Expressive Forms in Brahms’s Instrumental Music: Structure and Meaning in His Werther Quartet

337 Pages·2005·22.646 MB·English

by  Peter H. Smith

Expressive Forms in Brahms’s Instrumental Music
Musical Meaning and Interpretation
Robert S. Hatten, editor
PETER H. SMITH
Expressive Forms
in Brahms’s
Instrumental Music
Structure and Meaning
in His Werther Quartet
INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS
Bloomington and Indianapolis
Chapter 4 is a revised version of “Brahms and Schenker: A Mutual Response to Sonata Form,” © 1994 by the
Society for Music Theory, Inc., reprinted from Music Theory Spectrum 16, no. 1, by permission of the publisher,
University of California Press.
Example 2.10 is from Charles J. Smith, “Musical Form and Fundamental Structure: An Investigation of Schenker’s
Formenlehre,” Music Analysis 15 (1996): 263, by permission of the publisher, Blackwell Publishing.
Example 2.16 is from Carl Schachter, “The First Movement of Brahms’s Second Symphony: The Opening Theme
and Its Consequences,” Music Analysis 2 (1983): 62 and 64, by permission of the publisher, Blackwell Publishing.
Example 5.11 is reproduced from Maury Yeston, ed., Readings in Schenkerian Analysis and Other Approaches, by
permission of the publisher, Yale University Press.
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© 2005 by Peter H. Smith
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tion Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Smith, Peter Howard.
Expressive forms in Brahms’s instrumental music : structure and meaning in his Werther quartet / Peter H.
Smith.
p. cm. — (Musical meaning and interpretation)
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 0-253-34483-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Brahms, Johannes, 1833-1897. Quartets, piano, strings, no. 3, op. 60, C minor. 2. Brahms, Johannes,
1833-1897—Criticism and interpretation. I. Title. II. Series.
MT145.B72S65 2005
785′.28194—dc22 2004017942
1 2 3 4 5 10 09 08 07 06 05
To the memory of my mother,
Carol Ruth Carlin
1933–2003
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
introduction
1. Quintessential Brahms and the Paradox of the C-Minor Piano
Quartet: A Representative yet Exceptional Work 3
part one
2. Analytical Preliminaries: Brahms’s Sonata Forms and the Idea of
Dimensional Counterpoint 31
3. A Schoenbergian Perspective: Compositional Economy, Developing
Recapitulation, and Large-Scale Form 66
4. Brahms and Schenker: A Mutual Response to Sonata Form 108
5. Brahms’s Expository Strategies: Two-Part Second Groups,
Three-Key Expositions, and Modal Shifts 122
part two
6. Toward an Expressive Interpretation: Correlations for Suicidal
Despair 183
7. Intertextual Resonances: Tragic Expression, Dimensional
Counterpoint, and the Great C-Minor Tradition 234
Notes 285
Bibliography 309
Index of Brahms’s Works 319
General Index 321
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Acknowledgments
It would be dif¤cult given limitations of space and memory to acknowledge each
and every individual who assisted in the completion of this book. I nevertheless
would like to recognize those who were at the forefront in helping me develop the
book’s intellectual substance and sustaining me through the inevitable ups and
downs of authorship. My interest in the dialectic of articulation and continuity in
nineteenth-century music was ¤rst sparked by the teaching of Robert Morgan of
Yale University. Professor Morgan was kind enough to accept me as a dissertation
advisee at a time at which my application of his insights to the music of Brahms
was in its most formative stages. It is a testament to his powerful in®uence as a
teacher and musician that the ideas that he helped me develop then still stand at
the core not just of this book but of my work in general.
The idea for a monograph focusing on intersections of structure and expression
in the C-minor Piano Quartet, op. 60, grew out of a long series of discussions of
the work with Professor Michael Friedmann, also of Yale University. Professor Fried-
mann’s passion for music in general and Brahms in particular has been an ongoing
source of inspiration. The three professors who have served as departmental chair
during my years on the faculty of the University of Notre Dame—Ethan Haimo,
Susan Youens, and Paul Johnson—have each in their own separate ways provided
professional accommodation and personal support. Without their help I would have
had a much more dif¤cult time maintaining the proper balance among research,
teaching, and service necessary to see me through to the completion of this book.
I also would like to thank Robert Hatten of Indiana University for his immediate
interest when I ¤rst brought my ideas for a book to him and for his careful reading
and editing of the completed manuscript. Gayle Sherwood and the staff of Indiana
University Press deserve credit for their professionalism in handling all aspects of
the book’s production. Ken Froelich provided expert note-processing of the music
examples, whose preparation was made possible by a generous grant from the In-
stitute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts, College of Arts and Letters, University
of Notre Dame.
Finally I owe my deepest gratitude to my family. My wife, Lumi, and my son,
Manny, have an uncanny ability to take me away from the struggles and frustra-
tions of academia, providing a joyous home life that allows me to put all else in
perspective. Over the years my parents and stepfather have provided not only un-
conditional love but also all the support for a musical career that any son could
wish for, starting with viola lessons in the third grade and continuing on through
graduate school and beyond. It will always hearten me to recall the sudden bright-
ness in my mother’s voice as she responded to my report that my book had been
accepted for publication, even as she was struggling with the later stages of the
cancer that was to take her life.