Brahms on a Bad Day

It’s a mystery, what I’m listening to at the moment: the first movement of a piano trio that first came to light in 1924 in the library of a musicologist named Ernst Bücken. There are differing accounts—some say that the cover was there with a question mark only, others say that the cover was torn off. Nor was the manuscript, apparently, the original, but rather a copy of a copy dating from the 1860's. It also doesn't help that the Bücken manuscript then went missing.

Brahms was a perfectionist who refused to present anything other than his best work to the world. And he was also sensitive to criticism—he burned everything that the violinist Joachim or that Clara Schumann suggested wasn't up to snuff. So how much was that? One source says half of his chamber music ended in the fireplace

So what to do about this music which sound just like Brahms, though not quite on his best day? (One critic calls it a “near miss”)

Well, it could be by somebody else. But then we get to who and why? It has all the trademarks of Brahms—are we dealing with a forgery here? And if so, who? Clara Schumann certainly could have done it—she both knew Brahms’s style better than anyone, and was a fine composer herself. Another possibility is the violinist Joachim.

Another theory is that it is Brahms, and that Brahms sent it off to someone and forgot the manuscript. This seems a bit unlikely to me—I’ve had the experience of writing a 250-page manuscript, and believe me, there’s no way I’d forget about it. It would have represented a significant amount of effort and time. Actually, to me it’s more likely that Brahms had the music copied, gave it to two or more people, heard back from one, and then requested the other friend to return the manuscript. The friend knew that the fire awaited the manuscript, liked the piece, and surreptitiously had it copied. If so—we owe someone a big debt.

By the way, Brahms wrote in a letter to Schumann that he was writing several piano trios, one of which was is A—the same key as this. The other is the great opus 8—which despite its low opus number is mature Brahms: he revised the work significantly 35 years later in1889.

So if this is Brahms, it probably dates from the mid 1850’s, and it’s probably unfinished. It may be a near miss—but it’s definitely worth a listen.

Brahms on a bad day is still Brahms….