'If the performer is not obliged by the stopped notes to play softly the piano and violin are not obliged to adapt themselves to him, and the tone is rough from the beginning.'[13]
The appearances at Oldenburg closed the tournée. Gratified as our musician declared himself to be with the results of his journey, which, if it had not brought him a series of triumphs, had at least demonstrated the fact that his works were gradually making their way through the musical circles of Europe, it was not, as we know, part either of his inclination or his aim to prolong his occasional artistic travels. He chafed at the restriction to personal freedom resulting from fixed engagements, and at the disturbance of mind inseparable from hurried journeys from place to place, and this year he had more than ordinary reason for desiring to be settled again to the quiet concentration of thought essential to all art-creation worthy to be so called. After a second and longer stay in Hamburg that confirmed the satisfaction with which he had lately contemplated the idea of his father's approaching marriage, he returned to Carlsruhe to pass the rest of the winter in Allgeyer's house in Langenstrasse, now known as Kaiserstrasse.
The first quarter of the year 1866 witnessed the publication of a long list of works. By Rieter-Biedermann, the two sets of extraordinarily difficult and brilliant Paganini Variations for Pianoforte, which, when in the hands of a competent executant, are found to be full of original and striking effects, even if they be inferior in musical value to the composer's other achievements in this form[14]; the three Sacred Choruses, Op. 37, for unaccompanied women's voices, and mentioned in our first volume in connection with the Ladies' Choir. By Simrock, the second String Sextet in G major, worthy sister to its companion work, though it has not obtained quite so wide a popularity, and the Sonata in E minor, dedicated to Dr. Josef Gänsbacher. The Horn Trio was issued by the same house quite at the end of the year.[15]
The Sonata in E minor for pianoforte and violoncello, the earliest of Brahms' seven published duet sonatas for pianoforte and another instrument, all of which are characteristic examples of certain sides of his genius, is a valuable number in the comparatively short list of works of its class for the violoncello. The first movement is of graceful, expressive, delicately melodious character, rising at one point of the development section towards passion, but returning immediately to the dainty, dreaming mood by which the composer so often subdues his hearers to the spell of his imagination. The 'allegretto quasi menuetto' which follows is an exquisite example of a species of movement in the making of which Brahms stands unrivalled. It fascinates with irresistible certainty by its ethereal, playful, poetic fancy, to which the touch of seriousness in the trio offers just sufficient, not too pronounced, contrast. The finale is written con amore in the form of a free fugue, which, full of spirit and energy throughout its course, rattles to its close in a lively coda. Care should be taken not to exaggerate the pace of this movement in performance. If taken too quickly, the violoncello passages lose their due effect.
On his return to Carlsruhe, Brahms settled down to the actual writing of the German Requiem, with which he was occupied during the succeeding months, and it was one of Allgeyer's favourite recollections in later years that a portion of the inspired work had been put on paper under his roof.
It is well known that Brahms' nearest friends accepted the composition as his memorial of his mother. 'We all think he wrote it in her memory, though he has never expressly said so,' Frau Schumann told the author some years later. 'Never has a nobler monument been raised by filial love,' said Joachim, referring to the German Requiem in the course of his address at the Brahms Memorial Festival held at Meiningen in October, 1899; and we may at least say with certainty that the work, which must be regarded as the crowning point of much of the composer's previous activity, is, on the whole, a memorial of the emotions by which he was stirred during the period that immediately succeeded his mother's death, apart from the question of whether or not he had planned it at an earlier time. It is, however, a circumstance of great interest that the strains he had conceived in his grief for the tragedy of Schumann's illness recurred to him as appropriate for the solemn mourning march—one of the most vivid and extraordinary of his inspirations—of the Requiem,[16] and we cannot be wrong in assuming that the remembrance of his beloved friend was with him as he worked. Perhaps we may venture to think that two of the strongest affections and griefs of Brahms' life, associated with strangely contrasted objects—Schumann, the great genius and master, Johanna, the simple old mother—live together in this exalted music. There is no warrant for the statement of anything more precise as to the composer's intention excepting with regard to the fifth number, the soprano solo with chorus, which was added some time after the completion of the other movements. Of this it may be said definitely, as will presently appear, that whilst Brahms was engaged in writing it the thought of his mother was present in a special sense to his memory.
Jakob's marriage with Frau Schnack took place in March, rather more than a year after the death of his first wife. Johannes sent a substantial sum of money as a wedding present, and his great contentment in the anticipation of his father's happiness was a constant and favourite theme in his talks with Allgeyer, always an interested and sympathetic listener.
Frau Caroline's business was given up, and the newly-married pair settled into a comfortable flat on the fourth floor of No. 5, Anscharplatz, at the corner of Valentin's Camp, a respectable business quarter of Hamburg, where there was sufficient accommodation to allow Frau Caroline to turn her housekeeping talents to account by taking two or three men boarders. A large airy room, 'the corner room,' was reserved for Johannes, who was ultimately responsible for the rent of the flat, and to it were transferred his books, bookcase, and other belongings, from the apartments that had been his mother's in the Lange Reihe, whilst Elise arranged to live near an aunt in another quarter of the city. A photograph of Johannes, taken by Allgeyer, was sent to Jakob a few weeks after the wedding as a permanent souvenir of his son's felicitations on the occasion. It is still in existence, and is now in the possession of Herr Fritz Schnack, 'the second Fritz,' as Johannes caressingly called his quasi stepbrother.
Persuaded by Theodor Kirchner, who was at this time resident in Zürich, to spend the summer near him, Brahms, arriving in the middle of April, found a lodging in a small house on the Zürichberg which commanded a splendid prospect of lake and mountain. Here every facility was abundantly at hand for his enjoyment. Dividing his time, from a very early hour of the morning until noon, between musing in the open air and work in his room, he was usually to be met about twelve o'clock in the museum, which became a place of rendezvous for his friends. After the early dinner, always taken out of doors in fine weather, and a more or less prolonged sitting over newspapers, or in chat with acquaintance, in the open air, he would drop in at a friend's house, generally Kirchner's, pass an hour or two in informal sociability, and often make music with some of the resident musicians. It was at Kirchner's that he became acquainted with the celebrated Swiss writer and poet, Gottfried Keller, and with the distinguished Zürich professor of surgery, Dr. Theodor Billroth, who was some four years our composer's senior, and who, called subsequently to Vienna, became one of Brahms' most familiar friends. Billroth's love for music was second only to his devotion to his own great vocation. He had studied the violin under Eschmann, played at a weekly trio meeting at his house in Plattenstrasse, Zürich, and was sufficiently proficient to take part on the viola with professional musicians in private performances of Beethoven's quartets and Brahms' sextets. He could play the piano well, was a good sight-reader, and acted occasionally as musical critic to one of the Zürich papers.
'Brahms arrived here a few days ago,' he writes on the 22nd of April to his friend, Professor Lübke of Stuttgart. 'This morning he and Kirchner played some of Liszt's symphonic poems on two pianofortes. Horrible music!... We purged ourselves with Brahms' new sextet that has just come out. Brahms and Kirchner played it as a duet.'[17]