Programme — Nachtwandler Op.86 No.3 (1877), Ständchen Op.106 No.1 (1888)

Auf dem Kirchhofe Op.105 No.4 (1886–88)

Meerfahrt Op.96 No.4 (1884-85)

Nachtwandler Op.86 No.3 (1877)

Es schauen die Blumen Op.96 No.3 (1884-85)

Ständchen Op.106 No.1 (1888)

One of the happier experiences of Brahms’s later years was his friendship with the contralto Hermine Spies, whom he first met when she took part in a performance of his Gesang der Parzen in Krefeld in 1883 and whose art and personality inspired his continuing interest in the Lied. Born twenty-four years after the composer, she died four years before him. Auf dem Kirchhofe might almost be a premonition of that sad event. But even here there is consolation, as the gusty C minor piano arpeggios that blow cold over the first six lines of the song give way to an allusion in the major to the Lutheran chorale “O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden” in anticipation of the final “genesen.” Meerfahrt, one of the three Heine settings in the Vier Lieder Op.96, offers no such consolation. The demonic waltz rhythms that arise out of the 6/8 metre of the sombre barcarolle that carries the lovers towards the haunted island are swallowed up again in the gloom as, inconsolable, they float on past it.

Unlike Mahler, Brahms was not much given to making allusions to his own music. His setting of Nachtwandler by his friend and biogapher, Max Kalbeck, is surely one of the exceptions, however. In creating the dreamy atmosphere of the song he clearly refers to his already famous Wiegenlied, adopting a similar rocking rhythm and similar harmonies in the piano part except that here the thirds in the right hand fluctuate disarmingly, and in a peculiarly Mahlerian manner, between major and minor – reflecting the perilously poised situation of the sleepwalker. The elusively fleeting Es schauen die Blumen alle, another Heine setting from Op.96, is also based on harmonic ambiguity but modestly defies the implied modality of the text by finally taking flight in the major.

Whatever the composer’s friendship with Hermine Spies had to do with the graveyard observations of Auf dem Kirchhofe, it seems to have had a magically rejuvenating effect in Ständchen, which is not only one of the most delightfully detailed and wittiest of Brahms’s songs but also, in spite of his 55 years, one of the most youthful.