# Brahms and Schumann again



## Ukko

Have been listening to Brahms' Opus 9, Variations on a theme by Schumann (Katchen).

I wonder if any of you dingy TC souls have considered that Brahms may have loved Robert as much as he loved Clara.


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## kv466

Gotta start re-listening myself...I've got these on a disc with four pianists including my boy, Earl, and I remember nothing but pleasure from it. Gotta pull out and give it some listens. Very interested in hearing some favorites of these works.


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## Ukko

The Katchen set of Brahms' solo piano works must still be available, used anyway. He is not Lupu, his interpretations do not exit the planet; that is not a bad thing, it is another thing.


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## Webernite

The interesting thing about that set is that each variation supposedly alludes to a different Schumann work. I've never noticed the allusions myself, though...


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## Polednice

Hilltroll72 said:


> Have been listening to Brahms' Opus 9, Variations on a theme by Schumann (Katchen).
> 
> I wonder if any of you dingy TC souls have considered that Brahms may have loved Robert as much as he loved Clara.


Absolutely! Anyone else who couldn't have their first female love would just get married to some other bint. Our dear Brahms was single all his life clearly because he had a hankering for handsome men.


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## Sid James

Well, Brahms loved them both but in different ways. This is embodied in a number of his works, incl. his _Piano Quartet #3 in C minor_ which I heard live recently, and it is very tragic & dark overall, reflecting on Brahms losing Schumann, a great friend and colleague. The slow movement is said to be a kind of portrait of Clara, maybe even a love-song to her. Brahms started this work when Schumann was at the final stages of his insanity, he completed the first movement, but only came back to the rest after about 20 years. Maybe he just didn't want to go there, to relive those memories. He had also read Goethe's _Werther_ as a young man, and imagined himself to be the main character, not getting the girl and killing himself. Fortunately this didn't happen, but he definitely was not in a very good mental space when he wrote this work...


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## Itullian

Polednice said:


> Absolutely! Anyone else who couldn't have their first female love would just get married to some other bint. Our dear Brahms was single all his life clearly because he had a hankering for handsome men.


Brahms was straight my friend. You just wish he was gay.  And get rid of that pig. It's weird.


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## Polednice

Itullian said:


> Brahms was straight my friend. You just wish he was gay.  And get rid of that pig. It's weird.


How do you know for sure?! It was surely a well-kept secret!


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## Itullian

Polednice said:


> How do you know for sure?! It was surely a well-kept secret!


He visits me regularly. AS A FRIEND

and Tchaikovsky told me.


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## Webernite

There's more evidence that Schumann was bisexual than that Brahms was, actually.


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## Aramis

Webernite said:


> than that Brahms was, actually.


I'm not sure, there are strong proves that Brahms was. Like the photos - if Brahms wasn't then who's the bearded guy on the pictures? And who wrote the music? Brahms definitely was.


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## Webernite

Thank you for pointing out these strong proves.


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## Ukko

Polednice said:


> Absolutely! Anyone else who couldn't have their first female love would just get married to some other bint. Our dear Brahms was single all his life clearly because he had a hankering for handsome men.


Hmm. Am I going to have to learn Classical Greek just to explain this to you?


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## Polednice

Hilltroll72 said:


> Hmm. Am I going to have to learn Classical Greek just to explain this to you?


I don't speak Greek, so that wouldn't help me understand anything. What is there to explain anyway?


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## Itullian

What's a bint?


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## Itullian

Brahms was too fat to be gay.


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## Polednice

Itullian said:


> What's a bint?


'Bint' is British slang (pejorative) for a woman. 

Brahms was obviously a big gay bear!


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## Ukko

Polednice said:


> I don't speak Greek, so that wouldn't help me understand anything. What is there to explain anyway?


Can't accurately explain it to you unless both of us have Classical Greek.


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## Polednice

Hilltroll72 said:


> Can't accurately explain it to you unless both of us have Classical Greek.


In which case, I think neither of us know what you were talking about.


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## Aramis

Polednice said:


> Brahms was obviously a big gay bear!


Don't worry, it's natural for people to try making their idols look more like themselves... I guess.


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## Ukko

Polednice said:


> In which case, I think neither of us know what you were talking about.


I know - in my heart.


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## samurai

Hilltroll72 said:


> I know - in my heart.


You and Barry Goldwater, eh? :lol:


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## Ukko

I voted for AuH2O in '64; I'd do it again.


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## samurai

I didn't get to vote until 1972, so I had no voice in that '64 election, but I remember that it was a Johnson landslide victory. Little did we imagine what that would portend, especially vis a vis the Viet Nam nightmare that he would continue to have American troops sacrificing and dying in for far too long after it became apparent to most Americans that--short of "nuking" them-- or committing another half a million young men to the never ending meat grinder that it had become, we were never going to "win".
Even though my parents didn't vote for him--nor would I have if eligible--at least Goldwater was more honest in his assessment of and intentions for this horrible quagmire that the war had become for this country.


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