Brahms and 4th Symphony interpretation

[Kbiggs]

Brahms and interpretation of Symphony 4, mvt. 4

I’ve been listening to Brahms lately, and I’m bothered by what I hear in some performances of Brahms 4th symphony 4th movement. It’s a small thing, really. It’s the climax of the symphony, about 9-10 seconds of music, the eight bars beginning at letter M (Breitkopf u. Härtel edition).

It’s a big moment for the trombones. It’s marcata, and it’s usually played fortississimo due to the crescendo from the previous fortissimo marking.

What I often hear is the trombones playing these 8 bars as if they were in 2 / 4, rather than 3 /4. I’ve edited what I think I hear in most recordings and once or twice in live performances, as well as the one time I’ve played it.

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(Red represents the accents that come through in the performance. The green apostrophe is a breath mark.)


When I hear this passage played like this, it disrupts the flow of the music. It’s almost like the music suddenly converts to 2 / 4, and then reverts to 3 / 4, kind of like a metric modulation. To me, it’s jarring: it feels like a sudden downshift prior to overtaking someone while racing.

I don’t think that’s what Brahms intended. Yes, one of his hallmark compositional tools is playing with time. Often he’ll write a duplet against a triplet and then back again (hemiola and sesquialtera). But I think that’s only part of what’s happening here. There’s a phrasing issue, too.

A while ago, I was listening to it on the radio, Classicalfm (I wish I could remember the orchestra and conductor). It sounded more like this:

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IMG_0104.jpeg

(Again, red represents the accents that come through in the performance. The green apostrophes in this second example are more phrasing marks.)

The trombones remain in 3, while the strings and winds are in 2, playing the hemiola. When played like this, time is preserved, the piece still flows, and there’s no sudden jarring feeling. Conductors are usually calling for a quicker tempo by this point in the movement—it’s usually in a slow one, almost a waltz tempo.

Thoughts?

[CalgaryTbone]

I'm not sure if I agree about the note on "3" of the first bar, but the note on "2" of the second br of the figure is probably a bit more stressed because most people breathe after beat "1". Phrasing-wise, that makes sense because of the repeated pitches on beats "1 & 2". I know that I certainly don't try to emphasize any note more than beat "1" in this passage, but I would have to find old archival recordings to see if that's what comes out. Interesting thought, but I think it's just because the melodic phrasing works out more or less as two groups of 3 notes that each start on beat "2".

Jim Scott

[SteveM]

I would think, based on Brahms having all the other instruments playing an accented note every two beats, it is likely that he intended the music to be felt in two at that point. And, intended to be jarring. As you mentioned, this is a typical Brahms rhythmic trick. It would be interesting to hear the trombones going against that two at that point but I don't recall ever hearing that happen. They would need to strongly accent the third note, and that isn't marked. It's an interesting question! Have you heard a recording where it's played the way you are describing you would like it to sound?

[EdwardSolomon]

It's a hemiola and it's exactly what Brahms intended. He does it quite a bit, especially in the second symphony.

[GabrielRice]

Good observations and nice discussion.

Brahms LOVED hemiola, and more than probably any other canonical composer he used hemiola as another tool for tension and resolution.

Those of us who don't play in professional orchestras might be surprised at how often such issues of phrasing go completely undiscussed in rehearsal. Louder/softer, shorter/longer...sure, but "the phrase goes HERE"...not so much.

Left to no discussion, with the trombones simply playing the notes with no particular phrasing intention, it will certainly sound like we are simply part of the hemiola.

I would never suggest that there's only one "correct" way to play this passage; it seems to me it's a matter of interpretation whether to unify the trombones with the hemiola everywhere else or have the trombones creating the tension against the hemiola. That said, I happen to agree with Kenneth; my preference is for the trombones to play the phrase as it appears to us in isolation. I wouldn't strongly emphasize the first downbeat we have, though; I would try to build the entire phrase toward the long note with a subtle crescendo (phrasing principle: shorter duration notes usually lead to longer duration notes). Though I might reconsider that...

[ithinknot]

It's a hemiola and, as Gabe says, the trombones will be heard within that context as long as they're not doing something to directly contradict that impression.

Were there a desire for cross-rhythm, Brahms could very easily have accented the second bar downbeat. He didn't, and the phrase is not without markings - the presence of the marcato implies that it's been annotated as much as he felt necessary. Overlaying an obviously new accent would seem more like a conductorly Big Clever Idea than a reinforcement or clarification of what is already indicated.

In the same spirit, the trombones don't need to 'help' mark out the hemiola either - the scale runs through the accompaniment, building in harmonic tension (and, implicitly, with some degree of crescendo) to the sustained #6/b7.

Those of us who don't play in professional orchestras might be surprised at how often such issues of phrasing go completely undiscussed in rehearsal. Louder/softer, shorter/longer...sure, but "the phrase goes HERE"...not so much.

Maybe it's a US/EU thing, but in my professional experience "the phrase goes HERE" - if not already made clear by the conductor/director, as might be hoped - is often the most useful thing to discuss, precisely because the other stuff (harder/better/faster/stronger) needs no discussion once everyone understands the overall shape...

[Kbiggs]

I would think, based on Brahms having all the other instruments playing an accented note every two beats, it is likely that he intended the music to be felt in two at that point. And, intended to be jarring. As you mentioned, this is a typical Brahms rhythmic trick. It would be interesting to hear the trombones going against that two at that point but I don't recall ever hearing that happen. They would need to strongly accent the third note, and that isn't marked. It's an interesting question! Have you heard a recording where it's played the way you are describing you would like it to sound?

Part of my thinking on this is from a recording I heard on the radio a while ago. I can’t remember who was playing as I was driving at the time. I remember it was a European orchestra. It was memorable because it sounded so different from what I’ve heard and how I’ve played it.

The hemiola is exactly what I wonder about. Earlier in the movement, he makes it clear that the ascending (or descending, when inverted) quarter note lines are in 3, or a slow 1. See the winds 8 before reh. A, the first time there’s a real melody in the movement.

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Throughout the movement he plays with the time. Sometimes it’s in one, sometimes three, and sometimes in two. For the passage at reh. M, if you’re just looking at the score, it seems that he’s super-imposing the hemiola (winds, strings, hns and tpts) on top of the melody (tbns). I think there’s one or two other places where he plays a hemiola against the melody. It also fits with Brahms’s composing quirks: he likes to quickly mash things (melodies, phrases, rhythms) all up together, and then quickly untangle them in time for a big chord at the end. (A gross generalization, obviously, but still…)

Yeah, it would be nice if the conductor spent a few minutes on phrasing to help everyone in the band play the tune consistently. Unfortunately, rehearsals are too often about transitions, road maps, and tricky spots.