Alto Rhapsody, Op. 53

Brahms wrote this piece in 1869 as a wedding gift for Julie Schumann, the daughter of Robert and Clara Schumann, reportedly channelling his own unrequited feelings into the text. It sets three stanzas from Goethe's poem about a wandering misanthrope who has cut himself off from human warmth, and the music opens with the contralto alone, accompanied by orchestra, in a dark C minor. Roughly halfway through, a male chorus enters with a prayer beseeching some restoring force for the wanderer, and the harmony gradually shifts toward C major by the close.

What to listen for

The entry of the male chorus marks the structural turning point of the piece: before it, only the solo contralto has been heard, and the texture is intimate and shadowed. When the chorus joins, the harmony begins to move away from minor, and the two voices interweave through a series of slow harmonic shifts until the final bars settle into a quiet C major. The whole work runs about 12 to 15 minutes, making it completable in a single sitting.

Recommended rendition

Kathleen Ferrier with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Clemens Krauss has been frequently cited as one of the most personal and direct accounts of this work on record.

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