Customer Reviews

Brahms: Ein deutsches Requiem Op.45

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As important as Brahms is to the Classical world and as great as his music is, it would be a far lesser thing without the incredible interpretation of von Karajan. I choose to look past all the many criticisms - too stolid, too slow, too grand, too careful - and look at the final product.

Brahms inhabited Karajan's soul as no other composer with the possible exception of Richard Strauss. I have the Symphonies (two versions), the Concertos and now the Requiem. The music is simultaneously beautiful and touching, moving on several levels. I have often wondered about the artists and their fount of inventiveness. What is Brahms "trying to say"? This is not the traditional Requiem of a Verdi, Mozart, Schubert or Beethoven. No, it is more a celebration of the human spirit. If you must get only one version, this is the one. The voices are clear, the orchestra just the right tone, the longing and "Germanenss" of the music stand out above all. It has that haunting forest mood that inhabits so much of Brahm's music.

I just compared Klemperer/Gardiner/3 Karajan's versions/Masur/Barenboïm /Shaw. This is the one I prefer because of the singing tempo, the articulation is just superb, very tuneful. If only, the solists were rather the Janovitch & Meyer combo of another Karajan's version but whose rythm is too flat & bland compared to this one, the ideal match would be met. I also really liked Rodney Gilfry in Gardiner's version & Janet Williams in Barenboïm's.

Karajan produced one of the great documents in the postwar era when he recorded the German Requiem in the rubble of 1947 Vienna. That radiant spiritual account, with the incomparable Hans Hotter and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf as soloists, should be the starting point for anyone exploring Brahms's greatest choral work. Karajan continued to feel an affinity for it and produced no less than three later versions in stereo, of which this digital account, also from Vienna, is the last -- in his end was his beginning.

It is solemn, at times staid, and full of power. If you identify late Karajan with glossy surfaces and glib interpretations (an ovr-generalization that made the great Carlos Kleiber, among others, bristle), never fear. Everything here is profound and touching. The recording is exceptionally fine -- the best of all his versions -- and Jose Van Dam is particularly strong in the baritone part, sounding deeply involved and dramatic. Barbara Hendricks produces an easy, honeyedlyricism in the Traurigkeit movement. I had overlooked this 1985 recording in my enthusiasm for the 1947 original, but it's touched by greatness in its own right.

Having been severely underwhelmed by the stodginess of Simon Rattle's much-vaunted Berlin recording of this great work, I turned with relief to this, the last of Karajan's versions. It is by no means afflicted by the "smoothification" which sometimes marked Karajan's later work: it is both grand and rugged, speeds not especially slow and invariably generating the requisite tension at such points when Brahms bursts out of the prevailing mood of melancholy and the music surges forward, as in the "Aber des Herrn Wort" and the great, consolatory C major fugue, so reminiscent of Bach. The Vienna forces are superb, galvanised by Karajan's sure direction, secure of intonation and startlingly unified. The soloists are equally inspired: José van Dam easily the finest bass-baritone I have ever heard in this part, noble of tone and subtle of expression; Barbara Hendricks' silvery voice soars angelically to rival Gundula Janowitz - which is high praise indeed. It is an "old-fashioned" account compared with Gardiner's friskiness but I think this Romantic, humanist grappling with grief and search for meaning in death needs more weight than Gardiner gives it and this 1983 recording remains my Brahms Requiem of choice.

This is a masterwork by Johannes Brahms. His greatest work if you look at the dimension and magnitude.The death of Robert Schumann inspired him to write this. It was a way of giving condolence to those who remain behind on earth after their dead have passed on. Brahms intended this work as a celebration of all humanity even in the face of inevitable death. Brahms claimed that he could have named this his 'Human Requiem'with its focus on comforting the living. The music really comforts whilst still acknowledging the tragedy of death.
The word 'Requiem' usually refers to the Roman Catholic Mass for the Dead which begins with the Latin phrase, 'Requiem Aeternam Dona Eis Domine' (Grant them eternal rest, O Lord!). Brahms conceived the extra-ordinary idea of creating his own text selecting Biblical passages that do not correspond to the funereal liturgy of any church.
Brahms gives a sombre colour to the first movement by omitting the violins, piccolo, clarinets and timpani entirely and by subdividing the violas and cellos culminating with the utterance of 'selig' (Blessed) to close the movement with harp accompaniment. The second movement begins with a slow march passage in triple meter. The violins enter for the first time and in a high register. The timpani quietly sounds out ominous triplets. The chorus sings in unison first softly then in full voice as the march theme is repeated. This is the music that Brahms had originally composed for and then removed from his early D Minor Symphony. One movement came here and the other three went to the Piano Concerto No. 1. The baritone solo begins the third movement in a dialogue with the chorus. This is a haunting movement. The fourth movement is harmonically in a new world. It is a gentle middle section to the whole work representing sublime tranquillity. The fifth movement brings out the soprano and the contrast to the third movement is striking. The baritone earlier represents grief, doubt and despair. Here, the soprano sings of consolation. The opening of the sixth movement reverts to the uncertainty of the third in harmonic progressions that accompany the baritone's description of the mystery to come, the harmonies ranging from C Minor to F Sharp Minor. Three trombones and tuba announce the great moment.The excitement is extended into a powerful fugue in C Major. A Stretto leads to a final and forceful statement. The final movement is like the first. The basic thematic cell is in double bass and cellos. The sombre orchestral colours of the opening are replaced by reinstatement by the clarinets, the second pair of horns and the violins. The final section of the movement is a magical reworking of material from the opening movement. There is a return to the home key of F Major as the sopranos soar to a brilliant high A Major just like at the end of the first movement. The harps enter and rise to an ethereal conclusion over the final choral murmurs of 'selig' (blessed).
The definitive reading has come from Herbert Von Karajan and the Wiener Philharmoniker in 1985. Other recommended readings are : Fritz Lehmann/Berliner Philharmoniker; Daniel Barenboim/London Philharmonic; Robert Shaw/Atlanta Symphony; Otto Klemperer/Philharmonia Orchestra; Sir Georg Solti/Chicago Symphony; Sir Simon Rattle/ Berliner Philharmoniker.

I'm certainly not a fervent fan of religious choral music. When listening to any choral work, whether religious or secular, I tend to take an agnostic's objective viewpoint and allow the performance to either make me feel the composer's inspiration or perhaps even "convert" me.

I've heard only two recordings of Brahms' seemingly popular German Requiem, this being the first. First impressions, being what they are, left me nonplussed with Brahms' creation and in awe of the absolutely wondrous choral singing as well as the very fine contributions of the soloists; I was particularly enamored of the angelically sung "Ihr habt nun Traurigkeit" by soprano Barbara Hendricks. The overall tone here is one of utmost reverence and solemnity in a performance that extends over 75 minutes. Hearing it this morning, and after having experienced the leaner, swifter "period-inspired" performance conducted by John Eliot Gardiner, I've still not been "converted", but remain spellbound by the sheer beauty of this 1985 recording, apparently later re-released on this single CD without an appended Bruckner Te Deum. If it was Brahms' intent to convey peace to the living, Karajan and company channel it marvelously.

Von Karajan's Requiem is the best one ever recorded, plain & simple. It is of course in German.

KARAJAN Had Always The Style To Explain A Music Thinking, And This BRAHMS "German Requiem" Is One Of The BEST Vocal&Instumental Peace Played on DG ,So This Interpretation Of KARAJAN Is Amazing ,Glorious ,Dynamic ,Wonderful, What Do You Want More? The Recording Is Powerful And Glade To The DG.

Plus The Performance Of Jose Van Dam & Barbara Hendricks is Also Perfect. Of Course Barbara Cannot Be Like Gundula Janowitz In The Last Version Of Karajan With The Berliner Philharmoniker ,this Recording had Taken The Price: "Grand Prix Du Disque" BUT This Recording has the same value of the Last Disk with Janowitz. =>A Nice DISK ,Very Recommended.

Karajan is not my idea of the perfect accompanist. Instrumental, operatic, choral -- I can not think of a performance of his that I do not find, in some way, irritating.

This reading is an odd combination of the elegant (the first two movements are rather nice) and the grotesque. The exxagerated crecendos are vintage Karajan. Overall, a little too quirky for my taste. I am reminded of the accounts of the 1867 Vienna preview of the first three movements. Apparently it was inadequately rehearsed and in the fugue ending the third movement, the tympanist felt inspired to play as loud has he could, drowning out everyone else. No mean accomplishment.

An interesting document for the afficianado, otherwise choose Klemperer and/or Walter.

In a century entirely dominated by the often brutal progress of man, i.e. a male individual, through industrialization and the invention of railroads, cars, steam engines, the steel industry, coal mines and so many other - often polluting - things, in a century where the male figure of life and death dominates, alienates, exploits all beings, Brahms sings the earth, the growth of nature and grass, the call of the wild and open space, immense space and unlimited time. Brahms calls to his side the feminine, the female mother-earth from which all life and sustenance come and to which all human beings go back for their last sojourn on this planet and for their last comforting home and sleep.

Brahms dedicates this Requiem to the mother, the evercomforting woman who can take all suffering men in her embrace, in her arms, in her warm tear-sprinkled patience and understanding, love in a word. Brahms moves the Requiem from the male figure of the Father, God, or the male figure of the sufferer and savior, Jesus, to the female suffering and yet comforting figure of the mother.

Brahms is at the antipodes of the German myth : Death is « der Tod », hence masculine, a male character, but Brahms makes it an incarnation of the mother, the archetype of all mothers, of Mary weeping at the foot of the cross. Yet at this moment we remember what the dying Christ said, near the end, to his disciple and his mother : « See, this is your son ! See, this is your mother ! »

This reflects the suffering of Brahms in front of a world that is changing too fast and is becoming blindingly inhumane, in front of the loss of his friend Schumann and the loss of his own mother. He is able to recapture his lost past, the love of his mother, the friendship of Schumann, the comforting certainty of mother-earth, in this shifting of a death dominated requiem into a motherly and comforting communion with the very principle of humanity that the mother represents on Earth.

In fact he goes back to the old Romanic and Romanesque tradition of the mother church in the Middle Ages and rediscovers the mother in a male dominated Germanic world.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan