Johannes Brahms

1833-1897

Intermezzo Op. 116 #6

Friday, October 1, 1999

College piano majors frequently play this piece. It isn't a very long piece, only three pages. But it is deceptively simple and incomparably profound. I decided to learn it and commit it to memory.

In typical Brahms fashion, the main theme of this little gem is stated in the first NINE measures. He seemed to like the irregular phrase. The melody lines are illustrated in color on the score, like a pair of old friends that meet as they walk along a street. They are old friends, the beautiful bass line counterpoints them perfectly. The challenge is to make the melody lines come out just enough from the chordal background without making them sound exposed. The tempo is marked Andantino, which normally suggests a tempo somewhat faster than Andante, which is a normal walking tempo. But these friends are old both in soul and in body. Their concerns outwardly at any rate are serious. But it is a deep seriousness not a superficial solemnity. During this piece, these friends are going to exchange memories of deep hurt.

I play these measures with my natural weight, not more; almost the way Brahms is pictured in the famous drawing of him by Willy von Beckerath featured above. One couldn't really deliver a hard attack from this posture. And no, I don't normally sit at the piano this way. In this drawing, Brahms is featured in a sort of sad reverie and the feelings I have as I play this piece are quiet, calm, and sensitive to real sadness, real loss, real hurt, and the kind of pain that can't even find words to express it. But the music can and does.

The red vertical line marks a real pause. I may not actually take my hands off the keys at this point, but I bring the sound to a pause, let the fermata before it take a certain moment and then release the damper pedal to make a real silence. Resuming after the pause, it is important not to speed up the tempo. Yes, there are pleasantries in the phrases to come, but they are mere pleasantries. Within the circle marked "A" there is a problem for a pianist to solve; the top note, a g #, must be held while the notes under it form the cadence to the unpredictable key of C# major. Since the piece is in the key of E major, it would have been usual to lead to a cadence in B major, but we are out of the classical era here and modulations to any conceivable new key center are possible.

The next phrase offers the pianist a similar little problem within the circle marked "B". This is going to lead to pleasantries underlined by the triplets that begin in the bass in this measure. These triplets need to be made distinct but not loud enough to overpower the "head wagging" up and down "oh yes, yes" motions in the right hand. They will come to an end after all and then there is a return to the themes of the first nine measures. As they proceed, both the volume and the tempo are slowed into the second fermata on the page. Again a distinct moment as before.

The middle of this Intermezzo contains the internal message. What is it?

Again there are the two friends. I've marked out what they are passing to each other in red and green. At the beginning of this section the markings say "piano" and dulce or sweetly, but I start pianissimo, very softly and as for dulce, the sentiment I want to express is hardly sweet. It is as if in a dream of a past time, these friends are sharing what each has longed for and lost and now will never have opportunity to win again. There is a sort of high tensile bitter irony and agony that I want to express here. It is all very quiet though, very private.

By the time I've played to "C" I am at the loudest point in the phrase and it's still only piano, soft or normal volume. The music will groan into "D" and get as loud as it ever gets, a distinct forte, but very a smooth one. Then the melody will be carried in the first fingers of the right hand, the rest playing above the melody. This is tricky for some to do. It may require some repetative practice or you may need to find a piano that lets you do this more easily. A tiny console isn't going to, at least not without exaggerating your attack and making the phrase too loud. But this is one of the real wonders in this piece. How simply can a descending scale suggest such utter despair as this? At "E" one of the friends is going to sympathize and it will be quieter but not completely. Notice the forte where the friends recount their miseries before the piece reaches its third fermata. Again, a moment, a full stop.

This middle section requires if anything an even lighter touch than natural with one's natural weight applied to the melody notes, but barely. But we are not tiptoeing on eggshells here either. Each note is connected to each succeeding note. It is really a study in legato playing. When I play it, I am not wandering off somewhere either, not letting any of it get it away from me. It is far too poignant for that.

After the third full stop, the piece resumes with the initial greeting, the way the piece began, played as if nothing deep had just been said or passed between the two friends, but there are subtle changes that lead to this descending phrase at F".

If we are to believe that these dynamics markings are Brahms', and knowing how careful he was about everything they probably were, then we come off the recap falling into a very quiet little glen here. I have tried an alternative. I may decide to do just the opposite, getting louder as I get to the bottom. It isn't what Brahms might have wanted and he might wag his finger at me or worse for showing so little restraint. However it does work as long as the five chords that follow it are played pianissimo.

But at "G" the friends are on the verge of parting and break through their exterior conventionalities and embrace. This extended hugging continues right on through til the final cadence, extending to the fingers of each as they leave each other at "H" and perhaps walk their seperate ways as they look back at each other. The only question is do they rush right into the hug or is there again a little pause first? There is no fermata here to help us. But it has always seemed to me so un-natural just to rush forward through to the end without a break preceding it. And some players even speed up the tempo here as if this were a scene out of a Wagnerian music-drama that needed to be "wrapped up" the way Wagner often does. No, this piece isn't like that at all. I pause at the vertical line after "G" then play the final embrace even slower than I just played the rest of the piece as there last bars contain some really extraordinary modulations that I want to savor and have all those who hear me play it to savor as well. The piece has wound down to a slow and quiet finish.