Joachim's prolonged visit to Austria came to an end in the second week of the New Year with a farewell dinner given in his honour by Brahms, Billroth, Hanslick, and other friends, and a fortnight later he removed with his family from Hanover to Berlin. His residence was permanently fixed in the Prussian capital in the course of the following year by his acceptance of the post of director of the Royal High School for Music (executive art), which was about to be founded by King William of Prussia (afterwards the German Emperor William I.), as an addition to the State department for Art and Science, and in the planning and practical arrangement of which Joachim actively participated. Under his devoted management, it quickly rose to the high state of prosperity for which it has long been famous, and now, after more than thirty-five years of existence, it still enjoys the high advantage and distinction of his personal labour and influence as director, conductor, and teacher. The occasion of the opening in 1902, by the Emperor William II., of the spacious new buildings of the Royal Schools for Art and Science at Charlottenburg, of which the fine new music school is one, must have seemed to the great veteran musician, as he recalled the modest beginnings of his own special department in 1869, as one that included the crowning of much of the activity of his life.
Brahms quitted Vienna a few weeks after his friend to fulfil a series of concert engagements, most of them arranged with Stockhausen, for the months of February and March, by which he hoped to make his journey to North Germany on the business of the Requiem answer a practical as well as an artistic purpose. He took up his headquarters at his father's house, and it was the last time that he returned from Vienna to Hamburg as to his nominal home. The post of conductor of the Philharmonic had again fallen vacant in 1867 by Stockhausen's resignation, and again, though Brahms did not apply for the appointment, there was a strong conviction amongst his friends that he would accept it if it were offered him. But it was not to be. Admired and loved as he was in Hamburg by an ever-increasing circle of friends, it was by a circle only. He was not popular with the average musician or the general public, and the Philharmonic committee passed him over a second time, electing Julius von Bernuth as Stockhausen's successor. Brahms said little on the subject, but it is fairly certain that the mortification caused him by this repeated slight from the musical officialdom of his native city sufficed to lead him to the determination at which he soon afterwards arrived, to settle permanently in Vienna.
Brahms made several public appearances in Hamburg during the second half of February. He performed, at the Philharmonic concert of the 14th, Beethoven's G major Concerto and Schumann's Etudes Symphoniques, adding to the published version of the latter several variations contained in Schumann's original manuscript. On the same occasion Stockhausen sang Schubert's songs 'Memnon' and 'Geheimniss' to orchestral accompaniments arranged by Brahms, at his request, a year or two previously. The composer was able to spare a few days for Bremen, in order to make Reinthaler's personal acquaintance, though his numerous engagements for March obliged him to leave the work of preparation and rehearsal in the experienced hands of his new friend. He played at the Oldenburg subscription concert of the 4th,[26] and gave concerts with Stockhausen during the same week in Dresden and Berlin, appearing for the first time before the public of either capital. At the second concert in Berlin (March 7) Nos. 3 and 5 of the 'Magelone Romances' were included in the programme. On the 11th the two artists gave a soirée in Hamburg, when Stockhausen introduced Brahms' 'Mailied' and 'Von ewiger Liebe' from the manuscripts, and gave several folk-songs as an encore. At Kiel, where they appeared on the 13th, they made the acquaintance of Löwe, the famous ballad composer, now a man of seventy-two, with whose music Brahms proved to be thoroughly familiar. Their next destination was Copenhagen, where they had arranged to give four concerts. Stockhausen's selection on the first of these occasions included songs by Stradella, Schubert, and Boieldieu, all accompanied by Brahms, who performed as his solos a Toccata and Fugue by Sebastian Bach Andante by Friedemann Bach, two Scarlatti movements, Beethoven's Sonata in E flat, Op. 27, and, of his own compositions, Variations on an original theme and the early Scherzo in E flat minor. Both artists awakened a furore. Stockhausen 'electrified the house'; Brahms was 'enormously applauded,' especially after the performance of his own compositions. The second concert, given within the next few days, was equally successful. The concert-room was crowded, the audience extraordinarily enthusiastic, and the financial result brilliant beyond expectation. Then Brahms committed a faux pas, which put an end, so far as he was concerned, to further result of the triumph.
Being asked, at a party given by the Danish composer Niels Gade in his and Stockhausen's honour, if he had visited and admired the great Thorwaldsen Museum, of which the citizens of Copenhagen are so justly proud, he replied in the affirmative, and added that the building and its collection were so fine it was to be regretted they were not in Berlin. This unfortunate remark, made in a circle representative of educated Danish society, where the remembrance of the recent Prussian occupation of Schleswig-Holstein was still sore, produced an effect which the speaker had been far from intending. It was regarded as a deliberate insult to the country in which Brahms had been a fêted guest, and was resented so strongly as to make the composer's reappearance on a Copenhagen platform impossible. Pursuing the wisest course open, he embarked on the next boat for Kiel, leaving Stockhausen to make such arrangements as he could for the third advertised concert, and to pursue his success further by associating himself with Joachim, who was about to pay a short visit to the Danish capital.
Arriving at Kiel at a very early hour in the morning, Brahms proceeded to the house of Claus Groth, whose guest he had been on his outward journey, and, walking in the garden until the inmates were astir, was presently greeted by his friend from an upper window. 'Be quick and come out; I have made a heap of money,' he cried in answer, slapping his pocket. Coffee was soon served and a lively talk ensued, but, as no explanation was offered by Brahms of his sudden reappearance, Groth at length began to question him. 'What have you been about that you have, so to say, run away? Stockhausen has not returned, and you have had great success?' And thus brought to the point, the delinquent was obliged to relate his indiscretion. 'Brahms! how could you have said such a thing in a company of Danes!' cried Groth. 'I only meant,' replied Brahms, 'that it would be better if so fine a work, so many beautiful objects, were in a great centre where many people could see them.' 'But you might have supposed Danes would not put up with such a remark.' 'It did not occur to me,' answered Brahms. 'However,' he added after a moment, 'I have earned so much money I shall not want more for a long time; so the matter is indifferent to me.'
Brahms arrived in Bremen on the first day of April, to remain until after the 10th as the guest of Reinthaler, with whom he soon became intimate. Appreciation of his works had steadily grown in the artistic circles of Bremen since the musical life of the city had been under the leadership of the distinguished artist whose name will remain associated with the first performance of the then complete German Requiem; and the Good Friday concert of this year was anticipated with the interest attaching to an event of unusual importance, the more so as many distinguished visitors from far and near were expected to be present as performers or in the audience. To the gratification of the former members of the Ladies' Choir, Brahms expressed a wish that the old favourite society should be represented in the chorus, and four of the most enthusiastic and trusty of his quondam disciples—Fräulein Garbe, Fräulein Reuter, Fräulein Seebohm, and Fräulein Marie Völckers—answered to his summons, arriving at Bremen in time to take part in the last general rehearsal. The programme of the sacred concert, the proceeds of which were to be devoted to the Bremen musicians' provident fund, included the German Requiem (baritone solo, Stockhausen), between the first and second parts of which, some of the miscellaneous items were placed; movements by Bach and Tartini, and Schumann's Abendlied for violin (Joachim); 'I know that my Redeemer liveth' (Frau Joachim); air for contralto with violin obligato from Bach's 'Matthew Passion' (Frau Joachim and Joachim); and the 'Hallelujah' chorus. Brahms was to conduct his new work, Reinthaler the remaining selections. All the soloists gave their services.
The doors of St. Peter's Cathedral Church opened punctually at six o'clock on Good Friday evening, and during the next hour the visitors, many of them old acquaintances of the reader, streamed to their places. Frau Reinthaler and Frau Stockhausen were of course present. The Dietrichs, with their friend Fräulein Berninger, came from Oldenburg, the Grimms from Münster. The Hamburg contingent included Minna Völckers, the composer's former pupil and very stanch friend, now grown up into a young lady, and her father, who had invited Jakob Brahms to accompany them as his guest. Max Bruch, Schübring, and young Richard Barth were there. Switzerland was represented by the future publisher of the Requiem, Rieter-Biedermann; England by the enthusiastic John Farmer; and shortly before the time of commencement Frau Schumann walked up the nave on Brahms' arm. She had arranged that her intention of making the journey from Baden-Baden with her daughter Marie should be kept a secret from the composer, and the two ladies surprised him with their greeting at the cathedral door.
No pains had been spared in the preparation of chorus and orchestra, and their difficult tasks were perfectly achieved.
'The impression made by the wonderful, splendidly performed work was quite overpowering,' says Dietrich, 'and it immediately became clear to the listeners that the German Requiem would live as one of the most exalted creations of musical art.'
The composer, the executants, and their friends, to the number of about a hundred, met for supper in the ancient Rathskeller close to the cathedral, and listened afterwards to a short address by Consul Hirschfeld and to about a dozen other speeches.