The first of the three sections of the single movement that constitutes the Rhapsody, an impressive orchestral picture upon which the independent recitative of the solo voice enters, may be accepted as the reflection of the poet's intense realization of the unhappy youth's condition. Its tones convey a penetrating impression of rich warmth and pity lying behind the deepest gloom. The feeling of the second section is no less concentrated, though it is expressed with more calm:
'Ah! how comfort his sorrows
Who in balsam found poison?
Who from the fulness of love
Hath drunk but the hate of men?
Once despised, now a despiser,
Secretly he consumeth
All his own best worth
In fruitless self-seeking.'
The noble declamatory passages of the voice are supported by an accompaniment that becomes agitated or intensely still in accord with the course of the poet's self-questionings, which reach their only possible and beautiful resolution in the third section:
'If thy Psalt'ry containeth,
Father of love, one tone
That can reach his ear,
Oh, refresh his heart!
Open his obscurèd sight
To the thousand sources
Near to the thirsty one
In the desert.'
Here, by a fine inspiration, the chorus of men's voices enters for the first time pianissimo, supporting the solo voice in fervent supplication.
Words and music are fitly associated throughout the movement, which is a treasure amongst works of art, and it is impossible to say that either of its parts is superior to the others, though the divine outpouring of love and pity in the last section often seems to appeal, especially, to the hearer listening for the first time to the composition. This, however, is really due to its position, which contains and brings to an issue the effect of what precedes it. The work has long since been generally recognised as one of the finest of Brahms' shorter compositions, and continues to be more in demand every year, though it had no great immediate success.
'I send you my Rhapsody,' Brahms wrote to Dietrich in February, 1870, a week or two after its publication; 'the music-directors are not exactly enthusiastic about the opus, but it may, perhaps, be a satisfaction to you that I do not always go in frivolous 3/4 time!'
It sprang from the composer's very soul.
'He once told me he loved it so,' says Dietrich, 'that he placed it under his pillow at night in order to have it near him.'