Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

[NikF]

Oh, yes the clarinet sonatas are, along with the clarinet trios, among my favorite Brahms, but then again, I love pretty much everything he wrote.  Have you heard the clarinet sonatas as viola sonatas?  Same work but scored for viola/piano and offering a new window into these great works.  I like Martin Frost, Karl Leister, David Shifin best but there are others well worth hearing. 

Here lately I've been listening to some of the lesser known choral works, Nanie, Vier Gesänge,  Marienlieder, Gesang der Parzen - but also revisiting some of the more familiar ones: Schicksalslied and the Requiem.

Yeah, I've heard them although I only have one recording and that came courtesy of the woman I mentioned in my first post. It's this one -

[asin]B0000012YX[/asin]

On this forum I always welcome listening suggestions and so those you've made have been noted. 

Also, last night was the first time I'd heard the Requiem.  But there was a reason for me waiting so long and so I don't mind at all. 

[amw]

If I tried to think of a top 5 Brahms works list, I suspect the late chamber works and would be heavily represented. There are so many works in his corpus that I love that naming just five seems rather difficult.

I love almost everything by Brahms but a top 5 list? Honestly not hard.

Sextet Op. 36
Symphony Op. 90
Violin Sonata Op. 78
Klavierstücke Op. 118
Cello Sonata Op. 38

Like, I'd obviously regret leaving out a lot of stuff. But if I look at the things I actually listen to often and that are important to me..... yep. These ones. I could try to explain why but it would take ages and probably not be very interesting.

[Sergeant Rock]

Is there a cycle you consider a favourite?

I have these, favorites in bold. Wand probably goes to the desert island.

JOCHUM LPO
BERNSTEIN VIENNA
MACKERRAS SCOTTISH CHAMBER
KLEMPERER PHILH
BARENBOIM CHICAGO
MAAZEL CLEVELAND
DOHNÁNYI CLEVELAND
SZELL CLEVELAND
FURTWÄNGLER (M&A)
FURTWÄNGLER (Archipel)
SANDERLING STAATSKAPELLE DRESDEN
WAND SONDR
CELIBIDACHE MUNICH PHIL
GIELEN SWR SO BADEN BADEN
ESCHENBACH HOUSTON

[North Star]

If I tried to think of a top 5 Brahms works list, I suspect the late chamber works and would be heavily represented. There are so many works in his corpus that I love that naming just five seems rather difficult.

This is close enough, I suppose. I could almost have sticked with the three-figured opus numbers, really.

Violin Sonata No. 1 in G major, Op. 78
Nänie, for mixed chorus and orchestra, Op. 82
Symphony No. 4, Op. 98
Clarinet Quintet, Op. 115
Six Pieces for piano, Op. 118

[North Star]

I love almost everything by Brahms but a top 5 list? Honestly not hard.

Sextet Op. 36
Symphony Op. 90
Violin Sonata Op. 78
Klavierstücke Op. 118
Cello Sonata Op. 38

Like, I'd obviously regret leaving out a lot of stuff. But if I look at the things I actually listen to often and that are important to me..... yep. These ones. I could try to explain why but it would take ages and probably not be very interesting.

Ha, I see you posted this while I was getting me a cup of tea. Yeah, that's a good list, too.

[NikF]

I have these, favorites in bold. Wand probably goes to the desert island.

JOCHUM LPO
BERNSTEIN VIENNA
MACKERRAS SCOTTISH CHAMBER
KLEMPERER PHILH
BARENBOIM CHICAGO
MAAZEL CLEVELAND
DOHNÁNYI CLEVELAND
SZELL CLEVELAND
FURTWÄNGLER (M&A)
FURTWÄNGLER (Archipel)
SANDERLING STAATSKAPELLE DRESDEN
WAND SONDR
CELIBIDACHE MUNICH PHIL
GIELEN SWR SO BADEN BADEN
ESCHENBACH HOUSTON

Thanks. 
I've heard about half of those, although in most cases not the complete cycles. Yeah, the Wand/NDR is a go to for me. I didn't know about Jochum with the LPO, I was only aware of the mono set with the Berlin Phil.
Mackerras with the Scottish Chamber is on my 'to buy' list, as is Celibidache with the Munich Phil.

[Jaakko Keskinen]

My top5 of Brahms would probably currently be:

Violin Concerto op. 77
Symphony 1 op. 68
Symphony 2 op. 73
String quartet 3 op. 67
Violin sonata 1 op. 78

[Sergeant Rock]

I didn't know about Jochum with the LPO

I think that is amw's favorite cycle, or one of them anyway. Comes highly recommended, in any case.

Sarge

[amw]

I think that is amw's favorite cycle, or one of them anyway. Comes highly recommended, in any case.

Sarge

It's certainly a very good cycle. My favourite, and first choice for a recommend, is probably Kertész/VPO but the EMI Jochum represents his best effort in the field of Brahms and is highly recommendable especially for the 3rd and 4th. I also endorse Kempe/BPO, Mackerras, Walter/NYPO and Kubelík/BRSO.

[TheGSMoeller]

About 4-5 other works could've made this list in place of others and I would be fine with it. Lots of great music to choose from....

Symphony No. 3 Op. 90
Piano Quartet No. 3, Op. 60
String Quintet No. 2, Op. 111
Horn Trio, Op. 40
Violin Concerto, Op. 77

[Jaakko Keskinen]

Which are your favorite Lieder? I have a great appreciation for op. 48, it almost made it into my top5. I guess I could have replaced either op. 67 or 78 with it.

[Mandryka]

Which are your favorite Lieder? I have a great appreciation for op. 48, it almost made it into my top5. I guess I could have replaced either op. 67 or 78 with it.

Op 103 for me

[Vaulted]

I've recently been exploring the chamber music of Brahms, and would be interested to hear the thoughts of others on some matters:

The piano quartets seem the most likable of all Brahms's music that I've heard. Why is there such a difference from the piano trios? When Brahms felt the weight of history upon him, in a genre established by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven (and Schumann), did he instinctively react by making the music more knotty (not to say convoluted)?

Is it just me, or is the finale of the 3rd piano quartet his weakest movement in that genre? I have Domus and the Han group (Brilliant), plus Nash Ensemble on order. Can anyone recommend a recording that makes the most of this movement?

Despite their reputation, I find the string quartets very easy to like (I have the Tokyo Quartet recording for Vox, rereleased by Brilliant). It does strike me that the 2nd quartet is disconnected, structurally. The first three movements are very lyrical (overtly Mendelssohnian, I would say), but then the finale is very stern and dry. Has anyone else noticed this? Can anyone recommend a recording that resolves this "problem"?

Thanks all.

[Madiel]

Memory like a sieve on some issues, so apologies if I've raised this before.

Hyperion is currently doing a series of Brahms Lieder which ultimately is intended to be complete, similar to their Schubert and Schumann and some others.

What other complete sets are around? I would've thought that Brahms' songs were mainstream enough to do, and not so copious as to be impossible, but I can only find signs of one other example, a set of recordings by the CPO label that runs to 10 volumes.

Otherwise I presume they exist within "Complete Brahms" boxes.

[Jo498]

The hyperion project might well be only the second serious attempt or so. Besides cpo, there was a DG/UNiversal Brahms-box that might contain all Lieder but probably from different sources: Mainly Fi-Di (he did 6 discs for EMI as well), but also Norman or some other woman for the ones usually sung by a female voice.
Although Brahms (and Schumann) wrote considerably fewer Lieder than Schubert, there are still around 200 or more from each composer and the "dropoff" in popularity/familiarity beyond the best known pieces is probably even sharper than for Schubert. It's not something that would obviously sell like hot cakes, taking in mind the somewhat niche character of Lieder.

[Madiel]

On iTunes I just found 3 volumes from Brilliant, labelled "Complete Songs & Duets" (volumes 1 to 3).

Further searching indicated that there is an equivalent physical box, with 13 CDs.

[asin]B002HNAALW[/asin]

(Amazon US doesn't have it, but Amazon UK does.)

[Jo498]

Interesting; Brilliant also had a re-issue of Fi-Di's 6-disc-box on EMI but this one is obviously different and apparently with a dozen of (mostly) younger (mostly German) singers (many names I have never encountered before). And 13 discs is a lot, although there is a bunch of vocal ensembles (like the Liebeslieder-Walzer) as well as folksong settings (Volkslieder and Volkskinderlieder) that might be included. As I mentioned elsewhere, almost half of Brahms oeuvre is Lieder and choral/vocal ensemble music and only a small amount of this is well known. Unfortunately, but understandably, Brilliant has no single/smaller portions of these Lieder recordings on offer; I am not sufficiently interested for a 13-disc-box...

[Jo498]

The piano quartets seem the most likable of all Brahms's music that I've heard. Why is there such a difference from the piano trios? When Brahms felt the weight of history upon him, in a genre established by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven (and Schumann), did he instinctively react by making the music more knotty (not to say convoluted)?

Brahms felt the weight of history mainly wrt string quartets and symphonies. The main difference between the piano quartets and trios seems to be that the quartets are all earlyish (the op.60 was finished 1875, 20 years after earlier forms of the first two movements had been composed in 1855, this is contemporary with the first piano concerto!) and of the piano trios two are fairly late and the early one is best known in a late version that was considerably tightened up. I still find the op.8 in the late version the most accessible of all these pieces. The piano quartets are similarly romantic whereas the two late trios are more condensed and in some respect "classicist".
I have some problems with the op.60 finale as well. After the extremely emotional first movement, the scherzo roughly in the same vein and the gorgeous slow movement it seems somewhat distant, "cool" and classicist. It is a strange way of resolution for a piece that seemed to demand either a catastrophic or a triumphant finale and now gets neither...

[Scion7]

It is a strange way of resolution for a piece that seemed to demand either a catastrophic or a triumphant finale and now gets neither...

That's why the composer is the composer, and Brahms is Brahms, and we're all just the audience (except for the performers, of course.) 

Came across this (free) nice little rendition Friday - unaware of whether or not someone else has already mentioned it - but, I'm a lazy sod this morning, and couldn't be bothered to look back.

BRAHMS-Piano Concerto Nr.1, by Gabriela Montero, North German Radio Philharmonic (Hannover), Elvind Gullberg Jensen, conducting rec. 2014 - and recorded well:

http://ceolnasidhe.blogspot.com/2014/08/gabriela-montero-brahms-piano-concerto.html

[SymphonicAddict]

Just I stumbled upon this raritie. An orchestration of the String quintet No. 2 by Brahms. Originally, Brahms intended his quintet like a symphony, but for some reason he changed the plans and decided to settle on the chamber form. I wish Brahms had composed another magnificent symphony. Unfortunately, the 4th movement is missing.

Most of the times I believe the original creation is worthier than revisions or arrangements/transcriptions. Those arrangements are optional and may give another perspective about the work.

1st movement
https://www.youtube.com/v/pQZpJuLBsN8

2nd movement
https://www.youtube.com/v/tWvuIwuH8xw

3rd movement
https://www.youtube.com/v/x1gbI5wFqgA&t=29s

I also found the orchestration of the Piano trio No. 1.

https://www.youtube.com/v/3uNsLVfKJjA