Biography by All Music Guide
The stature of Johannes Brahms among classical composers
is well illustrated by his inclusion among the "Three Bs"
triumvirate of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms. Of all the
major composers of the late Romantic era, Brahms was the
one most attached to the Classical ideal as manifested in
the music of Haydn, Mozart, and especially Beethoven;
indeed, Hans von Bülow once characterized Brahms' Symphony
No. 1 (1855-1876) as "Beethoven's Tenth." As a youth,
Brahms was championed by Robert Schumann as music's
greatest hope for the future; as a mature composer, Brahms
became for conservative musical journalists the most
potent symbol of musical tradition, a stalwart against the
"degeneration" represented by the music of Wagner and his
school. Brahms' symphonies, choral and vocal works,
chamber music, and piano pieces are imbued with strong
emotional feeling, yet take shape according to a
thoroughly considered structural plan.
The son of a double bassist in the Hamburg Philharmonic
Society, Brahms demonstrated great promise from the
beginning. He began his musical career as a pianist,
contributing to the family coffers as a teenager by
playing in restaurants, taverns, and even brothels. Though
by his early twenties he enjoyed associations with
luminaries like violinists Eduard Reményi and Joseph
Joachim, the friend and mentor who was most instrumental
in advancing his career was Schumann, who all but adopted
him and became his most ardent partisan, and their esteem
was mutual. Following Schumann's death in 1856, Brahms
became the closest confidant and lifelong friend of the
composer's widow, pianist and composer Clara Wieck
Schumann. After a life of spectacular musical triumphs and
failed loves (the composer was involved in several
romantic entanglements but never wed), Brahms died of
liver cancer on April 3, 1897.
In every genre in which he composed, Brahms produced works
that have become staples of the repertory. His most
ambitious work, the German Requiem (1863-1867), is the
composer's singular reinterpretation of an age-old form.
The four symphonies -- lushly scored, grand in scope, and
deeply expressive -- are cornerstones of the symphonic
literature. Brahms' concertos are, similarly, in a
monumental, quasi-symphonic vein: the two piano concertos
(1856-1859 and 1881) and the Violin Concerto (1878) call
for soloists with both considerable technical skill and
stamina. His chamber music is among the most sophisticated
and exquisitely crafted of the Romantic era; for but a
single example, his works that incorporate the clarinet
(e.g., the Trio in A minor, Op. 114 and the two Sonatas,
Op. 120), an instrument largely overlooked by his
contemporaries, remain unsurpassed. Though the piano
sonata never held for Brahms the same appeal it had for
Beethoven (Brahms wrote three to Beethoven's 32), he
produced a voluminous body of music for the piano. He
showed a particular affinity for variations -- notably, on
themes of Schumann (1854), Handel (1861), and Paganini
(1862-1863) -- and likewise produced a passel of national
dances and character pieces such as ballades, intermezzi,
and rhapsodies. Collectively, these constitute one of the
essential bodies of work in the realm of nineteenth
century keyboard music.
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