'He was the most agreeable guest,' says Dietrich, 'always pleased, always good-humoured and satisfied, like a child with the children.
'He took the greatest pleasure in our happiness. He thought our modest lot enviable, and had his position then allowed him to establish a home of his own, perhaps this might have been the right moment, for he was attracted by a young girl who was often with us. One evening, when she and other guests had left, he said with quiet decision: "She pleases me; I should like to marry her; such a girl would make me, too, happy." He met many people at our house, and in small and large circles outside it, and everyone liked his earnest nature and his short and often humorous remarks.'
It is pleasant to have to record here that a few weeks before the events now described, New York, distinguished, as we have seen, by Mason's timely performance of the B major Trio in 1855, led the way a second time in connection with Brahms' career. In February, 1862, the first performance after publication of the second serenade took place there at a Philharmonic concert, and the occasion is doubly memorable as marking the earliest introduction of an orchestral work of Brahms to a public audience outside the cities of Hamburg, Hanover, and Leipzig. This early appreciation of the composer's genius in America has proved to have been neither accidental nor transitory. It grew steadily year by year with the general growth of interest in musical art, and his works, great and small, were welcomed as they appeared, and performed—often, it must be said, from pirated editions in the earlier days—with ever-increasing success. It has been impossible to ascertain the exact dates of first American performances. New York, the earliest centre in the United States for the cultivation of Brahms' music, was emulated later on, especially by Boston; and the famous Symphony Orchestra of this city has, since its foundation in 1881, performed each of the four symphonies, in Boston and in the course of numerous concert tours, at an average of forty concerts; whilst the two overtures, the concertos, and other large works, have been given with corresponding frequency.
The chamber music has been a special feature in the programmes of several concert-parties resident in various parts of the United States. Of these, special mention should be made of the Kneisel String Quartet of Boston, whose performances, familiar not only to American, but also to some of the circles of European music-lovers, were warmly appreciated by Brahms himself.
In the spring of 1862, an artistic tour undertaken in France by Frau Schumann laid the foundation of Brahms' reputation in Paris, which, little to be noted during many years, has of late been rapidly increasing. That the great pianist, when introducing her husband's works, which were almost unknown to French audiences, had to confront the inevitable prejudice against what is new, explains the fact that Brahms' name did not appear in the programmes of her concerts at the Salle Erard. The efforts she made in the cause of his art, however, amongst the inmost musical circle of her acquaintance created an impression that was not entirely fleeting.
The two first Pianoforte Quartets, now finally completed, and performed, as we have seen, during the winter of 1861-62—the earlier one in public, and both frequently in private—add two glorious works of chamber music to the series so brilliantly inaugurated by the Sextet in B flat. In their broadly-flowing themes, their magnificent wealth of original and contrasted melody, their consummate workmanship, their fresh, vigorous vitality, their enchanting romance, one seems to hear the bounding gladness of the artist-spirit which has attained freedom through submission to law, and revels in its emancipation. They are so rich in beauty, so transcendent in power, that the attempt to point out this or that particular detail for admiration results in bewilderment. The romantic intermezzo, the riotously brilliant Hungarian rondo, of the first; the graceful scherzo with its bold trio, of the second, and the adagio, with its atmosphere of mystery, lit up twice by the outbreak of passion that subsides again to the hushed expressiveness of the beginning and end; the opening allegro of either work—all are original, great, beautiful; but so is every portion of every movement of both quartets, and each movement proclaims—from Bach to Brahms. That Brahms' course of development proceeded ever further in the direction of concentration of thought and conciseness of structure cannot affect the value of the splendid achievements of his earlier period of maturity, and of these the two quartets stand amongst the greatest.
The sincerity of Brendel's efforts to conciliate the contending musical parties, and his desire to do justice to each, is strikingly proved by the appearance in his journal, in the course of several months of the year 1862, of a series of articles signed 'D. A. S.,' by Dr. Schübring, a distinguished musician and critic of the Schumann school. The first few numbers are devoted to sympathetic reviews of the works of Theodor Kirchner, Woldemar Bargiel, and others; and following these are five articles in which the whole of Brahms' published works are examined in detail. The composer's genius, his progress, his moods and his methods, are discussed with the skill of a scientific musician, the impartiality of a sound critic, and the affection of a personal and artistic friend. They are too technical for quotation here, but the last sentence of the concluding number may be given in well-deserved tribute to Brendel, who must have known what he was doing when he arranged for Dr. Schübring's contributions.
'The foregoing words may sound inflated, but stopped horns are of no use when it is desired to arouse the great public, which does not yet seem to comprehend in the least what a colossal genius, one quite of equal birth with Bach, Beethoven, and Schumann, is ripening in the young master of Hamburg.'
The mediator's task is seldom a grateful one, and it appears probable that Dr. Brendel was reproached for his large-mindedness by some of the New-German party, with whom he had been so long intimately connected, as a half-apologetic explanation of his reasons for desiring the publication of the 'Schumanniana,' as the articles were entitled, appeared in a later number of the Zeitschrift.
It would be unsatisfactory to omit all mention of the first performance of a 'Magelone Romance,' though there is but little to record save the fact that Stockhausen sang the opening one, the 'Keinem hat es noch gereut,' from the manuscript, at the Philharmonic concert of April 4, as one of a group of songs by Brahms. It produced no impression whatever on the Hamburgers, who were only mystified. How many persons in the audience had read Tieck's poems? How many had ever heard anything about the adventures of Magelone and Peter? Without such knowledge, the first and second numbers of the cycle cannot be really appreciated. To those who are aware that the first is the song of a minstrel who incites a valiant young hero to journey to distant lands in quest of adventure, and the second the exultant shout of the joyful aspirant as he rides forth from his parents' home, resolved on doughty deeds, the music becomes living, and seems to breathe forth the very spirit of chivalry. The third, fourth, and some other of the songs, notably the ninth—the ravishing 'Ruhe Süssliebchen'—are capable of telling a tale of their own, and give rich delight apart from their place in Tieck's version of the story; but the enjoyment even of these favourite and familiar songs is much heightened by an acquaintance with the incidents of the romance. Tieck's 'Beautiful Magelone' is contained in his 'Phantasus,' a collection of tales published between 1812 and 1816, some of which have been made familiar to English readers by the translations of Hare, Froude, and Carlyle. The 'Magelone' story of the book is a modernized version of an old romance of chivalry, and, by introducing into it a number of songs, Tieck furnished the opportunity seized upon more than forty years later by Brahms, to which the world is indebted for some of the composer's most perfect inspirations.