Brahms: Ein deutsches Requiem [A German Requiem] | Johannes Brahms, Otto Klemperer, ... |...

Brahms: Ein deutsches Requiem [A German Requiem] | Johannes Brahms, Otto Klemperer, ... | Death is not a man but a motherly feminine comforter

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Brahms: Ein deutsc...

	Brahms: Ein deutsches Requiem [A German Requiem] Johannes Brahms, Otto Klemperer, ... EMI Classics, 1999 average customer review:based on 28 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Klemperer's German Requiem

I have been listening to Brahms's German Requiem to commemorate the death of a parent of a dear friend. This beloved work received its first performances in 1868 and 1869. Its immediate inspiration was the death of Brahms's mother and, probably, the death of Robert Schumann as well. Although many view Brahms as a conservative composer, the spiritual message of this work is distinctly modern. In writing his Requiem, Brahms eschewed traditional religous doctrines, creeds, and texts. Instead, he chose passages from the Bible (Old and New Testaments and Apocrypha) that emphasized a sense of the mystery of life, the fragility of life and inevitability of death, the hope for the future, and the value of patience and endurance. The German Requiem gives a sense of spirituality in a secular age. Brahms himself saw his work as a "human" rather than as merely a German requiem. Malcolm Macdonald, in his 1990 book, "Brahms", has aptly captured much of the spirit of this music when he describes it as showing "human love as the equivalent of God's love of the cosmos" (p. 22). Human love encompasses the love of a parent, friend, child, sweetheart, and much else.

I can't think of a more fitting interpreter of the German Requiem than Otto Klemperer or of a better recording to bring this music to life than this historic, 1961 recording with the Philharmonia Chorus & Orchestra, with soloists Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Elisabeth Schwartzkopf. The recording is available at modest price on the EMI Classics series of "Great Recordings of the Century." It is that, indeed.

Otto Klemperer (1885-1973) was himself a religious seeker passing through at various times of his life periods of skepticism, Judaism, Christianity, and then near the end of his life a return to Judaism. He was at his best in the performance of serious, monumental music and in the works of Beethoven and Brahms. (His performance of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis is also masaterful and available on this series.) This recording captures the solemnity and gravity of Brahms's great Requiem and also its lyricism -- its ultimate message of comfort and hope. The sound is outstanding. The chorus can be heard clearly and understood, and the instrumentation of the work comes through. The soloists, Fisher-Dieskau and Schwartzkopf perform their important parts in the third, sixth, and fifth sections beautifully. Klemperer's tempos are slow and magesterial.

The Requiem combines Brahms's study of the music of the past, primarily Bach and Mozart, with his need to compose in his own voice. Put otherwise, Brahms tried to reformulate the religious sensibilities of the past for the modern temper. Large massive fugual sections conclude the second, third and sixth sections of the requiem and counterpoint looms large in much of the rest of the work. But the prevailing tone is one of peace and comfort.

The first movement of the work is a consolation to mourners set in the lower registers of chorus and orchestra. The second movement is a lengthy and solemn sarabande which celebrates the transience of human life and the hope of an enduring life hereafter. This movement includes grand music for brass and tympani as well as for the chorus and the monumental fugue. Fischer-Dieskau delivers an eloquent prayer for wisdom and understanding in the third movement which, again, is capped by a great fugue. The fouth movement, the climax of the work, is short and songlike and captures the etherial spirit of heaven. The fifth movement belongs to Ms Schwartzkopf as she delivers Brahms's message of hope and consolation to mourners. The sixth movement is an impassioned dialogue on the mystery of life between the chorus and Fischer-Dieskau culminating in a grand fugue of glory to God. The finale returns to the movement of the opening, in a higher register, and closes the work on notes of hope and serenity.

The German Requiem is one of the treasures of music. Klemperer's version is an inspiration and will move both new listerners and those familiar with Brahms's great score.

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Death is not a man but a motherly feminine comforter

In a century entirely dominated by the often brutal progress of man, i.e. a male individual, through industrialization and the invention of railroads, cars, steam engines, the steel industry, coal mines and so many other - often polluting - things, in a century where the male figure of life and death dominates, alienates, exploits all beings, Brahms sings the earth, the growth of nature and grass, the call of the wild and open space, immense space and unlimited time. Brahms calls to his side the feminine, the female mother-earth from which all life and sustenance come and to which all human beings go back for their last sojourn on this planet and for their last comforting home and sleep. Brahms dedicates this Requiem to the mother, the evercomforting woman who can take all suffering men in her embrace, in her arms, in her warm tear-sprinkled patience and understanding, love in a word. Brahms moves the Requiem from the male figure of the Father, God, or the male figure of the sufferer and savior, Jesus, to the female suffering and yet comforting figure of the mother. Brahms is at the antipodes of the German myth : Death is « der Tod », hence masculine, a male character, but Brahms makes it an incarnation of the mother, the archetype of all mothers, of Mary weeping at the foot of the cross. Yet at this moment we remember what the dying Christ said, near the end, to his disciple and his mother : « See, this is your son ! See, this is your mother ! » This reflects the suffering of Brahms in front of a world that is changing too fast and is becoming blindingly inhumane, in front of the loss of his friend Schumann and the loss of his own mother. He is able to recapture his lost past, the love of his mother, the friendship of Schumann, the comforting certainty of mother-earth, in this shifting of a death dominated requiem into a motherly and comforting communion with the very principle of humanity that the mother represents on Earth. In fact he goes back to the old Romanic and Romanesque tradition of the mother church in the Middle Ages and rediscovers the mother in a male dominated Germanic world.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan

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Very Worthy of Repeated/Unlimited Listenings.

This is one of my most treasured CD's. That might not mean a lot to you, but trust me, you won't feel sorry for buying this Requiem.
It's --IMO-- the best 'version' of this very powerful piece of music. It stirres the soul and made a tremendous impact upon me when I first heard it. I relied solely upon the other reviewers on Amazon, so thanks for your recommendation.
Now go read the more technical and in-depth reviews of the other people, then BUY.
One last thing: PLAY IT LOUD{ly}!
That was all.

profound, but unpleasant choir

Klemperer is the best conductor of this piece. Listening to him is finding that in his epic reading Brahms is carrying the entire Judeo-Christian culture and understanding about Death, but transfiguring it to his beliefs. It is memorable how solemn and at the same time vital it is. Partly is because of tempi. He is middle of the road, that is 69 min, between Masur (60) and Kempe (?)(79 !!!!). So he is slow enough to be profound but fast enough to be fluid. That is important.
The baritone, Fischer-Diskau, is reference. Each word is painted with a lot of vocal resources. THE BEST.
But the soprano didn`t grab me. Refined as she is, she seems so flat (limited volume range)... Margiono (Gardiner) is better.
The orchestra is truly amazing: power and acceptable clarity.
But the choir: full, lot of vibrato. If you can stand it, this is for you. If not, go for Gardiner: is also very good: his Monteverdi Choir is extraordinary, baritone just fine, great soprano, good orchestra (could have been better) and a great interpretation (if sometimes less profound): Gardiner surpasses Klemperer in the fugues (more deliberate, less mechanic). I have to admit Klemperer wins in #2 & #3 (beggining), #1 & #7, but Gardiner wins in the rest. But the choir sound is of paramount importance for repeated listening. And moments like the relaxing #4, with those vibrato, simply drags. Had Klemperer recorded with our vibrato free choirs, surely would have been the reference for eternity.

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reviews: 1, 2, page 3, 4, 5, 6

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