The city of Hamburg this year conferred its honorary citizenship on Brahms, a distinction he shared with Bismarck and Moltke. Greatly touched by this recognition, the master let himself go for once, and immediately telegraphed his thanks to the mayor in natural, impulsive fashion that he seems to have regretted when he saw his words in print.
'... You will find me here,' he wrote to Hanslick from Ischl, 'until—I must go to the music festival at Hamburg! I must, for my honorary citizenship, with all that is associated with it, has been too pleasant and gratifying. I dread it, however, for I see that my telegram to the mayor has been printed! It sounds too foolish; "the best that could have come to me from men"—as though I had been thinking of eternal bliss; whereas all that I had in my mind was that when a melody occurs to me it is more welcome than an order, and that if it lead to my succeeding with a symphony, it gives me more pleasure than all honorary citizenships!...'[73]
In acknowledgment of the honour bestowed on him, Brahms composed three eight-part choruses a capella, which he entitled 'Fest and Gedenksprüche' (Festival and Commemoration Sayings) and dedicated to the mayor of Hamburg, Herr Oberbürgermeister Dr. Petersen. Patriotic remembrances and hopes were vividly present to his mind as he composed them, and the work is to be accepted as a second great musical memorial and glorification of the events of 1870-71. The texts are again selected from the Bible: from Deuteronomy, the Psalms, and the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke. The choruses were studied by the Cecilia Society, and performed under Spengel at the first of three festival concerts arranged by Bülow for the opening of the Hamburg Industrial Exhibition. Sittard calls them 'a splendid musical gift,' and places them amongst the best and finest of the composer's works.
'The "Sayings" do not address themselves to a particular nation or creed, but speak to every thoughtful mind, to every human heart susceptible to earnest, ideal influences, and striving after the high and the beautiful. There lives in these movements something of that strong confidence which we find—expressive of another period of thought and of art—in Handel's works, and which acts like a tonic on every faithful mind. Brahms is the only composer of the present day who can sufficiently control his own individuality to be capable of expressing his texts in a musical language universally applicable and intelligible.'
The work was received with immense enthusiasm, and the master was obliged to come forward to acknowledge the long-continued plaudits which followed its conclusion. It was the last time that he stood on a concert platform of his native city.
Spengel, who witnessed with Bülow the presentation of the citizens' document, which took place at Dr. Petersen's house, relates that Brahms gave warm verbal expression to the deep feeling animating the written acknowledgment by which he had supplemented his telegram of thanks. This letter ran as follows:[74]
'Your Magnificence
'Most Honourable Herr Bürgermeister
'I feel with my whole heart the need to add a few words to my hasty, short telegram. Kindly permit me again to assure your magnificence that my fellow-citizens have delighted and honoured me beyond measure by the bestowal of the honorary citizenship. As the artist is rejoiced by such a distinguished token of recognition, so also is the man by the glorious feeling of knowing himself so highly esteemed and loved in his native city. A feeling doubly proud when this native city is our beautiful, ancient, noble Hamburg!... The precious gift of my citizen's letter ... becomes more precious and dear to me as I place it by the side of my father's citizen's document (still in Low-German). My father was, indeed, my first thought in connection with the pleasant event, and one wish only remains, that he were here to rejoice with me....'
This was not the only mark of the esteem felt for him in high places by which the master was this year honoured. The news that the Emperor Francis Joseph had conferred upon him the distinguished 'Leopold's' order reached him in Ischl, taking him completely by surprise, and was followed by an inundation of letters, cards, and telegrams of congratulation, to all of which he replied individually.
'I was so pleased that the Austrians, as such, were glad that I was obliged to reply prettily,' he wrote to Hanslick.[75]