Vier ernste Gesänge
Four Serious Songs, Op 121, is a cycle of four songs for bass and piano by Johannes Brahms. He composed the work in Vienna in 1896 and dedicated it to Max Klinger.
History
As a young man, Brahms had composed 1865-1868 A German Requiem, the themed based on a collection of biblical quotes from the Luther Bible death. He wrote Four Serious Songs at the end of his life, turn to words from the Bible. His friend Clara Schumann had suffered a stroke on March 26, 1896. Brahms completed the composition of this song cycle, his last, on his birthday, May 7, 1896 in anticipation of her death.
The texts for the first three songs are taken from the Old Testament, and explores death and the transience of life. The text of the fourth song comes from the New Testament and represents faith, hope and love in focus. The titles of the four songs are:
1 Because there goeth the people like cattle Ecclesiastes, Chapter 3
3 O death, how bitter are you Ecclesiasticus, Kap.41
4 If I with men and of angels tongues S. Paul to the Corinthians I, chapter 13
The biblical sources:
1 Because there goeth a man from Ecclesiastes 3:19-22
3 O death, how bitter you are out of Sirach 41:1-2
4 If I with people from the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians 13:1-3, 12-13
The songs were published in 1896 by music publisher N. Simrock. Originally written for a deep tone of voice, they were rewritten in a higher voice. For orchestra example, they were edited by Günter Raphael.
Premiere
The work was premiered in Vienna on 9 November 1896 in the presence of the composer by two Dutch artists: the baritone Anton Sistermans and the twenty -year-old pianist Coenraad V. Bos. Brahms came after the show backstage and thanked Sistermans and Bos for the performance, which, as he said, completely realized his intentions. Two weeks later, Bos Raymond of escorted to mills to the four songs. To mills could the final diminuendo, as it was noted in the score, do not bring about, so he pointed Bos on, the crescendo at the end of the singing voice to continue to play and work with fff instead of p, such as Brahms had given it, end let. Later spoke to mills with Brahms and said he hoped that he would not take him this deviation from the score badly. Brahms replied that have to mills sung excellent and he had not noticed anything wrong.
Structure
In the table below, the key is that of the original composition, tempo marking and clock are also given. The links to the scores lead to the version for high voice.
Recordings (selection)
In 1947 Kathleen Ferrier Four Serious Songs on with the pianist Phyllis Spurr and 1950 with John Newmark. In a live broadcast from the Royal Albert Hall in 1949, she sang an orchestra version in English with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Malcolm Sargent.
Hans Hotter made a recording of the songs in 1951 with pianist Gerald Moore, along with other songs by Brahms and Bach cantata "I have enough ."
By Dietrich Fischer -Dieskau, there are several recordings of the songs; the first one is on his first record for German gramophone from 1949, it is accompanied by Hertha Klust. Anne Ozorio described the shooting as " another significant moment in the history of the song. The singer was just 24 years old, but he already erspürte the depth of Brahms' meditation on death. " In March 1972, he took it up with Daniel Barenboim and again with Jörg Demus. Christian Gerhaher and pianist Gerold Huber took the songs on in 2002.