CHOIR DISCOVERS AN INTIMACY IN BRAHMS
Shows strip A German Requiem bare
Performances of Brahms’ A German Requiem are a fairly regular proposition in Vancouver and everywhere choral music is popular. This masterwork will occupy the lives of conductor Jon Washburn and the Vancouver Chamber Choir over the next few weeks, with three scheduled performances in Vancouver, White Rock and Langley.
These will be performances with a difference. Instead of the usual sumptuous orchestral version, this requiem will be in the more intimate configuration Brahms created for choir and two pianists — in this case, the impressive Bergmann Piano Duo.
Requiems often seem to bring out the best in composers, and they can prove surprisingly good at the box office. Brahms’ work in particular has been remarkably popular, and I asked Washburn why he thinks it has had such a hold on audiences from the mid-Victorian era until today.
“I think that it must have something to do with the warmth that Brahms was able to exude in his music,” Washburn said. “It really connects. More traditional requiems can be more ceremonial and more focused on religious dogma. Brahms has something for all of us. It’s about consolation; people need consolation, he needed it and we do, too.”
Though Brahms spent much of his life in Catholic Vienna, he was brought up as a Protestant in Hamburg, and his creation eschews the traditional Latin text in favour of selections of scripture in the German language. The very title, Ein deutsches Requiem, makes that clear, but, given the spirit of Brahms’ age, is there perhaps more to it?
“Most people conclude that it means only that it is a requiem written in the vernacular,” Washburn said. “The inspiration is supposed to be the death of his mother.”
The version that will be heard this winter is one of the more exotic items in Brahms’ catalogue, though it should be noted that Brahms wasn’t at all adverse to multiple versions of his compositions, like the Sonata for two pianos, an alternate version of the famous Piano Quintet in F minor.
Does Washburn anticipate any new revelations from this adaptation?
“This is my first time conducting the piano duet version,” he said. “Many of my colleagues around the world have told me that you hear so much more of the inner workings of the choral elements.”
There’s a more pragmatic reason for the project as well.
“We wanted to do a real collaboration with Elizabeth and Marcel Bergmann,” he said, “and this just seemed an appropriate piece. We’re doing three performances: at Ryerson and then in White Rock and the Langley Music School. This expands the collaboration.”
There’s one problem with the German Requiem: its length — just a bit too short to make an entire evening. So what do you pair with it to complement the mood and the forces? Washburn has chosen more Brahms: Hungarian Dances for the pianists, and for the choir, the Five Songs, Op. 104. “This program has much more integrity because it is all Brahms.
“It seemed a nice way to balance the program to do the choir alone, then the pianos alone, and then finally all together. Opus 104 is my favourite a cappella secular music of Brahms. I love these pieces, and now that I’m in the autumn of my life, they are life’s autumn by Brahms — later works which really speak to me.”
More traditional requiems can be more ceremonial … Brahms has something for all of us.