Brahms's Triumphlied, Op. 55

[John Boyer]

There are many celebrated composers who nonetheless have a large body of unsung works which are rightly discussed here.  Bruch and Saint-Saens are but two examples of names familiar to every concertgoer but most of whose output is just as unfamiliar.  But what of Brahms?  Even his unfamiliar works, like his motets for acapella choir, are unfamiliar more for their genre than because they are ignored in and of themselves.  Acapella choral works are a niche market, but in the world of such ensembles Brahms's contributions are frequently performed.

Large choral works with orchestra, however, are another matter.  They fall in the mainstream of performance repertory.  Brahms has contributed several standards here, yet there are two which are remarkable for their obscurity: the cantata Rinaldo, Op. 50, and the Triumphlied, Op. 55.  Rinaldo, I think, is unjustly neglected, and is a curious window into what an opera by Brahms might have sounded like.  The Triumphlied, on the other hand, is justly ignored, yet every once and a while I can't help but give it a spin to see if it's as bad as I remember. 

I well recall the first time I heard the Song of Triumph (let's use the English name, if only because its pomposity better matches the pomposity of the work) when I was 19 or 20.  At that time many works of Brahms were still new to me, and I keenly looked forward to finally hearing this "triumphant" work.  Then the music began...  I kept thinking that the disc jockey must have made some mistake and cued up something by Handel.  Not a note of it sounded like Brahms.  To this day there are only a few passages, particularly in the baritone solo in the finale, that sound like Brahms.  The rest?  Surely this is late Handel? 

I'll give Brahms credit: he could be a clever mimic.  I have on occasion played "guess the composer" with his acapella choral songs Abendstandchen, Op. 42, #1, and Vergangen ist mir Gluck und Heil, Op. 62, #7, and gotten answers ranging from Heinrich Schutz to Palestrina.  But whereas in those works the archaic imitation results in things of almost breathtaking beauty, the imitation Handel of the Song of Triumph only adds to the sense of empty pomposity.

The work came to mind again because of a passage that appears in George Mosse's "The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich", which I have been reading of late.  Mosse writes:

***
"When in 1871, at Versailles, Bismarck proclaimed the Prussian King to be the [German] Emperor, unity seemed won at last.  But the political unity of the new Prussian-dominated federation proved a disappointment to many Germans.  It was prosaic, concerned with everyday problems, whereas the movement toward unity had been highly idealistic and indeed utopian.

"Experiences rarely, if ever, turn out exactly as anticipated, and this is especially true if the anticipation has gone on for a long time.  For many German thinkers the anticipation of unity had grown to almost messianic dimensions, and the confrontation with Bismarck's bloodless Realpolitik was a tremendous disappointment.  At first, the new Reich was greeted with great enthusiasm.  But the kind of enthusiasm it received is more properly reserved for religious experiences, not political ones, and the business of government is hardly designed to produce a continuing state of ecstasy."
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Here, more than 40 years after my first encounter with the Song of Triumph, are the keys to why it flopped so badly with me and why it continues to do so:

"...highly idealistic and indeed utopian."
"...anticipation...grown to almost messianic dimensions..."
"...enthusiasm...more properly reserved for religious experiences..."

Brahms was clearly caught up in the hubris of the unification and the crushing defeat of France, treating it with "enthusiasm...more properly reserved for religious experiences."  He might have called this work "A German Te Deum", and in that spirit he selects passages from the Book of Revelation in a manner that is tasteless at best and blasphemous at worst.  Can there be any doubt that the "anticipation...grown to almost messianic dimensions" expressed in the concluding quotation from Rev. 19:16 ("And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written: King of Kings and Lord of Lords") was meant to apply to Wilhelm I's role as German Emperor over the now subordinate kings of the lesser German states?  And all this set to the most un-Brahmsian, bombastic, ersatz Handel, despite its demonstrably impressive (this is still Brahms, after all) counterpoint?

In hindsight, I should not be surprised that such dubious inspiration resulted in such dubious music.  I can still feel the disappointment of that much-anticipated first encounter more than 40 years ago.  I should have read Mosse first:  "Experiences rarely, if ever, turn out exactly as anticipated, and this is especially true if the anticipation has gone on for a long time."

But what do others think?  Any fans of the work, or do you have equally harsh opinions?  I am curious to know.

[semloh]

such dubious inspiration resulted in such dubious music.

Yes indeed, but I am always more troubled by music, indeed any art, that I think has dubious inspiration and yet in my view has significant artistic merit. It says much about its creator, or my taste!