The Muse (Piano Music by Brahms)

by Bill Heck

Brahms: Händel Variations & Fugue op. 24; Rhapsodies Op. 79; Intermezzi Op. 117; Clara Schumann: Three Romanzes, Op. 21 (No 1). Challenge Classics CC 72970

Long-time readers may recall that I favorably reviewed an earlier album of Schumann works played by the Georgian pianist Nino Gvetadze (see review here). In the current album, Gvetadze takes on a set of works by Brahms, along with an "epilogue" piece by Clara Schumann.

First – and I am summarizing from the interesting liner notes in what follows – the works presented here are in some sense inspired by two muses: Clara Schumann and Elisabet von Herzogenberg. We don’t have space here to repeat – or even start – the topic of Johannes’s complex relationship with Clara (wife of Brahms champion and friend Robert Schumann and virtuoso pianist in her own right), but there can be little doubt of the depth of his feelings and his respect for her. Brahms presented the Handel Variations to her for her 42^nd birthday in 1861; she premiered the work later that year.

In turn, the Rhapsodies were dedicated in 1879 to Elisabet. At the least, he was fond of her; the nature and depth of that fondness is difficult to assess from our distance across time, but we know at least that he corresponded with her for years.

And perhaps both of these women were more indirectly muses later in Brahms’s life. By the time of the Interezzi of Op 117, Brahms wrote of “sorrows”: among other things, Elisabet had died and Brahms was aging, perhaps looking back on “almost” romantic interests that had not come to fruition.

Finally, we return to Clara Schumann. Was Brahms her muse? Her Romances were composed at a difficult time of her life, while her husband Robert was in mental decline just before his attempted suicide and subsequent institutionalization. These are lovely works, if melancholy; Clara was not in the same compositional league as Brahms, but Gvetadze makes a good case for them.

Rather than focus on individual works here, let’s talk about Gvetadze’s playing throughout this album. For one thing, it is marked by more rhythmic freedom than is sometimes given to compositions by Brahms. I admit that, on first hearing, I thought that it was a little too free at a few points, but repeated hearings have changed my mind. Brahms, after all, was a great composer of leider and, despite his break with the hyper-romanticism of Liszt and Wagner, he was perhaps the artist who most successfully joined the classical tradition with romanticism. In this light, I hear Gvetadze’s accents and dynamic shifts as the singing lines that Brahms gave to the piano. (And don’t forget that Brahms’s first instrument was the piano.) Moreover, in the Handel Variations, Gvetadze seems to create a different mood for each variation – by turn introspective, joyous, extroverted, quiet – you get the idea. Certainly, this is not the only legitimate style for Brahmsians, but it does make for lovely and engaging playing. Another characteristic is careful attention to dynamic balances, with seemingly each note judged and allocated its proper emphasis in the whole, and not just between the lines being played by two hands but individual note by note. Here’s just one example that caught my ear: in the final Fugue movement of the Handel Variations, at about 38 seconds, the right hand is repeating a single note, but so subtly that it only dawns on consciousness slowly and to good effect.

Then there’s the pianist’s secret weapon: the recording team from Challenge Classics who capture every nuance of the tones that she produces from her Steinway instrument. The sonic image is relatively close but coherent: no ten-feet-wide keyboards here. Moreover, the full range is present, the lower registers with incredible weight; just listen to the resonances in the solemn low notes at the beginning of the second Rhapsody. (It helps if you have speakers with real dynamic capability.) Gvetadze’s fine control of dynamics, which I mentioned as one of her expressive strengths, comes through unscathed.

Is the sonic presentation such a big deal? Well, I think it is. Compare, for example, Radu Lupu’s playing in the Rhapsodies. There’s no doubt that the playing is awesome (in the full sense of that overused word). But the recorded sound is, by today’s standards, tubby and overly reverberant, detracting from the sheer enjoyment of listening. (I wonder if Lupus’s great Brahms recording might one day be remastered?) That’s a somewhat extreme example, but it’s just easier and downright more fun to listen to the newer recording.

In the end, there are oodles of choices for all of these works, save perhaps the Clara Schumann one; judging as if there is some competition among the better ones seems pointless. (This despite a widespread cultural attitude saying that we must rank order everything and declare a winner!) But Gvetadze’s account joins the ranks of worthy entries that cast light on some wonderful, timeless music.