Written by Anna Vorhes
BORN: May 7, 1833, Hamburg, Germany
DIED: April 3, 1897, Vienna, Austria
INSTRUMENTATION: solo soprano, solo baritone, SATB Chorus, three flutes (one piccolo), two oboes, two clarinets, three bassoons (optional contrabassoon), four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, one tuba, harp, strings
DURATION: 68-70 minutes
WORLD PREMIERE: Three movements were premiered in 1867 in Vienna, Six movements premiered in April, 1868 with Brahms conducting; the final movement was composed and premiered alone in September, 1868, and the seven movement format was premiered in February, 1869, in Leipzig.
SOMETHING INTERESTING TO LISTEN FOR: The first three notes of this seven-movement work, sung by the sopranos, are used by Brahms to stitch the whole work together. These three notes are used in their original presentation, in retrograde (meaning backwards), in inversion (upside down, using the intervals as a guide) and in retrograde inversion (upside down and backwards).
PROGRAM NOTES
The exact reason for Brahms' composition of this work will never be known, though there has been much speculation. He was a very close friend of the Schumann family, and in going through Robert's papers found a project note about that composer planning to write Ein Deutsches Requiem. Schumann's wife Clara did not believe that was Brahms' inspiration. She felt the death of Brahm's mother in 1865 was the source of his desire to create a requiem. Brahms himself never identified his inspiration.
Although he didn't attend formal worship services regularly, Brahms was an avid Bible reader, studying Martin Luther's translation of the Bible to German. He selected the texts for this composition himself, carefully ordering them. The result is a requiem for the living. The history of the Latin requiem comes from the Middle Ages, with many composers choosing the format for composition through many centuries. A traditional Latin requiem is a worship service intended to usher those who who have died from this world. Brahms lived in a time when the power of the church over all society was waning. Religion remained a large force in society, but the parameters were less rigid. Brahms felt free to use the sacred text to create something worthy of worship but not intended to be liturgical. Comfort in times of sorrow was Brahms' intent.
The seven movements of the composition can be divided into two main sections. The first three movements are about earthly suffering a lamentation. In the final four movements this mourning is transformed through faith to offer consolation and hope for a triumphant resurrection and reunion. Each of the movements also offers contrast of spirit: the first between grief and joy, the second between anguish and everlasting bliss, the third between uneasy doubts and divine repose, for example.
Brahms' biographer Geiringer speaks of the difference between the traditional Latin requiem mass and Brahm's form:
"The Latin requiem is a prayer for the peace of the dead, threatened with the horrors of the last Judgement; Brahm's Requiem on the contrary, utters words of consolation, designed to reconcile the living with the idea of suffering and death."
The fact that Brahms carefully chose the text for the Requiem leads us to consider how to sing the work for an English speaking audience. One of Brahms' friends, Reinthaler, suggested to Brahms that he needed to insert the idea of Christ's death as the redeeming reason Christians need not fear death. With that additional thought the work could be easier to use in liturgical settings. Brahms refused, saying his requiem was "fur alle Menschen" - for all men. Knowing this intention, would the composer have chosen to translate the words into the language spoken by the majority of the audience as the piece became known outside the German speaking world? Music analyst Donald Tovey explains the problem:
"The best available English will not always bring the rhetorical points where the music puts it: and some of the repetitions of English words (occur) where Brahms had no such stammering in the setting of the German...Where such irritating things happen in an English version, we must realize that Brahms would have composed the English text differently."
Long time SD Symphony concert attendees may remember the last time this work was performed. At that point a new English translation was sung for the audience. For this concert we return to the original German of Martin Luther's translation of the Bible, as Brahms would have read and studied them and set them to music.
TRANSLATION TEXT
For an audience that primarily speaks English, a translation of the text is helpful. Below are the texts for the movements. The translations are from the Lutheran Study Bible, also known as the New Revised Standard Version. There are two verses from the Apocrypha, which Luther translated into German but segregated from the rest of the Bible. The translation given for these verses is from the New American translation of the Apocrypha by Edgar Goodspeed. (For those unfamiliar with the Apocrypha, these books were part of the early Christian Bible, but were not part of the Hebrew Bible. They are frequently called the hidden or secret books. The Puritans disapproved of them, and they have dropped from general inclusion in the Bible translations. Luther translated them with his German Bible, so they were part of Brahms' Bible.)
Movement 1:
Matthew 5:4 - Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. (from the Beatitudes. Blessed in this passage can also be translated as "happy").
Psalm 126: 5-6 - May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy. Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves.
Movement 2:
1 Peter 1:24 - All flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord endures forever.
James 5:7 - Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains.
1 Peter 1:25 - but the word of the Lord endures forever. That word is the good news that was announced to you.
Isaiah 35:10 - And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow, and sighing shall flee away.
Movement 3:
Psalm 39: 4-7 - Lord, let me know my end, and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is. You have made my days a few handbreadths and my lifetime is as nothing in your sight. Surely everyone stands as a mere breath. Surely everyone stands as a mere breath. Surely everyone goes about like a shadow. Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; they heap up, and do not know who will gather. And now, O Lord, what do I wait for? My hope is in you.
Wisdom of Solomon 3:1 - But the souls of the upright are in the hand of God, and no torment can reach them.
Movement 4:
Psalm 84: 1, 2, 4 - How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the living God. Happy are those who dwell in your house, Ever singing your praise.
Movement 5:
John 16:22 - So you have pain now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.
Isaiah 66:13 - As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; you shall be comforted in Jerusalem.
Ecclesiasticus 51:27 - See with your own eyes that I have worked but little, and yet found myself much repose.
Movement 6:
Hebrews: 13:14 - For here we have no lasting city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.
1 Corinthians 15: 51, 52, 54, 55 - Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled:
Death has been swallowed up in victory.
Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?
Revelations: 4:11 - You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.
Movement 7:
Revelation 14:13 - And I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Write this: Blessed are the dead who from now on die in the Lord." "Yes," says the Spirit, "they will rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them."