Johannes Brahms
Brahms wrote in Classical forms at a time when most of his contemporaries had left them. His four symphonies use the old four-movement plan and his sonata forms have proper expositions, developments and recapitulations. What he changed is the material: instead of themes that stay recognisable, he works with small intervals and rhythms that are constantly reshaped, so that a movement can grow out of a three-note figure without ever repeating a tune exactly.
Two habits are worth knowing. He writes two rhythms against each other, usually three notes in the time of two, so the beat feels unsettled even in a calm passage. And he thickens the middle of the orchestra, giving weight to violas, cellos, horns and clarinets rather than brilliance to the top, which is why his sound is darker than Mendelssohn's or Tchaikovsky's.
The First Symphony took him about twenty years. He was aware of the comparison with Beethoven and the finale's main tune resembles the Ode to Joy closely enough that people asked him about it; his reply was that any fool could see that. The Second followed within a year and is lighter throughout. The Third ends quietly, which was unusual, and its third movement is a slow, sad waltz rather than a scherzo.
What to listen for
- Three against two. Count a steady two while the music plays in threes, or the reverse, and you will feel the pull Brahms builds into almost every movement.
- The first few notes of a first movement, then track how their shape returns transformed later.
- Horns and clarinets carrying melody rather than filling harmony, especially in slow movements.
- In the First Symphony, the horn call in the finale's introduction before the main theme arrives.
Source: Johannes Brahms