# Is the German Requiem really 'boring'



## BenG (Aug 28, 2018)

On an old thread named 'pieces that bore you', many people posted saying that the Brahms German Reqiem bores them to death. What do you think? I'm considering attending a performance soon so do you think it's worth it?


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

I love choral music, sing it, perform it, collect recordings of it. The Brahms has bored me since the first time I heard it. I don't hear what its fans hear.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

It sags in the middle


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Simple answer: No. As with any other piece, it all depends on the performers, and particularly on the conductor.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

All subjective. Some listeners find certain composers boring where others don't. I agree with Becca it also depends on the performance. Some conductors/performers can turn boring stuff into gold. Personally I don't like the German Requiem, but I like the sound when Klemperer conducts.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

I have to say yes. There's so much slow music and the orchestration is quite plain. I've heard it once live - that was enough. I can't even remember the last time I put the cd on (Klemperer). I've played it in orchestras several times and it's not that thrilling to play.

There are some pieces of great music that just belong to another people in another period of time and the Requiem is one of them. Like Mendelssohn's Elijah, even Beethoven's Christ on the Mount of Olives or the Mass, and also Bernstein's Mass. None of them mean much to me. Yes, the German Requiem is boring. Beautiful at times, but boring.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

GB Shaw on Brahms German Requiem: "I do not deny that the Requiem is a solid piece of musical manufacture. You feel at once that it could only have come from the establishment of a first-class undertaker."


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

G.B. Shaw, like Thomas Beecham, was more concerned with making 'clever' quips to enhance his reputation as a wit, than with expressing any thought out opinion.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

There are some conductors who have raised the creation of tedious performances to an art form and with some works it is easier than others. I will name no names in order not to offend.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Having said that it is rather universally considered to be a bit boring. Conductors are not magicians, they can't turn inherently boring music into not-boring music; that baton isn't a wand.

It may be that it appeals to people who like a certain kind of approach to music. Tchaikovsky disliked all of Brahms music and Brahms didn't care much for Tchaikovsky's (we know the former's views first-hand, Brahms's less so). 
I agree with Tchaikovsky's sentiments that Brahms was good at thematic development, but his melodies aren't that great and there is flatness in the entire structure. 

The German Requiem was highly-praised when premiered and was 'a public success', but the musical landscape has to be considered too. The search for a Beethoven replacement, the anti-Wagner crew and the almost total ignorance of Russian music in Germany/Austria.
To me it sounds like a work from a 2nd-rate kapellmeister.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Becca said:


> G.B. Shaw, like Thomas Beecham, was more concerned with making 'clever' quips to enhance his reputation as a wit, than with expressing any thought out opinion.


I think that's a bit simplistic. Shaw was a music critic for many years. A compilation of his reviews is available, _Bombardments_, totaling almost 400 pages. Certainly he liked to turn a clever phrase, but what he wrote always reflected his true opinions.

https://www.amazon.com/Great-Compos...2535/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540661590&sr=8-1

He also wrote a very lengthy commentary on Wagner's Ring cycle, _The Perfect Wagnerite_.

https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Wagn...=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1540661910&sr=1-2

He did not like the music of Brahms. Not. One. Bit.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Its a great work, a masterpiece. Brahms greatest strengths I think were in his use of harmony, counterpoint and structure. Especially in the latter two areas he was far greater than all but a few. Brahms was a heavyweight classical composer, most of Tchaikovsky's output sounds essentially like pop music in comparison. It is not uncommon for fans of pop to find classical music 'boring'.


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## Dimace (Oct 19, 2018)

tdc said:


> Its a great work, a masterpiece. Brahms greatest strengths I think were in his use of harmony, counterpoint and structure. Especially in the latter two areas he was far greater than all but a few. Brahms was a heavyweight classical composer, most of *Tchaikovsky's *output sounds essentially like pop music in comparison. It is not uncommon for fans of pop to find classical music 'boring'.


Thanks!

* The ''Ein Deutsches Requiem'' is so beautiful and unique piece of music, I consider it the best Brahms ever composed.


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## jdec (Mar 23, 2013)

OP, not to me, it's a wonderful work.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Brahms more than any composer divides people.

I must say I think you'd have to have a pretty hard heart not to find something to enjoy in _Wie lieblich sind deine Wohnungen._ This is something that Rattle did very well indeed.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

tdc said:


> Brahms was a heavyweight classical composer...


That old chestnut. It's more of that business of German/Austrian supremacy in music.



tdc said:


> most of Tchaikovsky's output sounds essentially like pop music in comparison. It is not uncommon for fans of pop to find classical music 'boring'.


It _is_ pop = popular. But also with a mastery of orchestration Brahms never achieved. It's true Brahms had a fine mastery of harmony, but look what he did with it. It's like having a length of fine velvet and using it to make a potato sack.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I think most disparaging of Brahms' orchestral music - and including the German Requiem - is a result of people expecting him to be something he was not. Much of this orchestral music is warm and tender but many people seem to expect drama and intensity, which can be there but not so much to the fore. He was also the most classical of the Romantics and his music is much more controlled than most Romantic music. The German Requiem is not Verdi but it is a great and impressive work.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Enthusiast said:


> I think most disparaging of Brahms' orchestral music - and including the German Requiem - is a result of people expecting him to be something he was not..


Interesting? Arresting?


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I sang the _Deutsches Requiem_ and listened to many performances of it in my college years, and came to love it. It's a gentle work for the most part, intended by Brahms not to pray for the dead but to comfort the living. It may seem a bit square or staid to some people today - I feel this way about a lot of 19th-century choral music, especially on religious texts (e.g. Mendelssohn's oratorios, as opposed to Berlioz's Requiem!) - but it's beautifully written and really unlike any other work. The old Klemperer recording with Schwarzkopf and Fischer-Dieskau as superb soloists is still hard to top.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Brahms vs. Tchaikovsky again? It's motivic development vs. themes/melody. Personally, I feel Tchaikovsky is more relevant today. Brahms is largely superseded in my mind by the 20th Century Modern Greats, who weren't afraid to have more fun.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Phil loves classical said:


> Brahms vs. Tchaikovsky again? It's motivic development vs. themes/melody. Personally, I feel Tchaikovsky is more relevant today. Brahms is largely superseded in my mind by the 20th Century Modern Greats, who weren't afraid to have more fun.


Brahms, the "Classical Romantic," had a powerful and original musical brain. It generated numerous masterpieces that aren't going anywhere. You love them or you don't. The idea that some "20th Century Modern Greats" (who, for example?) have "superseded" him is strange. How do original artists supersede each other?


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## wkasimer (Jun 5, 2017)

I didn’t appreciate the work until I sang in a performance of it.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I was wondering why the Brahms Requiem only has a little over 100 recordings on the market. Now I know it's because it's a boring piece of music. :lol:


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> How do original artists supersede each other?


Hmmm... that's a conversation-stopper. I'll steal that and use it. I have a date on Monday evening (was meant to be tonight, but didn't work out) and I'll throw this into the conversation with her musical friends. Prefacing it with: "The famed music critic Wooduck asks..."

See if they pretend to know of you.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

I am not a huge Zbrahms fan but find the requiem very moving. Try listening to Klemperer or the 1948 Karajan to see how it should be done


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Who is Zbrahms? Some kind of rapper?


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

eugeneonagain said:


> Hmmm... that's a conversation-stopper. I'll steal that and use it. I have a date on Monday evening (was meant to be tonight, but didn't work out) and I'll throw this into the conversation with her musical friends. Prefacing it with: "The famed music critic Wooduck asks..."
> 
> See if they pretend to know of you.


I presume that if they pretend to know who I am, it will be your last date with her?

On the other hand, there's no telling how far my fame has spread.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Infamy, perhaps?


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

eugeneonagain said:


> Infamy, perhaps?


All renown is good. At least when money follows. I haven't figured that part out yet.


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## Oldhoosierdude (May 29, 2016)

Most Req's and Masses are over long in my opinion. I enjoy the German Req, but it suffers the same malady. I recently attended a Mozart Req and found it lengthy also (please don't hurt me!). Not boring, but long.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Oldhoosierdude said:


> Most Req's and Masses are over long in my opinion. I enjoy the German Req, but it suffers the same malady. I recently attended a Mozart Req and found it lengthy also (please don't hurt me!). Not boring, but long.


It does seem pointless to go on and on about people who are dead and can't even hear what you're singing about (and might not care for that "day of wrath" stuff if they could). Of course Delius's _Mass of Life_ is quite a sprawling mass of Nietzsche, who is better digested in small morsels (if at all). I think Faure got it just about right.


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## Guest (Oct 27, 2018)

All depends on whether one gets bored listening to it or not.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

shirime said:


> All depends on whether one gets bored listening to it or not.


And the material plays no part in that?


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

KenOC said:


> GB Shaw on Brahms German Requiem: "I do not deny that the Requiem is a solid piece of musical manufacture. You feel at once that it could only have come from the establishment of a first-class undertaker."


It is a requiem efter all.


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## Guest (Oct 27, 2018)

eugeneonagain said:


> And the material plays no part in that?


I always thought being bored is a response to the music rather than an intrinsic quality in the music itself. I guess the only way I can prove that is that I don't get bored listening to the work in question but other do. What we like to hear in music and what our tastes in music are will always influence how music affects us, won't it?


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

The only orchestra-scale work by Brahms that I like is the 2nd Piano Concerto. I prefer the chamber music. Also, the more introspective one, like the late 1st Clarinet Sonata, and not things like the 1st Op.79 Rhapsody, which, to me, sounds stiff and constipated.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> I sang the _Deutsches Requiem_ and listened to many performances of it in my college years, and came to love it. It's a gentle work, for the most part, intended by Brahms not to pray for the dead but to comfort the living. It may seem a bit square or staid to some people today - I feel this way about a lot of 19th-century choral music, especially on religious texts (e.g. Mendelssohn's oratorios, as opposed to Berlioz's Requiem!) - but it's beautifully written and really unlike any other work. The old Klemperer recording with Schwarzkopf and Fischer-Dieskau as superb soloists is still hard to top.


Bravo! Well said! I feel the same way. For those who dislike it or find it boring, how many take into account the genuine grief behind it that Brahms was experiencing at the time from the loss of his dear friend Robert Schumann and Brahms' mother before writing it?

I also find it a gentle work, tender and sensitive, and indispensable in understanding Brahms' feelings for the sacred. While it's usually not considered a religious work, it's certainly been considered a sacred work... For everyone who finds it "boring," they should be required to mention the performance they've heard. Some can indeed drag, but it's certainly not intended to be boring or lack interest. Or maybe its dismissive critics should wait for the modern hip-hop or disco version for a little more spice and excitement in a beautiful but somber work dedicated to both the living and the dead.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

eugeneonagain said:


> Who is Zbrahms? Some kind of rapper?


Yup - he and JK-Cool Typo are currently very popular.


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## Gottfried (Feb 16, 2018)

No!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

As with everything else, it is a matter of personal taste. I suspect people who dislike the Requiem perhaps mostly do not like much else by Brahms either. He is often criticized for holding back too much, and indeed, he tended to keep his dramas under strict control.

To me, that makes his rare outbursts all the more thrilling, but that's just me.

Personally, I find the Requiem deeply moving.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

brianvds said:


> As with everything else, it is a matter of personal taste. I suspect people who dislike the Requiem perhaps mostly do not like much else by Brahms either. He is often criticized for holding back too much, and indeed, he tended to keep his dramas under strict control.
> 
> To me, that makes his rare outbursts all the more thrilling, but that's just me.
> 
> Personally, I find the Requiem deeply moving.


The _Requiem_ was actually my gateway to Brahms. As a teenager I found his music somewhat knotty, dry and constipated - frustratingly unlike the more freewheeling Romantics, Tchaikovsky and Wagner. After I came to appreciate the _Requiem_ his other works began to sound different to me, and for a time I couldn't get enough of him. His chamber work is still some of my favorite music, especially the piano trios, quartets and quintet. No one wrote better for piano and strings.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Without in any way denigrating the composer -- whom I respect and admire a lot and whose music I generally like -- it's a piece only Brahms could have composed.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Pardon a long short story. Quite a few years ago we were in Maui, and my son wanted to take the bike ride down Mt. Haleakala (elev. ten thousand feet) which starts at sunrise and gets you all the way to the coast (zero feet) never touching the pedals.

So we were driving across the flatter terrain on the way to the mountain and it was pitch dark. The sugar cane fields were being burned, and we were surrounded by flames on all sides. The car radio was playing an oddly absorbing and compelling choral work. I didn't know it, but it seemed to fit right into the surreal scene.

It ended, and the announcer said, "That was _Denn alles Fleisch, es ist wie Gras_ from Brahms's German Requiem, _All Flesh is Grass_." Now *that *was a memorable moment!


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> Brahms, the "Classical Romantic," had a powerful and original musical brain. It generated numerous masterpieces that aren't going anywhere. You love them or you don't. The idea that some "20th Century Modern Greats" (who, for example?) have "superseded" him is strange. How do original artists supersede each other?


Brahms doesn't seem so original to me following Schumann sort of language, but rather a creative force. I mean in terms of motivic development, I don't find it really that interesting compared to say Prokofiev, Bartok and a few others. To me Brahms is stuck in a no-man's land of being conservative yet modern without the freedom of 20th century greats. It is an uneasy mix to me, trying to do too much.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Another towards OP: Noooooooooooooooooooooooo.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Phil loves classical said:


> Brahms doesn't seem so original to me following Schumann sort of language, but rather a creative force. I mean in terms of motivic development, I don't find it really that interesting compared to say Prokofiev, Bartok and a few others. To me Brahms is stuck in a no-man's land of being conservative yet modern without the freedom of 20th century greats. It is an uneasy mix to me, trying to do too much.


Brahms's mixture of Romantic songfulness and structural severity was peculiar to him. It's a paradox which I think mirrors an effort to deal with personal insecurity, perhaps concerning his sexuality (I'm not assuming anything specific here). Just as a person's controlled exterior may reveal inadvertently an inner turmoil, the iron grip of Brahms in developing his music's formal structures represents an act of control and a sublimation of a passionate nature which we can sometimes perceive as such. It baffles me that you would find the motivic development in his music uninteresting, but then we tend to find uninteresting music that doesn't grab us on an emotional level.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

I just realized that the combination of Yes with No sounds like Nose. I wonder what are the implications of that.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

aleazk said:


> I just realized that the combination of Yes with No sounds like Nose. I wonder what are the implications of that.


"He Who is Running Nose" (P.D.Q. Bach)


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## Guest (Oct 28, 2018)

aleazk said:


> I just realized that the combination of Yes with No sounds like Nose. I wonder what are the implications of that.


Maybe ask Gogol....then Shostakovich?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

shirime said:


> Maybe ask Gogol....then Shostakovich?


What does a disembodied nose do, without hands or handkerchief, when it get a bad head cold? Too messy to think about.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> "He Who is Running Nose" (P.D.Q. Bach)


Iphegenia in Brooklyn?


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

KenOC said:


> What does a disembodied nose do, without hands or handkerchief, when it get a bad head cold? Too messy to think about.


A disembodied nose has no head to get a cold in.

Yes, picky picky...


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

All I know is that it's a beautiful piece of music.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

KenOC said:


> What does a disembodied nose do, without hands or handkerchief, when it get a bad head cold? Too messy to think about.


For some reason, this puts the image of Mussorgsky in my mind.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

I do find the Requiem boring, rather listen to Nänie or Schicksalslied.


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## Merl (Jul 28, 2016)

Tbh, i find ALL requiems boring.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I like all the choral works I've heard by Brahms. The _GR_ has never struck me as being over-long or sagging in the middle or whatever. I'm particularly fond of the _'Denn alles Fleisch, es ist wie Gras'_ section.


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## Bradius (Dec 11, 2012)

Absolutely love Brahms EDR. Possibly my favorite choral music. Ranks with Bach's Mass and Handel's Messiah for me. I'm going to listen to EDR now!


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

I have performed the work twice and it has a very challenging bassoon part.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Dimace said:


> Thanks!
> 
> * The ''Ein Deutsches Requiem'' is so beautiful and unique piece of music, I consider it the best Brahms ever composed.


I am with you. Brachms German Requiem is the only Brahms work I like.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Just listening to the Klemperer version. 'Boring' is the last word I would put to it.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

'Boring' is perhaps not the word; just long, as was said at the beginning of this thread. The second movement is particularly solemn and moving.
People unfamiliar with Brahms will recognise the march portions as the music used as the theme for the documentary: _The Nazis: A Warning from History._ Not a brilliant connection, but fitting for the programme.

Movement 5 - Ihr habt nun Traurigkeit, has a sort of purity and beauty about it.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Some of y'all are uninvited to my funeral. I don't want to bore you or anything.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Are you going to play the Sugar Plum Fairy dance?


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

eugeneonagain said:


> Are you going to play the Sugar Plum Fairy dance?


Well, to be honest, I don't know for sure. I'd really like someone to set Matthew 25:31-46 to some really frightening music. If no one does that, then it's pretty much either Denn alles Fleisch or the Sugar Plum Fairy. To be sure, Night of the Electric Insects and Entry of the Gladiators are also possibilities.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Some of it drags a little but calling the whole thing a "boring" piece is crazy.

Seeing this thread made me want to listen as it had been a while. Now listening to Abbado's, which is new to me - don't think it will top Klemperer but I like it so far.


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

I heard it just twice and the word I would use to describe it is beautiful and not boring. The same goes for Dvořák's requiem, which is similar (Brahms was Dvořák's teacher and friend)


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## David Phillips (Jun 26, 2017)

I'm a massive Brahms fan - 24 chamber music pieces and every one a solid-gold winner - but the Requiem has got me beat: dull, stodgy, slooooow. Lord, I have tried over the years. Verdi knew how to write a decent requiem, and Faure, but for me the Brahms' is a dud.


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## Josquin13 (Nov 7, 2017)

I believe you have to hear the Brahms German Requiem live in concert, & in an exceptional performance, in order to understand how great a choral work it is. What may seem slow and boring on CD is anything but when heard live in concert. Rather, if the choral singing and soloists are first rate, the vocal music can be overwhelmingly beautiful and deeply moving in concert. You don't get the same effect on a recording, not even close. (So, you have to turn the volume up at home.)

The other problem is that it's a difficult work to perform well. Sawallisch 1 & 2, Haitink Vienna, Sir Colin Davis, Klemperer, and Previn LSO live are among the conductors & recordings that I've liked most over the years.


















But again, a CD is no substitute.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Josquin13 said:


> I believe you have to hear the Brahms German Requiem live in concert, & in an exceptional performance, in order to understand how great a choral work it is. What may seem slow and boring on CD is anything but when heard live in concert. ...


Yep, First time I heard Brahms German Requiem was in concert and at a world-class venue, Hill Auditorium on the campus of the University of Michigan. It was amazing.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Josquin13 said:


> I believe you have to hear the Brahms German Requiem live in concert, & in an exceptional performance, in order to understand how great a choral work it is.


I'd agree with you. But personally, I've never found it boring, especially because of the text, following the German Trauermusic tradition of using biblical references to death and resurrection, and also its arch form: parts 1 and 7 using the same material; parts 2 and 6 being funereal; parts 3 and 5 addressing grief and consolation and the fourth speaking of the upcoming heavenly dwelling place.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Perhaps it’s already been mentioned, but he started writing his German Requiem when he was only 32 and it took him some years to finish. I think that makes it a very ambitious work for his age to tackle something this serious. So he felt deeply about it and I think it was very healing to him spiritually... I don’t think it’s mentioned enough that the works of Brahms can be very comforting in times of tragedy, crisis and grief. I think he could deal with those tragic emotions, but not without difficulty, and it’s one of its greatest strengths because he had gone through those emotions personally, and I think he understood them from a very early age... I have enormous respect for him for being able to portray those qualities for those who don’t find him ‘boring’... I don’t find him boring but there have certainly be less than stellar performances when performers forget that he was writing to bring comfort to the living as well as honoring the memory of dead.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

BenG said:


> On an old thread named 'pieces that bore you', many people posted saying that the Brahms German Reqiem bores them to death. What do you think? I'm considering attending a performance soon so do you think it's worth it?


Go for it. And come back and report on its worthiness. If you stay home you'll never know.


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

Mandryka said:


> Brahms more than any composer divides people.
> 
> I must say I think you'd have to have a pretty hard heart not to find something to enjoy in _Wie lieblich sind deine Wohnungen._ This is something that Rattle did very well indeed.


I used to find Brahms in general boring. I no longer think that, far from it.

That said, I haven't listened to the German Requiem in a long time. The first time I listened to it, I was probably 13 and I did find it boring. But I was expecting something different, after having heard requiems by Durufle and Berlioz. I would like to give it another chance and I'm going to buy a new recording of it soon.


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## Dima (Oct 3, 2016)

People do lectures, write articles, recordings, concerts every year - all about such dull composition as German Requiem.
If you try to listen to the next fragments of the opera Moses by Brahms's contemporary - Anton Rubinstein - you would not need any lecture - when music is talented words are meaningless: https://cloud.mail.ru/public/GGY4/EmT2bGPmV
I gave this example because it's in the same music tradition.
This post does not concern Brahms fans, sorry me if you can...


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

If I were to pick my favourite five requiem-like pieces the Brahms would be among them along with the Verdi, the Britten (although it is the songs rather than the setting of the Latin requiem mass that makes that one special), the Faure and the parts of the Mozart that are genuinely Mozart. I don't think the Berlioz (good though that is) or anything by Dvorak would make it. So, you can see I really do like it a lot. But like many here it was not always the case. I think it was the cheap and well-paced Kegel that finally pushed it into the really greats for me:


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