Johannes Brahms
(1833-1897)
reconstruction by Jorge Rotter as a Nonet
Allegro molto
Scherzo (Allegro non troppo)
Adagio non troppo
Menuetto I & II
Scherzo (Allegro)
Rondo (Allegro)
The idea that there is a Nonet by Brahms may come as a surprise. It is in fact a hypothetical reconstruction of the original version of his first published work for orchestra alone, the Serenade in D. Thus are restored to the world a composer’s first thoughts, making a valuable addition to the chamber music repertoire. The maker of the reconstruction heard in this concert, Jorge Rotter, regards this Nonet as corresponding, in density of tone, to Schubert’s Octet and Beethoven’s Septet, replacing the broader orchestral palette with a subtler sound.
Brahms composed this music while he was employed at the small court of Detmold, where he played a good deal of chamber music with the principals of the court orchestra, and heard performances of Mozart wind serenades and divertimenti. The 24 year-old was still an apprentice in orchestral composition. The piece he composed in imitation of these grew, eventually, to symphonic proportions, but it remains entertainment music, with three dance-derived movements (two scherzos and a minuet). The opening and closing movements are expansive, even discursive, and the slow movement gives plenty of opportunities for songful solo expression by the wind instruments. The writing suggests modest string forces, and indeed there is agreement nowadays among scholars that the original was a nonet, possibly without at least the first of the two scherzo movements. There is further evidence in the correspondence between Brahms and his friend, the violinist and composer Joseph Joachim.
In1858 Brahms wrote that he was in the process of making modifications to the parts of his serenade, begun the previous year, and asked for advice. Joachim, who had apparently performed the nonet version in Hamburg, replied that he was unable to say whether Brahms should set the music for full orchestra or leave it as it was, but that the piece was ‘definitely symphonic’ in its leanings. Brahms decided to ‘rework the Serenade into a symphony’ (by which he meant orchestrating it). Joachim conducted two further versions, each with additions to the scoring, bringing it up to its definitive form, heard in Hanover in 1860, with pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings.
Brahms seems to have destroyed the scores and parts of the original version. A pity, because the Serenade in its final, orchestral form sits uncomfortably between 18th century-like entertainment music and symphony. Taking the lead from Brahms scholars who wondered whether the music may not have been better in its original form, at least two reconstructions have been made in recent years: one by Alan Boustead, performed and recorded by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble in 1987, and this version by Jorge Rotter, published in Bad Schwalbach in 1987, and recorded by the Scharoun Ensemble Berlin in 1989. Both these versions assume that Brahms left much of the original material unchanged in the orchestral version. They try to discover textures that would have led Brahms to orchestrate as he did.
Brahms’ immersion in his models – Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert – doesn’t stop this music from sounding like Brahms. But you may hear traces of Haydn in the horn theme over a drone bass which leads off the first movement, Beethoven for the echoes of the ‘Scene by the Brook’ from the Pastoral Symphony, in the slow movement, Mozart and Schubert for the relaxed, social music for pleasure tone which mostly prevails. The first Scherzo is not only prophetic of the corresponding movement, many years later, of Brahms’ Second Piano Concerto, but its key, D minor, and manner are the only reminders, in this Nonet-Serenade, of the stormy and powerful First Piano Concerto on which Brahms had been working shortly before. The last movement recalls Schumann, and was composed as Brahms tried to recover from the emotional turmoil of his venerated mentor’s illness and death.
Published 2007