BRAHMS: FREE BUT HAPPY

In 1883, Antonín Dvořák spent a few days with Brahms in Vienna. At Dvořák's request, Brahms played the first and last piano movements of his - still unreleased - Third Symphony. Of that encounter, Dvořák wrote: 'I say without exaggeration that this work surpasses his first two symphonies, [...] What magnificent melodies there are for discovery!'

In addition to the beautiful melodies noted by Dvořák, the Third Symphony also contains vibrant orchestral colors, unprecedented rhythmic flexibility, and a hidden musical message. One of the main motifs of the symphony is based on the musical transposition of the initials of a phrase that Brahms often repeated: 'Frei aber froh' (Free but happy), FAF, that is: Fa-La-Fa. The F-A-F motif (although the second note is A flat) is immediately heard in the exclamation of the winds that opens the symphony and opens the door to one of the greatest symphonic pages in history.

 

---

---

---

 

Johannes Brahms. Recreation of Haidi Karimi