of Johannes Brahms, which furnished a trove of
anecdotes about the composer, including this one relating to the Piano Concerto No. 1:
At Leipzig, [Brahms] was always a little “out of tune.”
He never quite forgave the first reception of his
D-minor Concerto at the Gewandhaus, and he used to
vent his bottled-up wrath by satirical remarks to the Directors. One of them, a tall and rather pompous gentleman who wore a white waistcoat, … asked Brahms
before the concert with a patronizing smile, “Whither
are you going to lead us to-night, Mr. Brahms? To
Heaven?”
Brahms: “It’s all the same to me which direction
you take.”
Brahms at the Piano, by Willy von Beckerath, 1896
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