# An opera by Brahms



## AKILEGO (Jun 22, 2013)

We are in 1890 Vienna. I just came back from a meeting with Brahms, and this is what he said to me:
- Well, Akilego, I think I reached a point in my career when I can slow down and take it easy. My works are performed all over the world, I have a comfortable living. They even gave me a doctorate in Breslau! Still, I have a few good years in me and something I always wanted to do is write for the stage.
- An opera, maestro?
- An opera, indeed. What I need is a good libretto. I have no intention of writing my own like Richard. I got in touch with Giuseppe, he will never allow Piave to work for me. And Da Ponte is dead. That leaves you, my friend. Give me a nice story and I'll make you famous. Take these 100 ducats, the rest C.O.D. See you in 6 weeks.
- Yes, maestro.
Here I am, wondering which opera genre would trigger Brahms' genius. Comedy, drama, 5 acts Meyerbeer stuff, ballet included, verismo, fairy-tale, folksy, russianesque historical? Grandiose or intimate? Please help.
I'll give you 20 ducats.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Whatever the literary style or form, I'd wager he'd have a preference / proclivity for the moral fable, whether couched in a re-written classical Greek tragedy, a barnyard tale from Montaigne or Aesop, or a newly written story about a rake in London past... I.e., much like Stravinsky's inclinations, and it would be a bit 'detached' while still getting at the pathos of the libretto.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

How many euros in a ducat?

Okay, I'll bite. Old composer meets entrepreneurial time-traveler who spoofs to the black & white bearded guy that he can write a libretto. Old Brahms shuffles away to smoke his beard while he awaits the said libretto. Meanwhile, the scene shifts to an ensemble song with a chorus of TC contributers singing "Brahms can't write opera, not a bleedin' _hope_ra!"

On a corner of the stage sits the ghost of Mozart, who meanwhile has written six operas while Brahms smokes and strokes his beard. Curtain falls, loud silence in the audience...


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## CypressWillow (Apr 2, 2013)

Brahms' patience is rewarded. He's introduced to the young librettist F. N. Stein and the collaboration begins. 
It's a sad tale, narrated by Frau Bluecher, a horse-faced woman who tells of her youthful passion for her employer. I won't go into the details of the plot here, the libretto is as silly as most. 
But Brahms was very pleased with it, for it offered him opportunities to write beautiful music, incorporating the world-famous "Dobbin" theme for Frau B herself, and a wilder version for her employer, the Baron. The final scene, accompanied by the sound of a babbling brook, is poignant and tragic, and yet, in some strange way, almost irresistibly funny. It reveals a new side of Brahms, one that his later paramour, the lovely Madeline Teri, has immortalized in her own poetry. 
The opera deserves to be better known. don't you agree?


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

It would start out as a Fidelio knockoff and end up as bad Wagner.


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## Ravndal (Jun 8, 2012)

A Brahms opera - that id see!!


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