Brahms Short-Work Collections

Op. 76

Capriccio in F-sharp minor

My first thoughts about this piece regard Brahms’ ability to orchestrate piano textures. The ideas are basic regarding thematic motives and flowing accompaniment. The melody keeps being relocated from soprano to alto to tenor. Brahms uses these changes to affect atmosphere and character while keeping the harmonies and melodies similar. This economy of technique is truly impressive of a composer, to keep the listener interested and engaged without flashy changes.

Capriccio in B minor

The character of this piece seems to be that of a gypsy dance. The staccato eighth notes serve as a unifying element throughout the piece. They begin as the melody and later become the accompaniment. The dynamics and registers are relatively conservative in this piece, using the extreme bass only in one instance causes that section to stand out as the definite climax.

Intermezzo in A-flat major

This piece sounds to me either like a lullaby or a nighttime love scene. I could very easily see this as being orchestrated as the accompaniment to an aria in a love story. The piano utilizes rolled chords to achieve both a harp-like effect as well as a twinkling atmosphere. The harmony uses a constant shift between major and minor to create an atmosphere conveying both something dark and beautiful.

Intermezzo in B-flat major

This piece is the most like a song without words out of any we’ve heard so far. The accompaniment consists of a bass line which changes measure-by-measure. The middle voice creates a swirling harmonic progression. The soprano simply sings a long and engaging melody from start to finish.

Capriccio in C-sharp minor

Texture is the main issue in this piece. Not only textures of sound but also of composition. Elements to consider are rhythmic textures and intervalic textures. The bass is in 6\8, the middle voice is in straight eighth notes, and the melody is in 3\4. Intervallically speaking the bass is in large leaps, the middle voice is a chromatic scale, and the melody varies between whole steps and half steps. With these mixed elements Brahms is able to achieve a large range of expression with discipline and restraint.

Intermezzo in A major

This intermezzo caries with it similar rhythmic issues of the preceding capriccio. This is extremely different in character and sound, but with this Brahms is able to achieve a more cyclic feeling for the set as a whole. The key areas and musical stylings always flow quite easily from one piece to the next.

Intermezzo in A minor

This intermezzo carries with it a dark and melancholy sound and nature. It also happens to sound exactly like a Chopin piece that I cannot recall. The reason behind this piece seems to me to be all about feeling rather than voice or expression. Brahms’ use of very close-knit use of registers would lead me to believe that this music is meant to convey a very introspected sorrow.

Capriccio in C major

This music is all about flowing, and had it been set in a higher register it could easily evoke images of fountains and water. Brahms uses the same technique of setting a melody over a flowing accompaniment, but this time he notates that the melody is a part of the accompaniment, rather than in its own separate voice. Why he would choose not to differentiate the melody from the accompaniment seems to me to be a pianistic choice rather than compositional, and I would imagine that the seperation of voices should be the same as if he would have notated them seperately.




Op. 116

Capriccio in D minor

I have maintained for some time that this capriccio is a rather blatent ripoff of Chopin’s Scherzo in C-sharp minor. The key may be different but the melody is certainly the same. Other than this melody at the start the piece seems to be made up entirely of odd rhythmic placements and octaves highlighting unusual key relationships.

Intermezzo in A minor

Rhythmic traits of this piece that catch my ear and eye are Brahms’ use of 3’s against 2’s, as well as his use of a metric modulation at the non troppo presto section. The movements of the accompaniment are simple and leave enough transparency for the melancholy harmonies to be evident. I would assume this piece is about loneliness based on the accompaniment and character combination.

Capriccio in G minor

The A section of this piece seems to be an example of accompanimental invention rather than the highlighting of some wonderful melody. The B section is all about the melody, and Brahms uses offset rhythms to add to its expressive quality. Brahms ends the piece with an extreme hemiola, causing it to come as a schocking conclusion rather than a conclusive resolution.

Intermezzo in E major

The beginning of this intermezzo is a great example of a situation where the accompaniment if equally as important as the melody, I may argue that there is not really anything here that I would consider accompaniment, but rather its own voice in the grand scheme of the work. The second section is peaceful and flowing, and for me evokes the feeling of being on a boat. Not a gondola-type boat that produces music reminiscent of a slow dance, but a boat in a peaceful lake that is without waves or disturbance.

Intermezzo in E minor

This A section is literally all about the expressive nature of two-note slurs. The B section calls on Brahms’ slow and flowing nature once more. This piece is quite odd, and I actually used to despise it when it was performed by a member of my last studio. Now that I am hearing it performed by a professional I enjoy it and its constrained nature. Previously it seemed to be an extreme overuse of hemiolas and sounded a bit like a 20th century composition. It goes to show how important the sensitivity of the performer is in music of this complexity.

Intermezzo in E major

This piece seems to me like an experiment of what happens when you add severly chromatic accompaniment beneath a simple and insignificant melody. I think that if it were an experiment Brahms proved his compositional abilities effective once again. The chromatic sounds present the music with a completely different set of emotions than if this melody were set to a classically reminiscent progression.

Capriccio in D minor

This piece begins in a similar way to some of Brahms’s technical exercises. This lends to the idea that Brahms tended to the craftsmanship of his use of the piano just as much as his use of harmonies and motivic development. It is interesting at the close that even when Brahms is obviously attempting to sound virtuosic and bombastic that he cannot release his music into the realm of “just for show”. The complexities remain in the rhythm and use of harmony where a simplified Franz Liszt coda could have easily sufficed.