Brahms Requiem: Introduction to Musical Analysis

​A thoughtful analysis of the form, orchestration, and choral arrangement. 

     Few realize just how late in his life Johannes Brahms took to composing orchestral music compared to his chamber music, which, alongside his own piano virtuosity, had founded his career. His first symphony, while sketched in 1855, was not completed until 1874 and the Requiem was completed in 1868. By comparison, the previous generation of symphonists Mendelssohn and Schubert had completed several mature symphonies in their teens (Not to mention Mozart another generation prior). In short, Brahms lived in the shadow of Beethoven, and it is thought through studying Brahms’ own letters, that he venerated Beethoven’s music. This can also be seen in both the Requiem and the first symphony, as well as in many of his other works. Where the “New German” style was embracing programme music, with its champion in Richard Wagner, Brahms is considered the pinnacle of the traditional classical form, albeit with the expanded romantic tastes.
The Form
     Unlike Requiem masses that came before, this setting is not based on the liturgical mass text. This strategy naturally led Brahms to make many unique decisions about the overall form of the work. As previously discussed, the work is symmetrical in various ways. The first and last movements both use “selig,” and the musical motif based around that word. The second and sixth movements are both more expanded, dealing with death and the transition between life and death. The third and fifth movements, both starting with solo voice, deal with the perspective of an “other”; in the third movement it is someone reconciling with mortality (“Lord teach me to know my end,”) and in the fifth it is someone who shall comfort (“as one who his mother comforteth”). And at the center, the fourth movement focuses famously on “How lovely is thy dwelling place.” In addition to all of this, when looking at the harmonic relationships overall, they too form a sort of symmetrical progression starting and ending in F major:

I: F major
II: B♭ minor, ending B♭ major
III: D minor, ending D major
IV: E♭ major
V: G major
VI: C minor, ending C major
VII: F major

     And notice how each of the movements ending in fugues starts minor and ends major. Taking the various texts, you can see each stanza within each movement as its own musical section. The second movement outlines this well:

 ​ Section 1: Denn alles Fleisch es ist wie Grass…
                           Langsam, slow
                           B♭ minor

        Section 2: So send nun geduldig, lieben Brüder…
                           Etwas bewegter, more moving
                           G♭ major

        Section 1: (Repeated)
                           Langsam, slow
                           B♭ minor

        (Transition): Aber des Herrn Wort …
                               Un poco sostenuto, sustained
                               B♭ major

        Section 3, fugue: Die Erlöseten des Herrn…
                                      Allegro non troppo, fast
                                      B♭ major

     This quick analysis begs the question: Does the musical form come as a result of each of the sections having its own source text, or vice versa? That much is harder to answer, but this approach does make further analysis of each movement very transparent. Each stanza is accompanied by a change in the music, through a combination of tempi, harmony, and orchestration—ultimately, an expression of a change in mood overall. This progressive harmony as it’s known, where movements start and end in different keys, and circle in thirds as often as fifths, is another staple of romantic trends. Changing from B♭ to G♭ or E♭ to G is much more dramatic tonally, than the classical or Baroque norm of B♭ to F or B♭ to E♭.
The work as a whole is also unified by a three-note theme (motif) in the melody that can be seen at the very first choral entrance: An ascending major third followed by a half step on “Selig sind.” This motif can be found in every movement, in some variation.

Orchestration and Choral Arranging
     Notably, violins are absent in the whole first movement, giving the orchestra as a whole a much darker tone with the violas and cellos doing the bulk of the string accompaniment. The winds and brass throughout the work provide a wide color pallet, with much more involved parts compared to any similar work from the classical period, a trademark of romantic orchestration. Many passages are carried fully by the winds, and likewise, the brass writing is very thoughtful. Often only using a single pair of horns, Brahms reserves the full quartet, including trumpets and low brass, for the largest moments.

The Fugues
     Brahms respected composers of his past a great deal—not only Beethoven, but Palestrina, Gabrieli, Schütz, Handel, and Bach were all inspirations for Brahms, particularly with regard to counterpoint. A chief example of this craftsmanship with form, expanded to romantic style and taste, are the three fugues found in the Requiem. While classical requiems and masses like those of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven had their share of counterpoint, Brahms’ fugues are all the more uplifting and triumphant given their text, as they come at the end of otherwise tremulous movements given their respective texts. This underpinning of emotional weight is something that can easily be seen as tracing back to Beethoven —the Ninth Symphony having a parallel movements when introducing the fugal sections on “Freude schöner Götterfunken.”

     I could spend an entire post on just these three fugues, but alas, I do want to give the Verdi its due as well, and so for now, I will just give you this quick overview, and a few things to look out for as we keep working with these. Note how each fugue has a much different character from the others. As I’ve said before, this is because of the clear homage Brahms gave in emulating the counterpoint of other composers.

 II: Die Erlöseten de Herrn werden wieder kommen, und gen Zion kommen mit Jauchzen; ewige Freude wird über ihrem Haupte           sein; Freude und Wonne werden sie ergreifen un Schmerz und Seufzen wird weg müssen.
 The Redeemed of the Lord will come again, and come to Zion with shouting and everlasting joy upon their heads, joy and                   gladness will seize them, and pain and sighing will go away.
       B♭ major. Beethoven-like. So much about this to me feels lifted out of the Beethoven Mass in C. There is a triumphant exuberance to this fugue carried by a lot of syncopation in the orchestra and chorus. Measures 269–290 is a great example of this, you can almost hear the choral entrances as church bells echoing throughout a sweeping landscape as they crash into each other towards their final resolution at 296. It is such a “showing off” technique to introduce a fugue subject like in this opening on pg. 20, then completely ratchet up the complexity by displacing some of the voices off by a single beat—as on page 23—and having it still work!

III: Der Gerechten Seelen sind in Gottes Hand und keine Qual rühret sie an.
The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment touches them.
     D major. Very Bach-like. The D pedal-point throughout the whole fugue along with the moving string lines echoes Bach. The way Brahms cycles through major and minor keys quickly is another trademark comparison. The churning of it all, and the final cadence extended over the last three measures with all of the passing notes in the basses and tenors, really reminds me of the Bach’s Passions or even his B Minor Mass.

VI: Herr, du bist würdig zu nehmen Preis und Ehre und Kraft, denn du hast alle Dinge geschaffen, und durch deinen Willen haben sie das Wesen und sind geschaffen.
Thou art worthy Lord to take glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and through your will they existed and were created.
     C major. (Somewhat) Handel-like. The first half of this text is very much like the opening of Worthy is the Lamb. A “long-note” choral line alongside the rather Baroque opening of an Alberti-style sting line, this reads as Handel to me. There is a clarity and transparency of each line that you don’t get in the third movement’s fugue, with all of its dense complexity, which is why I don’t simply call this another Bach fugue. Instead it is quite stately, which also makes me think of Haydn or Mendelssohn, which are also perfectly reasonable associations. And yet, Brahms cannot help himself in complicating the orchestration, just take a look at G on page 74, when the strings pick up these sweeping triplets underneath all of this otherwise “straight-forward duple” music. Lastly, a real hidden gem of this fugue is on page 78, starting in measure 271, where you can trace out a G major scale on every whole note, passed back and forth through the chorus, which hints at the sweeping scales that come on the next page.
As we continue to study this work, it is my hope that these details will help you not only appreciate the messages behind this beautiful music, but have a more thoughtful understanding of just why this music is considered such a masterwork of choral orchestral music.