Who was Johannes Brahms? We all know the image of the old, stocky man, his true face hiding behind a large gray beard. Many associate his music with autumnal melancholy. A comforting beauty that seems to betray the pain of missed opportunities. Hank was the judgment of the philosopher Nietzsche, who gave him the "melancholy of impotence 'ascribed. But witnesses Brahms' music really so much failure?
He was hopelessly outdated, as the followers of Wagner claimed? Whether he was the "Progressive" as Schoenberg asserted much later? Who Brahms' lives further ownership, meets a man who could be blunt and aloof, but also warm and generous. For the less fortunate, he was very helpful. He also had a gift for friendship, though he was sometimes an ordeal for his friends. Striking were his platonic relationships with women. But even Clara Schumann, his most devoted friend, said friendship after 25 years Brahms still a mystery to her was. It is strange that he went with none of these women intimate relations. Possibly this has to do with his experiences in Hamburg brothel, where he moonlighted as a thirteen year old playing the piano. Anyway, this trauma has not deterred him in any case to develop a love for folk and popular music. Traces of Light Muse are everywhere in his work can be found. Many contemporaries Brahms but especially appreciated because of his more elaborate chamber music and symphonies. In this venerable Brahms genres gold as the true heir of Beethoven. He also wrote numerous songs and choral works, which are certainly as beautiful. Sometimes it seems that here we can catch a glimpse of the true Brahms, because the texts he chose often about fundamental questions of life. He had a great knowledge of the Bible. Yet he seemed to be more interested in stoic resignation than in the Christian redemption. Who was Johannes Brahms? Maybe he saved his most intimate feelings for his music. (HJ)more
