Ein deutsches Requiem
(A German Requiem)
by Johnannes Brahms

Saturday, May 20, 2000
8:00 pm
Lawrence Memorial Chapel

Richard Bjella, music director

Bridget-Michaele Reischl, conductor
Guest Soloists:
Kyoung Wha Cho, soprano
Jason Davis, baritone

PROGRAM NOTES

Try as we may, it is often difficult to find meaningful connections between the spirit of a composer's works and his personal life. Mozart's stormy Symphony #40, for example, was written during a relatively prosperous and happy period of his life, while The Magic Flute, three hours of untrammeled joy, was created in the midst of personal hardship and ill health. Such is also the case with the music of Johannes Brahms. His works rarely reveal the specific contours of his own emotional life, with one large exception: The German Requiem.

Brahm's Requiem stands alone as not only his largest work but also the one most emblematic of his spiritual values, philosophical beliefs, and most significant relationships. Although Brahms himself was unusually reticent on such matters, enough details of the work's genesis are known to piece together at least some understanding of Brahms' intent.

Foremost, it is his relationship with his mentor and friend Robert Schumann that leaves its imprint on the Requiem. In fact, five years after finishing the work, Brahms remarked in a letter "how very deeply a work like the Requiem belongs to Schumann." It was Schumann who, in 1853, had first heralded the twenty-one-year-old Brahms as the "Messiah" of German music in the article "Neue Bahnen" [New Paths], where he called on Brahms to compose for "the powers massed in the choir and orchestra." Schumann had encouraged Brahms' study of the old masters which is reflected in the many 17th and 18th century compositional techniques that infuse the work But it was Schumann's suicide attempt in 1854, which prompted the first draft of what would later become the Requiem's second movement.

The second catalyst for the creation of a Requiem seems to have been the death of Brahms' mother in 1865. Within a few months, movements I and IV had been finished, with III, VI, and VII following in the next two years. Within a year after the Bremen premiere in 1868, Brahms added the present movement V, a tribute to a mother's comfort, to complete the work. Clara Schumann later commented that "we all think he wrote it in her memory though he has never expressly said so."

Probably the most obvious "marker" of the personal, individualistic nature of this work is its text, a compilation of passages from the Luther Bible which Brahms selected and assembled himself While the great concert Requiems of Mozart, Verdi, Fauré and others use the Latin liturgical text of the Mass for the Dead, Brahms created a personal statement more philosophical than religious, and more addressed to the comfort of the living than to prayers for the dead. The Catholic liturgy, which begins "Grant them etemal rest, O Lord" is an ardent plea for salvation which includes descriptions of the terrors of Judgement Day. Brahms, on the other hand, focuses on the blessed comfort promised to those who mourn, and to those who 'die in the Lord.'

It is this very word "blessed" [Selig] which opens and closes the entire work. In the warm, darkly colored first movement, which dispenses completely with violins, clarinets, piccolo, trumpets and timpani, a tiny musical cell is introduced by the chorus: three ascending notes, "Selig sind" [Blessed are they], which will recur in many guises in all seven movements. The use of harp, an unusual sound for Brahms, brings a brightness to promises of joy in the text. The opening cello line suggests a Lutheran hymn melody, Wer nur den lieben Gott läßt walten, about which Brahms later remarked, "Oh well, if nobody notices it won't hurt."

The second movement, a striking cross between a funeral march and a dance of death, is driven relentlessly by ominous triplets in the timpani. The violins' first entrance is muted, yet in an eerily high register. The march becomes one of great power, interrupted by an episode calling for patience and a charming picture of rain by the flute and harp. The death march finally breaks open into a joyful, rhythmic fugue about the "redeemed of the Lord," closing with hushed tranquility.

A baritone solo begins a dark, serious dialogue with the chorus. Doubts and fears grow over the question, "And now, Lord, in whom shall I find comfort?" which is finally answered in a single, radiant phrase, "My hope is in Thee." From the depths of this Bach-like counterpoint rises another fugue, this time with two subjects, one for the orchestra and one for the chorus. The strong "hand of God," whicll holds the souls of the righteous, is symbolized by a low D pedal point which sounds a full thirty six measures.

The next two movements provide a luminous and calm midpoint to the entire work. In the fourth, a magical picture of heaven is evoked with a chorus that is probably the best-known and most often performed movement from the score. The fifth movement features a soprano soloist, who sings from beginning to end only of consolation, 'as one is comforted by his mother.' Its bright key and the gently rocking murmurs of the chorus underscore a mood of complete confidence and peace.

This mood, however, is quickly disturbed in the sixth movement by the restless tramping of pizzicato bass and wandering through vague and weird tonal landscapes. The baritone describes the "mystery" to come and Brahms forcefully asserts a triumphant cry of life's victory over death, which includes a powerful depiction of the last trumpet (in the Luther Bible, Posaune, e.g. 'trombones'). The piece reaches an overwhelming climax, which is resolved by the triumphant entry of another spacious fugue in C major, whose first three notes are another inversion of the basic melodic motif of the entire work.

The final movement, serene and majestic, borrows material from the opening chorus. "Blessed are they that mourn" becomes "Blessed are the dead." The sopranos soar to a high A and the harp, which we have not heard since the second movement, begins a heavenward climb. The chorus ends the work with ethereal, distant echoes of Selig -- blessed.

Randal Swiggum

Canadian baritone, Jason Davis, has just completed Graduate Opera studies at the University of Hartford and is the recipient of the Hartt Talent Trust and Berkowitz scholarships. Training out of the studio of Professor John J. Zei he has performed numerous roles both in Canada and abroad. Among these roles he has appeared as Sid in Britten's Albert Herring, Top in Copland's The Tender Land, Dancairo in Bizet's Carmen and Rigoletto in Verdi's Rigoletto. He recently sang the role of the Bishop in the east coast premier of Stephen Paulus' The Three Hermits, the baritone lead in Carmina Burana under the baton of David Effron, and the role of Giorgio Germont in Verdi's La Travita. Upcoming engagements include the role of the Marquise from La Traviata with the Connecticut Opera Theatre in August.