THE AMERICAN SOCIETY Schenker’s Brahms The last great master of German music"—this was the epithet Heinrich Schenker employed more than ‘once in reference to Brahms. While Schenker's esteem for Brahms is well known, it is not widely recognized that this regard was fostered by personal acquaintance during the later years of Brahms’s life, when Schenker was an aspiring young composer, performer, and critic During those early days of Schenker’s career, his contact with Brahms made a profound impression that re- mained long fier he had abandoned composition, per formance, and criticism for analysis and explication of musical masterworks. Unfortunately, no mention by Brahms of any cone’ tion between the two men seems to have survived. Even if one were to come to light, it would probably be no more than a passing mention, for Schenker was cc tainly in no position to play a significant role in Brahms’ life. The significance of Brahms in Schenker’s life, on the ‘other hand, is amply demonstrated in Schenker’s writ ings, which are studded with references to the master's views, his personality, and his artistic aims. As early as 1893, in an open birthday greeting to Brahms ("Ein Grub an Johannes Brahms," Die Zukunft 8 [1893]: 279), ‘a hint that Schenker may have had some personal con: tact with the composer is present, Referring to Brahms's attitude toward the lack of public enthusiasm for his work, Schenker writes, “Brahms himself is well aware that it could not be otherwise at present, and itis hardly one of the regrets of his life.” But immediately followin Brahms's death, more explicit references to the relation- ship begin to appear in Schenker's writings—in particu lar, anecdotes. of conversations, in which Schenker seems to have done most of the talking. In his obituary essay for Brahms ("Johannes Brahms,” Die Zukunft 8 [1897I: 265), Schenker recounts the following incident, which, judging from the number of times he repeated Brahms bon mot in later years, held special significance for him: “Once when I had occasion to be telling him about Bruckner, and when, in the course of my account, I repeatedly mentioned the names Bruckner and Hugo Wolf in connection with one another, he interrupted me NEWSLETTER Volume V, Number 2 Autumn 1987 suddenly and corrected me with irony: ‘Really? T thought that Hugo Wolf was a completely isolated sum- It was precisely such wry and laconic quips that Schen- ker took to heart most sincerely. Almost two decades after Brahms's death, while explaining that profound, statements made by the masters are especially suscepti ble to misunderstanding (Beethoven: Opus 111 [Vienna Universal, 1915}, 93), Schenker’s thoughts turned again to Brahms: [At this point I cannot help remembering the deceased last master of German music, Johannes Brahms. He never refused 4 request from anyone—niot even the youngest of the young— for comments on works presented to him. In this way, master Brahms distributed many treasures during the last years of his life (every morning between eleven and twelve in his plain rooms on the Karlsgasse), and perhaps he would have given way even more treasures had he been younger—but what has (continued on next page)(Schenker’s Brahms, continued) become of them? ... Not only dl the recipients ofthese tea sures, to their own detriment, fail to understand the master’s wisdom, but they began to revile him almost as soon as they had left his home, proclaiming him to be an intolerable, cruel artis, indeed even 4 "boot Unlike these ingrates, Schenker seems to have under stood even Brahm’ sarcasm—perhaps because he in- lined in that direction himself—and so he seems to have taken Brahms's criticism without resentment. ln ded, he seems always to have discovered a compliment oF a bit of good advice even in the master’s harshest words. In a memoir written for the one-hundredth an- hiversary of Brahms's birth (“Erinnerungen an Brahms,” Deutsche Zeitschrift 46 [1993]: 476-7), Schenker related two such incidents, "At my first visit, presented to Brahms my published Opus I; he neither praised nor censured it, but only said, "You play piano very well.” Schenker overlooked the pointed absence of any com: ment on the work itself—which he had, however, ready characterized as unworthy of Brahms’ attentio and focused instead on the compliment. “Whenever playing met with approval either in public or in priva ‘or my performance decisions aroused interest... felt honored by the first words the master had directed at me.” The second incident occurred somewhat later. How I summoned the courage to present him once with pieces that 1 had only worked out in pencil, I cannot say. He gra ciously and patiently loked them over; and once agains he neither praised nor censured them, but only sad, "Not writen ‘out in full,” and added that in his youth he had destroyed many things. and preferred to begin @ new attempe rather than to spenel time on making corrections. Schenker took the advice without protest In later life, Schenker looked to Brahms for corrobo- ration of his theoretical work. In his facsimile edition and commentary on Brahms's notes concerning ques- tionable contrapuntal successions (Oktaven und Quinten u. A. [Vienna: Universal, 1933), Schenker. brought Brahms's instinctual judgments into contact with the an alytical methods he had developed, thereby demonstrat- ing that his methods were, as he had always mainained, simply detailed verbal and visual descriptions of the practical knowledge possessed by the masters. Schenker held that all great composers shared the same under- standing of fundamental musical principles—those he sought to illuminate—which they acquired partly by in stinct and partly by industrious study of the works of past masters, It must have been through Brahms more than any other composer, even his hero Beethoven, that Schen- ker felt connected with the tradition of the masters; for in addition to sharing an understanding of musical laws with Brahms, Schenker had also experienced personally in Brahms a spirit that he took to be characteristic of the truly autonomous creative artist—a spirit that knows how to balance freedom and constraint. Schenker bor owed Schiller’s words to emphasize the importance of this spiritual capacity ("Brahms: Variationen und Fuge liber ein ‘Thema von Handel, Op. 24," Der Tonuille 819 11924}: 3), writing, “But only when both combine— when the will freely complies with the law of necessity and when the reason, notwithstanding all of the fluctua tions of the imagination, maintains its rule—only then does the divine or the ideal emerge.” This principle and Brahms, who embodied it—stands at the very cen: ter of Schenker’s musical thought; thus it is no ex Aaggeration to say that Brahms was the inspiration for the most imposing theoretical achievement of our time. William Pastlle A Portrait of the Young Brahms Preparations for the 1983 Brahms Jubilee Exhibition at the Kammerhofmuseum in Gmunden, Aust (ce Newsletter 1/2) produced an unexpected discovery--a portrait catalogued under the title “Jugendbildnis Sehu mann” which may well turn out to be a hitherto un known photograph of the young Johannes Brahms The picture shows a youth who could be described as almost childlike, one whose age can be estimated at fit teen or sixteen years, especially when the photograph is compared with the other known pictures of the young. Brahms—for example, the previously unknown pencil drawing of the seventeen-year-old Brahms [Ed.: with spectacles!) first published by Kurt Hofmann in his Jo Ahannes Brohos: Zeitafel zu Leben und Werk (Tuteing: Hans Schneider, 1983; Plate 3) and described there as the ¢ liest portrait. In relation to this sketch, the features of the Gmunden photograph appear significantly more The new Gmunden portrait