勃拉姆斯的渴望

来福给我了一张勃拉姆斯的中提琴的碟，就是底下这张。 http://www.douban.com/subject/2029759/ 最近很喜欢听中提琴的碟，那种不完美感带给人反而觉得别有风味。这个中提琴的Sonata（一套两曲，OP120/1-2）原来是为单簧管与钢琴而创作的，后来为了一位职业医生同时也是家庭四重奏组合中充当中提琴手的友人而改编成中提琴钢琴奏鸣曲的。名曲，优美就不多说了。 更吸引我的是这张碟里的那首歌，就是第一首Gestillte Sehnsucht，查了一下，中文有翻成“企望”这个词的。打动我的不是纯音乐的部分，而是这首歌后面的故事。这是来福告诉我的，我回来又继续研究了一下。众所周知，勃拉姆斯与19世纪杰出的小提琴大师约阿希姆友谊深厚，约阿希姆既是他的益友，也是他的良师，两人的友好情谊长达30年之久，但是后来两人却由于一件事情险些翻了脸。那是1880年，勃拉姆斯发现与他交往多年的约阿希姆近来越来越有些心理上的变态，他常常无端地指责他的妻子阿玛丽与勃拉姆斯的出版 商希姆罗克之间有着不正当的关系。作为朋友，勃拉姆斯深知约阿希姆的猜疑是毫无根据的，他的妻子阿玛丽是无辜的。但不管勃拉姆斯怎样从中作着各式的调解，似乎都无法使约阿希姆减除妒嫉的心理。于是勃拉姆斯便给阿玛丽写了一封信，表明了自己对这件事的态度。勃拉姆斯写这封信的目的，是想一方面消除约阿希姆的猜疑，另一方面是使他们夫妻二人和好如初。但是不想最后夫妻二人的关系非但没有好转，而且还闹到了法庭。在法庭上阿玛丽将勃拉姆斯写给她的这封信公布于众，以其为旁证来证实自己的人品。但为此，约阿希姆大发其火，从此便断绝了与勃拉姆斯的来往与联系。虽然两位相处了30余年的朋友至此不欢而散，但是约阿希姆在此后的一些音乐会上仍然在继续演奏勃拉姆斯的音乐作品，因为他懂得勃拉姆斯音乐的价值。两位朋友的友谊来往虽 然中断了，但是他们彼此还都非常惦记着对方在事业上的进步与发展。 1887年，勃拉姆斯准备创作一首弦乐协奏曲。1887年的7月，他便给约阿希姆寄去了一个明信片，投石问路。在信中勃拉姆斯写道：“我近日要创作一首小提琴与大提琴的二重协奏曲，有许多技术上的问题需请你合作，不知意下如何?”约阿希姆在收到明信片以后，便很快地复了回函，他在信中表示，非常乐意合作，于是一对朋友又重归于好了。 勃拉姆斯将这首作品题献给了约阿希姆，在总谱的扉页上勃拉姆斯这样写道：谨献给约瑟夫．约阿希姆。此作品系为他而作。打住，我们是在谈这首歌吗？不是，对，不是，这首作品是勃拉姆斯的《小提琴与大提琴二重协奏曲》。 那么这首歌呢？据八卦，就是勃拉姆斯在他和约阿希姆和好前写给约阿希姆的妻子阿玛丽的，勃拉姆斯的想法是他弹钢琴，约阿希姆小提琴，阿玛丽唱。有点感动和小资。（后面我找到英文说明，我发挥了一下） 我一直在想勃拉姆斯的一个切入点，他的音乐的那种内在的张力和吸引的地方究竟在哪里？我不喜欢那种技术的分析，现在从这首歌后面的故事我感到了那个勃拉姆斯是在用音乐和我们在讲他的种种，他是在用音乐讲话的，他是那种平民化的风格，就像一个老友在你身边唠叨，用后现代青年的话，他是不是有点唐僧呀？有点，他就是那种好人，一个普通的好人。 顺便这张碟的第二首歌是给约阿希姆儿子洗礼时写的。 最后，在Dig这个歌的背景时，有了一个很有趣的发现，这首歌居然在Jakob The Liar这个电影里出现过，在一个犹太人的电影里用了德国人的歌，所以我又复习了一遍这个电影，看完后我感觉周星星还是很菜呀，一个罗宾威廉斯就把他给毙了。但我没找到这个歌在电影里的哪里出现了. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hawgmykg0Iw JOHANNES BRAHMS Two Songs for Alto, Viola, and Piano, Op. 91 Published in 1884, the Two Songs, Op. 91, received its Carnegie Hall premiere on February 17, 1899, with Ernestine Schumann-Heink, mezzo-soprano, Nahan Franko, viola, and Emil Paur, piano. No less personal are the Two Songs of Op. 91, for alto voice, viola, and piano. Both songs have to do with one of Brahms’s oldest friends and colleagues: the great violinist Joseph Joachim, who also played viola, and whose wife Amalie was an alto soloist. The rich, dark timbres of viola and alto voice were perennial favorites of Brahms. What could be more appropriate than writing songs uniting all these friends and sounds? That cheery picture, however, does not match the reality. The Joachims had a miserable marriage (Joseph would go on to have three more wives), and Brahms took Amalie’s side in the matter. When that was made public during the divorce proceedings, it caused a break between Brahms and Joachim that lasted for years. So the lovely songs of Op. 91 that were written to celebrate wedded bliss and motherhood ended up commemorating a broken marriage and a broken friendship. Brahms wrote Gestillte Sehnsucht in 1884 and joined it with the earlier Geistliches Wiegenlied that he had written as a wedding gift for the Joachims in 1863. His hope in 1884 was that the two songs would remind the separated couple of happier times and maybe spark a reconciliation, but it was too late for melodies to do anything. Gestillte Sehnsucht (“Satisfied Longing”) sets a text of Friedrich Rückert that begins “Dipped in golden evening glow, how solemnly the forests stand!” So it is a nocturnal poem evoking the birds and winds “whispering the world into slumber” and going on to ask, “Thou longing of mine that makes my breast heave, when will you rest, when will you sleep?” The poet concludes that his longing will be satisfied only with his death—a theme close to Brahms’s heart. The opening sets an atmosphere gentle, mellow-toned, and meltingly lyrical, but the poignant dissonances and wandering syncopations of the viola hint at the ending, and its image of death. As usual in a Brahms song there is no tone-painting, no breezes and birds, rather a painting of a mood, the scene as a whole. Brahms had written his celebrated earlier lullaby, the lullaby, for the first child of a woman he had admired in his youth, using a song she used to sing to him. The Geistliches Wiegenlied, “Spiritual Lullaby,” on a text by Emanuel Geibel, begins with the viola on another old song, the lilting “Joseph, dear Joseph mine,” the Virgin Mary asking her husband to rock the baby—but here also affectionately addressed to Joseph Joachim. The voice and viola weave gentle and beautiful garlands around the rocking theme, the song another nocturne, this time a pastoral one. Gestillte Sehnsucht Language: GERMAN In gold'nen Abendschein getauchet, Wie feierlich die Wälder stehn! In leise Stimmen der Vöglein hauchet Des Abendwindes leises Weh'n. Was lispeln die Winde, die Vögelein? Sie lispeln die Welt in Schlummer ein. Ihr Wünsche, die ihr stets euch reget Im Herzen sonder Rast und Ruh! Du Sehnen, das die Brust beweget, Wann ruhest du, wann schlummerst du? Beim Lispeln der Winde, der Vögelein, Ihr sehnenden Wünsche, wann schlaft ihr ein? [ Was kommt gezogen auf Traumesflügeln? Was weht mich an so bang, so hold? Es kommt gezogen von fernen Hügeln, Es kommt auf bebendem Sonnengold. Wohl lispeln die Winde, die Vögelein, Das Sehnen, das Sehnen, es schläft nicht ein. ]1 Ach, wenn nicht mehr in gold'ne Fernen Mein Geist auf Traumgefieder eilt, Nicht mehr an ewig fernen Sternen Mit sehnendem Blick mein Auge weilt; Dann lispeln die Winde, die Vögelein Mit meinem Sehnen mein Leben ein. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Satisfied Longing Language: ENGLISH Steeped in a golden evening glow, how solemnly the forests stand! In gentle voices the little birds breathe into the soft fluttering of evening breezes. What does the wind whisper, and the little birds? They whisper the world into slumber. You, my desires, that stir in my heart without rest or peace! You longings that move my heart, When will you rest, when will you sleep? By the whispering of the wind, and of the little birds? You yearning desires, when will you fall asleep? [ What will come of these dreamy flights? What stirs me so anxiously, so sweetly? It comes pulling me from far-off hills, It comes from the trembling gold of the sun. The wind whispers loudly, as do the little birds; The longing, the longing - it will not fall asleep. ] 1 Alas, when no longer into the golden distance does my spirit hurry on dream-wings, when no more on the eternally distant stars does my longing gaze rest; Then the wind and the little birds will whisper away my longing, along with my life.