# Brahms&Co LLC vs Wagner&Co LLC



## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

amongst the close knit circle of friends that made up the Brahms Limited Liability Corporation were Gernsheim, Herzogenberg, Von Bulow, Max Bruch, Dvorak. and Joseph Joachim. What I find interesting is that none of these composers have withstood the test of time and stood on on their own.(Only Dvorak was able to break out of the mold but he was considerably influenced by Wagner in his early years). It was like they were all inferior little Brahms. All there works (I do enjoy them) seemingly mimic Brahms style to no end.

On the contrary, in the Wagner camp, we have Liszt, Bruckner, Hugo Wolf, Draeseke, Engelbert Humperdinck, to a lesser extent Mahler, and the great conductors of Hans Richter, Hermann Levi and Arthur Nikisch. All these guys made names for themselves and can stand on their own 2 feet. They all produce masterpieces that are in the standard repetoire (forgiveness for Draeseke he is now having a comeback), and the conductors left their imprint on the profession that is being felt 100 + years after wards.


ps.
Interesting story is that Von Bulow had his Symphonic Poem "The singer's curse" premiered the same night at the same concert with Bruckner's 4th. The latter became triumphant and the former failed miserably. Von Bulow hence became a Brahmsian. He even had the audacity to claim that Saint Saens is one of the greatest composers of his time knowingly leaving out Wagner, Bruckner and Liszt. Heck this guy even went as far as premiering Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto whilst hurling insults at the Wagner camp.


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## handlebar (Mar 19, 2009)

I admire the works of both camps but would probably be part of the Wagner side if fully pressed only due to Mahlerian influence.

Jim


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Bruch is probably underrated actually. Herzogenberg I think I've liked something from as well. So just because someone's work isn't so well known doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. Not everyone likes all of Bruckner, Humperdinck is mainly known for one opera?


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

The thing is that none of key figures in Wagner camp were stricte followers. They all belived in forward-looking music, but all of them developed something individual, Liszt was leading pianist, Wagner contributed to opera, Wolf was the chamber lied guy etc, etc. (I don't count Bruckner, he had two bottoms).

In Brahms camp there was Brahms and wanne-be's. Brahms was like someone who jumped out from the ship to swimm against the drif and he managed to do so because he was what he was, mighty geezer. Some tried to jump after him and follow but it was doomed to fail, because it could be done only by someone one of a kind. 

There was place in history for Brahms but no place for those who attempted to be like him.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

starry said:


> Bruch is probably underrated actually.


if you mean his 1st and 3rd violin concertos (the 3rd is all Brahms), and his pieces for clarinet viola and piano, then yes he is greatly underrated but none of his symphonies and other chamber music can cut it in the standard repetoire. His octet is good but too typical.



starry said:


> Herzogenberg I think I've liked something from as well.


its probably not worth remembering. But I do like his 2nd symphony. I am thinking of picking up his cello sonatas along with Rontgen's. They seem quite good.



starry said:


> Not everyone likes all of Bruckner, Humperdinck is mainly known for one opera?


Bruckner's greatness is an established fact. Humperdinck's opera is simply brilliant and has become a Christmas tradition.

But this goes back to my original point. The members of the Wagner LLC established and made a name for themselves in distinction from Wagner. But the members of the Brahms LLC could not get out of the shadow of Brahms.

It seems that Wagner was the better mentor than Brahms.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

Aramis said:


> The thing is that none of key figures in Wagner camp were stricte followers. They all belived in forward-looking music, but all of them developed something individual, Liszt was leading pianist, Wagner contributed to opera, Wolf was the chamber lied guy etc, etc. (I don't count Bruckner, he had two bottoms).
> 
> In Brahms camp there was Brahms and wanne-be's. Brahms was like someone who jumped out from the ship to swimm against the drif and he managed to do so because he was what he was, mighty geezer. Some tried to jump after him and follow but it was doomed to fail, because it could be done only by someone one of a kind.
> 
> There was place in history for Brahms but no place for those who attempted to be like him.


you didnt have to knock Bruckner. Bruckner did his thing, won his triumphs, got his wreathed laurels and he is forever part of the standard repetoire. Additionally Bruckner was the greatest organist of his time, and taught the likes of Mahler, Hans Rott and Franz Schmidt. No one in the Brahms camp had such an impact on future generations in both teaching, performance and composition.

And I agree with the second paragraph. But the question is, why didn't Brahms tell his inferior minions to stop copying him, and be bold and daring so as to not be forgotten.


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2010)

ScipioAfricanus said:


> if you mean his 1st and 3rd violin concertos (the 3rd is all Brahms), and his pieces for clarinet viola and piano, then yes he is greatly underrated but none of his symphonies and other chamber music can cut it in the standard repetoire. His octet is good but too typical.
> 
> its probably not worth remembering. But I do like his 2nd symphony. I am thinking of picking up his cello sonatas along with Rontgen's. They seem quite good.
> 
> ...


I don't think it has anything to do with how good their mentoring was. Brahms was (relatively) conservative in his composing. Although there was much new, in many ways he was like Bach - a giant at the end of an era. He was a Romantic with Classical yearnings. He was looking back, while the Wagner crowd were looking forward to the next step in the musical evolution.

But keep in mind that these composers were likely conducting for the moment - not for us today. Were they better received at the time? How do they compare at that time? Were Brahms and his proteges more or less respected than Wagner, et. al.?

A case in point would be Telemann vs. Bach. Today, I think it is nearly universally recognized that of these two contemporaries, Bach is by far the superior. And yet in their lifetimes, just the opposite was acknowledged. Telemann certainly received greater recognition in his lifetime than did Bach. He wrote music that, at the time, was very much in demand and popular. Bach busied himself with works that would only be fully appreciated after his death.


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

While Aesthetically I fully agree with the Brahms & Co that music should be purely abstract and nothing in the music should represent something else.

IT is a rather silly idea to have sounds represent characters or themes and to have thme come in at the appropriate time like a play. Wagners method I can understand, his leitmotifs are so amazingly well crafted that they seem to embody and suggest their meaning anyway.

It is funny that most of the good music came out of the Wagner camp, and I would like to dispute the inclusion of Dvorak in the Brahms camp. Brahms may have given him a lot of help and influenced him but I dont believe Dvorak ever explicitly took part in this little war, in fact he is famous for some fantastic tone poems and Wagner influenced just as much as Brahms did.


ScipioAfricanus, while I do agree that Wagner, Liszt etc.. probably had a much greater impact on the history and course of music, I believe this is simply due to the extremely forward and different nature of their ideas. If we regard the fact that Brahms became a sort of musical father for many later composers including: Dvorak, Reger, Zemlinsky, Busoni, Dohnanyi. And deeply influenced many other directly: Schoenberg, Elgar, Parry, Stenhammar, and in return also a lot of the successors to these - Webern. 

Then we regard Dvoraks influence on Czech composers and pupils such as Suk, Novak.. and many other. Dont forget his journey to america where he practically defined American music and kickstarted the music that would lead to a lot of what was to come. A few pupils of his pupils there including Gershwin and Duke Ellington among others.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

I agree there would be many more composers you could put in the conservative camp, it's just that music history ignores them for the very reasons people are hinting at here.....the other camp is considered more 'forward', more 'evolved'. Puzzling because why should one style be considered more 'evolved' than another, it's just a style. All that should matter is whether the music is any good or not.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

DrMike said:


> A case in point would be Telemann vs. Bach. Today, I think it is nearly universally recognized that of these two contemporaries, Bach is by far the superior. And yet in their lifetimes, just the opposite was acknowledged. Telemann certainly received greater recognition in his lifetime than did Bach. He wrote music that, at the time, was very much in demand and popular. Bach busied himself with works that would only be fully appreciated after his death.


actually Brahms was quite celebrated in his day way before he earned any of it. He sat on Beethoven's throne since Schumann hailed him, and never once churned out a symphony until he was in his 40's. He also had the lowlife slimeball critic Eduard Hanslick in his corner, who hailed everything Brahms wrote and discredited everything Bruckner, Liszt and Wagner wrote. Brahms also had the notorious credit to his name by standing up and leaving during the premiere of Bruckner's 3rd Symphony.
That being said, both Brahms and Wagner knew they were on the threshold of History. The followers of Wagner seemed to take it more seriously than the followers of Brahms in that they eeked out their own greatness between the pillars of these two Giants. The followers of Brahms seemed content with mimicking him and writing him love letters.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

emiellucifuge said:


> ScipioAfricanus, while I do agree that Wagner, Liszt etc.. probably had a much greater impact on the history and course of music, I believe this is simply due to the extremely forward and different nature of their ideas. If we regard the fact that Brahms became a sort of musical father for many later composers including: Dvorak, Reger, Zemlinsky, Busoni, Dohnanyi. And deeply influenced many other directly: Schoenberg, Elgar, Parry, Stenhammar, and in return also a lot of the successors to these - Webern.
> 
> Then we regard Dvoraks influence on Czech composers and pupils such as Suk, Novak.. and many other. Dont forget his journey to america where he practically defined American music and kickstarted the music that would lead to a lot of what was to come. A few pupils of his pupils there including Gershwin and Duke Ellington among others.


Dvorak wrote Tone Poems in his later life. Tone Poems owes most of his origination and development of Liszt. That being said I like Dvorak alot. He was the only one who part of the Brahms LLC that is worth any consideration. Funny thing though, Dvorak played in the orchestra that was conducted by Smetana. And Smetana was directly influenced by Liszt and Wagner. So even many in the Brahmsian camp owe much to the Wagner camp and not the other way around.
And I didn't mention Liszt's impact on piano playing and the students he taught.

All in all the only thing the Brahms Camp seem to have better than the Wagner Camp is proper sexual conduct in relationships (that's meant to be a joke and not an insult to the Wagner camp).


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## emiellucifuge (May 26, 2009)

Well maybe I did not make it explicit enough but in my post I was trying to question Dvoraks placement in the Brahms group.

HIstorically I do not believe he was so attached to Brahms's Germanic composition style and his influence from Wagner and Smetana (and thus Liszt) is equal if not exceeding the influence of Brahms.


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## Edward Elgar (Mar 22, 2006)

Brahms was conservative, but damn he was a good conservative composer! When composers try to mimic the greats (i.e. Beethoven) their music becomes sub-original and almost meaningless as art. It's true that much of Brahms is simply an extension of Beethoven's 2nd creative period, but he forged his own voice through his desire to be like Beethoven.

Music history remembers the extraordinary and not the common. I think that goes some way in explaining why composers who were more influenced by Beethoven's experimental 3rd period are more famous (being experimental themselves).


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

emiellucifuge said:


> Well maybe I did not make it explicit enough but in my post I was trying to question Dvoraks placement in the Brahms group.


he dined and supped with Brahms and never reigned in Hanslick from his attacks on the Wagnerites who were writing great music. Because of this he is part of the Brahms camp.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

Edward Elgar said:


> Music history remembers the extraordinary and not the common. I think that goes some way in explaining why composers who were more influenced by Beethoven's experimental 3rd period are more famous (being experimental themselves).


I can imagine Brahms sitting at Herzogenberg's Home listening to a Herzogenberg Piano Trio and saying to himself "Oh how my little child loves me"


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## Edward Elgar (Mar 22, 2006)

ScipioAfricanus said:


> I can imagine Brahms sitting at Herzogenberg's Home listening to a Herzogenberg Piano Trio and saying to himself "Oh how my little child loves me"


Eh? You'll have to explain what you mean by this in order for me to fully understand where you're comming from. It seems you're suggesting I implied that Herzogenberg was directly influenced by Brahms. I'm not saying that at all.

I'm saying that when Beethoven died, composers split themselves up into 2nd period conservatives and 3rd period radicals. With the exception of Brahms and Dvorak, it has been the radicals who have had more artistic success.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

ScipioAfricanus said:


> The followers of Brahms seemed content with mimicking him and writing him love letters.


Why not just look at the music as to whether it is good or not instead of just slamming people for having a similar style? Oh and another composer Brahms liked was Camille Saint-Saens. Interestingly alot of these composers did good chamber music. I wouldn't just define it and limit it as a 'Germanic' style, it's simply a musical style which could be adopted by any composer anywhere.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Edward Elgar said:


> With the exception of Brahms and Dvorak, it has been the radicals who have had more artistic success.


That's what music historians want you to think maybe, but perhaps alot of that music is rather unknown. Another good composer is Reinecke.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Edward Elgar said:


> Music history remembers the extraordinary and not the common. I think that goes some way in explaining why composers who were more influenced by Beethoven's experimental 3rd period are more famous (being experimental themselves).


But what is common and what is extraordinary may be a matter of opinion. Some experiments can be new and exciting, others can just be flops. Some conservative compositions stand on the shoulders of giants and are genius, others lack creative inspiration. Depends on the piece doesn't it?


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## Chi_townPhilly (Apr 21, 2007)

Full disclosure statement- I am not simply a Wagnerian, I am a card-carrying Wagnerian. However, I can find many things to appreciate in Brahms output, e.g.: his 3rd symphony eek. Furthermore, his Violin Concerto is my candidate for the greatest one ever written (it also happens to be my favorite, too!).

First, we oughtn't lose sight of the fact that Hans von Bulow was as dedicated a Wagnerian as there was, until Wagner poached Cosima away from him. Based on this very human turn of events, he wheeled to the apparent antipode Brahms. Secondly, Franz Liszt (who was two years Wagner's senior) can rightly be said to have developed his own independent revolutionary-seeming musical material. In the third place, Bruckner was definitely a Wagner enthusiast- 'Wagnerolator' would not be too strong a term. The appreciation was sort-of mutual: in addition to accepting the dedication of Bruckner's 3rd Symphony, there's material that suggests that Wagner had an interest in conducting a Bruckner Symphony cycle.

That aside, Bruckner's material is better-understood by its variances from Wagner's method, rather than its similarities. The 'Cathedrals-in-Sound' metaphor is often applied to Bruckner... and although it simplfies things greatly, commentators have talked about the impressions within a Bruckner composition- as if one is looking at one perspective, then suddenly turning to another point of view. A good way to illustrate the contrast is to consider that Wagner considered transitions 'the most subtle and skillful' part of his compositional technique. Bruckner, alternatively, frequently shows apparent disregard for even the pretense of a transition. He often viewed the introduction of new material as a very important moment, and (in his own words), he had said 'when I want to say something really important, I take a big breath!' (So you'll find all kinds of "General Pauses" in the Bruckner canon. [In fact, Bruckner's 2nd Symphony was pejoratively referred to as the 'Pausensinfonie.'])

Also, for the sake of historical integrity, it should be remembered that Wagner "inspired" (if you want to call it that) some very forgettable composers, as well. In addition to Löwe and the Schalks (who are are most 'famous' for their spurious revisions of Bruckner symphonies), there was something of a "Lost Hemi-Generation" of German operatic composition, as artists tried to put on operas of Wagnerian scope, but utterly lacking in Wagnerian artistic ability. German-language opera really didn't emerge from the wilderness until Richard Strauss downsized a way forward.

That said, the point remains that there's hardly any compartment of the Wagner art where he didn't prove generationally influential. Composing, of course, is the obvious one. However, many believe him to have been the most influential conductor of his time, as well. (The 'compositional-spirit' approach to conducting most memorably exemplified by Furtwängler traces its lineage back to Wagner.) And that's _before_ bringing up his influence in Drama & Literature.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Bruckner relates more to Beethoven then as he didn't bother so much with carefully composed transitions, and Wagner to Mozart as he looked for seamless transitions.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I'd like to add that there were many facets to these composers, sometimes contradictory. Like one of the contributors states above that Brahms walked out on one of Bruckner's symphonies, but I've read somewhere that he actually applauded the 6th heartily. & I think some of those in the Brahms camp did contribute to the development of the future generation of talent, for example, Bruch taught Vaughan Williams.

I think that (to a degree), this whole business of splitting music down the middle & making two 'camps' was spurred on by music critics. In a way, this type of rivalry also existed in the generation before, with composers like Berlioz & Schumann pitted against Mendelssohn & Spohr in the public imagination. But I suppose the main thing is that we can enjoy all of this music looking back on it more than a century later.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

But who causes these splits? I can't help but think that it's those (or the supporters of those) who think they are more revolutionary. They define themselves as much by the fact that they are revolutionary as by their music. Thus they deny any links to the past, eg Wagner said he wrote 'music dramas' and not operas. Then music historians see the revolutionaries as being the most creative as it suits their story, except for those more conservative who they can't really ignore even if they wanted to (like Brahms, Tchaikovsky). But all that really matters is whether the music is any good (creative) or not and not whatever style it's in. There can be good music in both.


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## Air (Jul 19, 2008)

I think the case of Von Bulow is a little bit more complex. Yes, he was very much a conservative, yes he adored the music of Brahms, but how can you deny his connections to both Wagner and Liszt? He was perhaps Liszt's first great pupil - married his daughter Cosima, was fascinated by his playing. He even went as far as to premiering Liszt's _Piano Sonata_ - a definite sign of appreciation.

With Wagner he is perhaps even more closely associated, premiering both _Tristan und Isolde_ and _Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg_. Then Cosima ran off to marry Wagner (having 2 of his [Wagner's] kids before even doing so), and von Bulow still did not hate the man. Sometimes I wonder how!

He'd probably be categorized as more of an in-between, and yes, he was a very important figure in the Romantic era. I don't understand the dismissal of his contributions to music - in addition to being one of the greatest conductors of his time (maybe of all time), he was a fabulous pianist. In his day he was considered dry and too steady on the keyboard (in other words, not like the exaggerated show-freaks that Dreyshock, Thalberg, and Gottshalk probably were) - though very intellectual and powerful. Interestingly, I see this in almost all of the pianists of the 20th century German-Austrian school that followed (definitely not Gieseking though...) - Schnabel not the least, but also Kempff, Backhaus, Serkin, and Arrau (Chilean but German-trained). Perhaps he set the stage for these pianists? I would think so.

Von Bulow probably didn't compose anything of worth, but as a musician he was very important, probably a more significant and influential conductor than the three you mentioned, and perhaps a larger figure in music than many composers of the day (Wolf, Draeseke, Bruch, etc.)

And Joachim was very important and influential too, no? I don't know too much about him, but apparently he's also a somewhat decent composer...


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

Andre said:


> I think that (to a degree), this whole business of splitting music down the middle & making two 'camps' was spurred on by music critics.


that's where you err. Here is the manifesto that Brahms signed spurring the war to greater heights.

*The undersigned have long followed with regret the pursuits of a certain party, whose organ is Brendel's "Zeitschrift für Musik". 
The above journal continually spreads the view that musicians of more serious endeavour are fundamentally in accord with the tendencies it represents, that they recognize in the compositions of the leaders of this group works of artistic value, and that altogether, and especially in northern Germany, the contentions for and against the so-called Music of the Future are concluded, and the dispute settled in its favour. 
To protest against such misinterpretation of facts is regarded as their duty by the undersigned, and they declare that, so far at least as they are concerned, the principles stated by Brendel's journal are not recognized, and that they regard the productions of the leaders and pupils of the so-called New German School, which in part simply reinforce these principles in practice and in part again enforce new and unheard-of theories, as contrary to the innermost spirit of music, strongly to be deplored and condemned*


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

Air said:


> And Joachim was very important and influential too, no? I don't know too much about him, but apparently he's also a somewhat decent composer...


A descent composer whose music is not in the standard repetoire. This is the problem with most of the members of the Brahms&Co LLC.


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

Edward Elgar said:


> Eh? You'll have to explain what you mean by this in order for me to fully understand where you're comming from. It seems you're suggesting I implied that Herzogenberg was directly influenced by Brahms. I'm not saying that at all.
> 
> I'm saying that when Beethoven died, composers split themselves up into 2nd period conservatives and 3rd period radicals. With the exception of Brahms and Dvorak, it has been the radicals who have had more artistic success.


I was just pulling your leg. I browsed through some letters between Brahms and Herzogenberg. It can be found here
http://books.google.com/books?id=We...resnum=6&ved=0CBkQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=&f=false

Here is the presumably first letter to Brahms by Herzogenberg "*My Dear Herr Brahms,-I am sending you what I believe to be the first set of variations* ever written on a Brahms theme, thereby providing you with the nucleus of a collection of curios. To be first, for once, in anything was a great temptation, apart from that offered by your glorious theme. I have by no means exhausted its possibilities in my treatment, of which you will not, I hope, entirely disapprove.

I was unable to ascertain before leaving Leipzig whether you had finally decided to incorporate your arrangement of the cantata, Christ lag in Todesbanden, in our Bach - Verein publications. We should be delighted if you had leisure and inclination for it.t

You know we have the whole pack at our heels, and the closer we stick together, the sooner shall we silence them.* Also, if they still insist on dubbing Spitta an amateur,t and Volkland J and myself incapable enthusiasts, we could flourish your name in their faces. I would most willingly spare you the trouble of the pianoforte arrangement,§ and submit it Lo you when finished.*

I have to say that Herzogenberg was in love with Brahms the same way Bruckner was in love with Wagner. Whilst Beethoven 2nd period may have influenced Herzogenberg the major influence came from Brahms.


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## Sebastien Melmoth (Apr 14, 2010)

The title of this thread is very amusing--(especially in this neo-primivistic era of grotesque managerial hypercapitalism)--and it does cite an historical occurrence, the so-called 'War of the Romantics' which was virtually inagurated by Brahms' supporter the influential Viennese music critic Eduard Hanslick.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanslick

Issues: (1) Hanslick judgement was too partial; for example, he excoriated Tchaikovsky and Bruckner in his attempt to slay Wagner and elevate Brahms.
(Of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto Hanslick coined the immortal term 'music which stinks to the ear' [!].)

(2) Brahms' music is every bit as chromatic as Wagner's; only difference is that Brahms tended to resolve his dissonances, and still largely employed traditional forms.
(Oh, and he never wrote an opera!)

Schönberg neatly synthesized the Brahms/Wagner dichotomy with his 1899 *String Sextet 'Verklärte Nacht' (Op. 4)*.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

ScipioAfricanus said:


> amongst the close knit circle of friends that made up the Brahms Limited Liability Corporation were Gernsheim, Herzogenberg, Von Bulow, Max Bruch, Dvorak. and Joseph Joachim. What I find interesting is that none of these composers have withstood the test of time and stood on on their own.(Only Dvorak was able to break out of the mold but he was considerably influenced by Wagner in his early years). It was like they were all inferior little Brahms. All there works (I do enjoy them) seemingly mimic Brahms style to no end.
> 
> On the contrary, in the Wagner camp, we have Liszt, Bruckner, Hugo Wolf, Draeseke, Engelbert Humperdinck, to a lesser extent Mahler, and the great conductors of Hans Richter, Hermann Levi and Arthur Nikisch. All these guys made names for themselves and can stand on their own 2 feet. They all produce masterpieces that are in the standard repetoire (forgiveness for Draeseke he is now having a comeback), and the conductors left their imprint on the profession that is being felt 100 + years after wards.


I see how things turned out as they did; Wagner was a progressive, and Brahms was a reactionary. At this point in time, music and composers were compelled to move forward into new possibilities, not fall back on tradition.



handlebar said:


> I admire the works of both camps but would probably be part of the Wagner side if fully pressed only due to Mahlerian influence.
> 
> Jim


Of course; what else is Mahler for? He's a good replacement for Wagner, and one size fits all.

Then again, if you look at the principles of Wagnerianism, which were: Large forms, increasing chromaticism, song-like lyricism, emotive gesture, narrative allusion, etc., then Wagnerianism was inevitable, if music was to progress.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

emiellucifuge said:


> While Aesthetically I fully agree with the Brahms & Co that music should be purely abstract and nothing in the music should represent something else.
> 
> IT is a rather silly idea to have sounds represent characters or themes and to have thme come in at the appropriate time like a play. Wagners method I can understand, his leitmotifs are so amazingly well crafted that they seem to embody and suggest their meaning anyway.


I think the Wagnerian achievement was to 'marry' music with character again, as it was in Greek times. But better than the Greeks: their music was simply accompaniment to the drama, and was secondary. With Wagner and Mahler, we enter a world in which music is "expressive gesture" without being narrative.

In fact, I think the distinction between "program" and "absolute" music is largely artificial, in that music can be full of "dramatic gesture" without the need to be explicitly narrative. The lietmotive went a long way in accomplishing this.

For example, in most of Mahler's symphonies, we hear tragedy and love, as if the music was narrating a love story of sorts. Schoenberg's Transfigured Night seems to convey "distress" with its resolution, without our having to really know the story; it does this through dramatic musical gesture alone.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

ScipioAfricanus said:


> amongst the close knit circle of friends that made up the Brahms Limited Liability Corporation were Gernsheim, Herzogenberg, Von Bulow, Max Bruch, Dvorak. and Joseph Joachim. What I find interesting is that none of these composers have withstood the test of time and stood on on their own.(Only Dvorak was able to break out of the mold but he was considerably influenced by Wagner in his early years). It was like they were all inferior little Brahms. All there works (I do enjoy them) seemingly mimic Brahms style to no end.
> On the contrary, in the Wagner camp, we have Liszt, Bruckner, Hugo Wolf, Draeseke, Engelbert Humperdinck, to a lesser extent Mahler, and the great conductors of Hans Richter, Hermann Levi and Arthur Nikisch. All these guys made names for themselves and can stand on their own 2 feet. They all produce masterpieces that are in the standard repetoire (forgiveness for Draeseke he is now having a comeback), and the conductors left their imprint on the profession that is being felt 100 + years after wards. [END QUOTE]
> 
> This is an interesting subject. I see what you're saying, but I'm not entirely comfortable with it.
> ...


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Brahms did *not* exemplify many of the principles of Romanticism, yet he was right in the middle of it. Wagner, Liszt, and other Romantics wanted to escape from tradition, hence the tone poem, Liszt's lack of symphonies, etc.

The Romantics were communicators with the audience, more than Brahms was. It's no wonder Brahms is less popular than he could have been, and why "problems" always crop up when average listeners report on him.

The Romantics were about being "in the moment," so their music is always "becoming" in the moment, and is written to appeal to the immediate listener, who was now "everyman" in the increasingly democratic Romantic enlightenment. Brahms was trying to create classical forms, and cared less about the individual.

Brahms was writing "for history," as he said about "standing in the shadow of Beethoven." He wasn't writing for his public, but he was trying to establish his place in history.

The Romantics were writing music to get the audience involved in their poetic quest, which included all the universal reactions and qualities of being human, much like Shakespeare. In fact the Romantics were literary men, associating with poets and writers, and wanted to create art in the new celebration of the individual, and to create the "new art" in the new spirit of the age; an age with no royalty and kings.

Brahms was out-of-touch with his own era; he was still trying to write Classical music for tradition, in the face of the new Romanticism. He had the old, classical view of tradition, as an unchanging state of being; the Romantics were constantly changing and becoming "new."

Brahms was a brilliant craftsman (although his orchestration was boring), but he harkens back to Mozart in his restrained classical approach. His saving grace is his lieder, and chamber works, which by default, more closely resemble Romanticism's intimacy, poetry, and celebration of the individual. But when it came to the large forms, I think he was his own worst enemy.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

millionrainbows said:


> Brahms did *not* exemplify many of the principles of Romanticism, yet he was right in the middle of it. Wagner, Liszt, and other Romantics wanted to escape from tradition, hence the tone poem, Liszt's lack of symphonies, etc.
> 
> The Romantics were communicators with the audience, more than Brahms was. It's no wonder Brahms is less popular than he could have been, and why "problems" always crop up when average listeners report on him.
> 
> ...


Greetings, millionrainbows!

Given the topic of this thread, I should make clear my Wagnerian loyalties before coming to the defense of my other good buddy Joe Brahms, who seems to be taking a beating around here. I've already had to defend some of his composer admirers (in my post above) against charges of hopeless derivativeness, mediocrity, and irrelevance, but it seems even the old beard himself ain't gettin' much recognition for his accomplishments.

Seriously,now: do you really think Brahms was an un-romantic composer who couldn't handle large forms? I think exactly the opposite: that he was a deeply Romantic composer whose life project - accomplished with amazing success - was to reconcile his passionate Romantic sensibility with the intrinsic strength and completeness of Classical form. This antinomy is fundamental to his nature as both man and musician; his personal difficulty in expressing the dualities of his nature necessitated his pursuit of the apparently contradictory vision of an art both profoundly emotional and strictly disciplined. The solutions he found won't please everyone; some temperaments will never understand him (I confess it took me several years). But, by Jove, he succeeded, with amazing consistency, in doing just what he set out to do. No one since Beethoven - absolutely no one - handled the large forms better than he did. Big-boned symphonies, concertos on an almost epic scale, elaborate chamber works - Brahms set himself huge structural challenges and met them, giving long movements a tensile strength that none of his contemporaries or followers equaled. But what's equally striking, given this triumph of absolute form, is the fervor and variety of emotional expression of a deeply personal nature which overflows from his work from the beginning of his creative career to the end.

From the long perspective of the 21st century, Brahms's Romantic creds hardly seem questionable, despite his neo-classical convictions. He was simply one branch of the luxuriantly spreading tree of 19th-century music. An artist need not be avant garde to be truly of his time.


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## FleshRobot (Jan 27, 2014)

millionrainbows said:


> Brahms did *not* exemplify many of the principles of Romanticism, yet he was right in the middle of it. Wagner, Liszt, and other Romantics wanted to escape from tradition, hence the tone poem, Liszt's lack of symphonies, etc.


Didn't he compose 2 symphonies? Or do you mean that Faust and Dante are not "real symphonies"?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

FleshRobot said:


> Re: Liszt: Didn't he compose 2 symphonies? Or do you mean that Faust and Dante are not "real symphonies"?


No, I mean he didn't create nine or ten. "Tone poems" seemed to be their replacement. "Lack," not zero.

Plus, as primarily a pianist, Liszt, with Chopin, exemplifies the Romantic celebration of the individual over the collective, as a 'poet of the piano.'

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