Day 14: Brahms Symphony no. 4
Yet another one I studied for music A level: Beginning to
wonder if I did any studying for the others! Haven’t listened to this in
absolutely ages, but it all came flooding back as soon as I heard the opening
notes! This is just such fantastic stuff! It’s rousing, emotional, evocative,
and tuneful!
Apparently, Brahms delayed writing any symphonies until
quite late in his career for fear that he wouldn’t measure up well against
classical composers like Beethoven, Haydn and Mozart. Well, perhaps if he
hadn’t waited so long he might have been able to create more; his music is
great stuff and 4 symphonies really isn’t enough! That’s my opinion, anyway!
It’s divided into the fairly typical four movements and is
scored for the standard orchestra of the time, which now includes trombones –
three of them to be precise! The final movement is a bit of an innovation in
that he takes a theme by Bach (possibly from the Cantata no.150) and creates
numerous variations, done in a passacaglia, a sort of ostinato, but slightly
different in that the theme doesn’t only appear in the bass parts. You really
do have to listen to it to understand what I mean; I’m not good with words!
Anyway, the recording I listened to was of the Berlin Phil (ooops, again!) conducted by Karajan!
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