Nänie, Op. 82: Vocal score

Johannes Brahms

Feb 2007 · Serenissima Music, Inc.

About this ebook

Brahms enriched the genre of chorus and orchestra with two impressive works from the early 1880s: In 1881, he set a text to Schiller's Nanie (Op. 82, four-part chorus and orchestra) and the next year (1882) he set Goethe's Song of the Fates (Op. 89, six-part chorus and orchestra).Brahms composed the piece in 1881, in memory of his deceased friend Anselm Feuerbach. "Nanie" (Song of Lamentation) is not about simple despair or mere complaint. Even in such dark moments, Schiller's romanticism is expressed as a yearning for the unattainable. The work opens with "Auch das Schone muss sterben!" (Even Beauty must die), and the tension between the veracity of the message and the yearning of the human spirit for the timelessness of temporality and the eternal recurrence of beauty can be sensed in the sheer beauty of Brahm's music. Unabridged digitally enhanced reprint of the composer's own vocal score that was issued by Breitkopf and Hartel in the early 20th century.

About the author

A composer, pianist, and conductor, Johannes Brahms was born in Hamburg, Germany. Possessing a talent that could have taken him in any musical direction, he chose the piano and composing. He made his debut as a pianist at the age of 14. In 1853 Brahms met the German composer Robert Schumann, who regarded Brahms as a genius. Schumann and his wife Clara, a noted concert pianist, became Brahms's lifelong friends. In 1862 Brahms moved to Vienna, where his talents as a composer reached full flower. The music of Brahms shows great respect for the form and structure of eighteenth-century classicism, yet it also incorporates the romantic style that was typical of the nineteenth century. Brahms is considered a giant among nineteenth-century composers of chamber music and symphonies. Among his 24 published chamber-music works are a piano trio in B, opus 8 (1854); two string quartets; two piano quartets; and a piano quintet in F minor, opus 34a (1864). He composed four great symphonies: Symphony in C Minor (completed in1876), Symphony in D Minor (1877), Symphony in F Major (1883), and Symphony in E Minor (1885). While classic in structure and design, Brahms's symphonies are romantic in their musical language and sound. Nonetheless, they exhibit feelings of repose that illustrate a return to discipline and a revival of order and form, indicative of changes in music to come in the 1900s. Today, many of the works of Brahms are staples of the concert repertoire. Brahms died in 1897.