BRAHMS SYMPHONY NO. 4
of German music in its graphic depiction
of repressed sexuality in a nunnery run
amok. Though it was the third in a trilogy
of short operatic shockers he’d composed in
a year—the previous two being Das Nusch-
Nuschi and Mörder, Hoffnung der Frauen
(“Murder, the Hope of Women”)—it
raised a scandal larger than its predecessors.
Hindemith’s chosen conductor for the
premiere, Fritz Busch, refused to lead it
on the grounds it was sacrilegious, and the
premiere was therefore delayed to March
1922 at the Frankfurt Opera. The Institute
of the Catholic League of Women protested
it, and by 1934, Hindemith himself banned
all future performances because he was tired
of dealing with the controversy.
After Germany’s defeat in World War
I, the period of the Weimar Republic that
succeeded the monarchy (1919–1933) was
one of the most unstable times in German
history. However, it was also a period of
tremendous artistic fermentation and
experimentation. German expressionism
—in which objective reality was distorted
to project the extreme emotions lying
beneath—swept the visual arts and
literature. As Hindemith wrote, “the
old world exploded,” and artists felt
compelled to make sense of the changes all
around them by breaking the codes and
conventions of the past.
The libretto for Sancta Susanna was
based on a play of the same title by August
Stramm, an Expressionist poet who
had been killed in the War. It is set in a
cloistered nunnery on a sultry, sensuous,
wind-filled May evening. The old Sister
Clementia finds the young nun Susanna
bowed in prayer before the high altar. The
nuns call her “Sancta Susanna” because
she is prone to visions. Clementia cautions
her that she is becoming all spirit, but has
a body. Outside, they hear a peasant girl
making love with a young man under
the trees. Susanna calls them both in
and curses the man as Satan. Concerned
about her state, Clementia warns her that,
decades earlier on such a night, a young
nun came naked to the altar and kissed the
life-sized figure of the crucified Christ.
For her blasphemy, the nuns buried her
alive behind the altar. This story enflames
Susanna’s repressed sexual desires. She
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strips off her habit and rips the covering
from Christ’s torso. Midnight strikes and
the nuns enter the chapel for prayers.
Seeing her, they condemn her as “Satana,”
but she refuses to repent.
Since the characters sing mostly
fragmented, enigmatic phrases—except
for Clementia’s narrative—the orchestra
carries the dominant role, describing their
emotions and relentlessly building the
drama to its climax. Hindemith follows
a carefully crafted structure throughout.
Nearly everything grows from the winding,
sweetly lyrical theme in the flute we hear
in the orchestral prelude, which conjures a
beautiful, fragrance-filled spring evening.
The little twisting figure in this theme
gradually grows more disturbingly obsessed
as it is passed to other instruments.
The opera follows the form of a series of
variations on this theme. Midway through
after Clementia’s story about the doomed
nun, the now frantic Susanna thinks she
still hears her screams. The shrieking
E-flat clarinet gives a horrific, demented
version of that once innocent flute theme.
Hindemith then uses repeated elements of
the theme to build a hysterical climax as
she strips herself naked while Clementia
vainly cries the words of her vow: “Chastity,
Poverty, Obedience.”
The music diminishes, as the nuns enter
singing the “Kyrie” to hushed, yet ominous
dissonances. Now Hindemith builds a still
more shattering climax as Susanna begs
them to wall her up like her predecessor and
the nuns condemn her as “Satana.”
Instrumentation: Three flutes including three
piccolos, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets,
e-flat clarinet, bass clarinet, two bassoons,
contrabassoon, four horns, two trumpets, three
trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp,
celeste, organ and strings.
SYMPHONY NO. 4 IN E MINOR
Johannes Brahms
Born in Hamburg, Germany, May 7, 1833;
died in Vienna, Austria, April 3, 1897
Brahms’ last and—in the opinion of
many—greatest symphony made an
inauspicious debut with its first audience,
a small group of the composer’s friends
gathered around two pianos in 1885 as
Brahms and a colleague played through
the score. They listened in stunned silence,
then began tearing the work apart. Max
Kalbeck, the composer’s first biographer,
suggested Brahms publish the finale as
a separate piece, throw out the third-
movement scherzo and rewrite the first
two movements! A discouraged Brahms
asked Kalbeck the next day, “If people
like…you do not like my music, who can
be expected to like it?”
Fortunately, the musical public liked
the Fourth Symphony much better than
did Brahms’ friends. It was a resounding
success at its premiere with the Meiningen
Orchestra under the composer’s baton on
October 25, 1885.
What could have been so distressing
about this noble work to those first listeners,
all sophisticated musical professionals?
While composing it during the summers
of 1884 and 1885 in Mürzzuschlag in
southern Austria’s Styrian Alps, Brahms
wrote to von Bülow: “It tastes of the
climate hereabouts; the cherries are hardly
sweet here, you wouldn’t eat them!”
Certainly compared to his first three
symphonies, the work has something of the
bitterness of sour cherries in its austerity,
harmonic bite and predominantly tragic
mood. It is the most tightly constructed of
his symphonies, governed by an internal
logic inspired by the strictness of its
celebrated passacaglia finale. But listeners
will be less aware of this than of the work’s
amazing range of moods, its wealth of
lyrical melody and its overall drama.
For Brahms, a firm structural foundation
gave freedom for unfettered expressiveness.
This is epitomized by the finale’s use of
the Baroque passacaglia or chaconne
form, in which a series of variations are
created over a repeated theme. Brahms
adopted his theme from Bach’s Cantata
No. 150, “Nach Dir, Herr, verlanget mich”
(“Toward You, Lord, I Long”).
The intimate opening of the first
movement is unique, suggesting the
symphony has already been in progress
for some time. The violins’ sighing
motive, descending then ascending, will
be the cornerstone of Brahms’ symphonic