Late 19th Century Chamber Music and The Cult of The Classical Adagio

Late-Nineteenth-Century Chamber Music and the Cult of the Classical Adagio
Author(s): Margaret Notley

Source: 19th-Century Music, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Summer, 1999), pp. 33-61
Published by: University of California Press
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Late-Nineteenth-Century Chamber Music
and the Cult of the Classical Adagio
MARGARET NOTLEY
"Nothing is more a product of the German merelywayin music but in art altogether."' Nohl
than [the] Adagio," wrote Ludwig Nohl thusin a on the soulfulness of the late-eigh-
dwelt
history of chamber music that appearedteenth-century
in 1885. slow movement while casually
With the "full awakening of inwardness" ina middle-European repertory as essen-
claiming
the late eighteenth century, the Adagio tiallyhad
German, two intertwining modes of re-
come "almost to seem richer than the entire ception in what appears to have been an intri-
cately textured late-nineteenth-century cult of
rest of the [multimovement] form": "the com-
plete mastery of musical technique could the
be Classical Adagio.
evident and everything still seem empty," but
when a composer grasped the purpose estab-
lished by Haydn and fulfilled by Mozart and
Beethoven, "the Adagio in German sonata forms
'Ludwig Nohl, Die geschichtliche Entwickelung der
belongs to that which is most beautiful not
Kammermusik und ihre Bedeutung fair den Musiker
(Braunschweig, 1885): "Nichts ist denn auch mehr ein Prod-
uct der deutschen Art als dieses Adagio der Sonatenform,
und es bedurfte des vollen Erwachens der Innerlichkeit,
wie sie eben das vorige Jahrhundert kennzeichnet, um
diesem . . . einen Gehalt zu geben, der es schliesslich fast
als reicher erscheinen lisst, denn das ganze Uebrige der
Sonatenform"; "Die v6llige Beherrschung der
19th-Century Music XXIII/1 (Summer 1999). ? by The
Regents of the University of California. musikalischen Technik konnte vorhanden sein und doch
hier innerlich Alles ode erscheinen"; "das Adagio der
I would like to thank Richard Boursy, Walter Frisch,deutschen
and Sonatenform zu dem Sch6nsten geh6rt, was
James Hepokoski for their helpful comments on thisnicht
ar- bloss die Musik sondern die Kunst iiberhaupt besitzt"
ticle. (p. 59).
33
19TH For Nohl and other acolytes of Richard may sound, there is an essential difference be-
CENTURY
MUSIC
Wagner, the history of chamber music had
tween the two." Ehlert then articulated what
peaked and in effect ended with the he saw
lateasstring
the specific problem posed by an
quartets of Beethoven. Consequently, although
Adagio: "The slower a theme is performed, the
he devoted considerable space in weightier,
his Evolution
the more substantial and coherent,
of Chamber Music to the build-upthetoward the
more unassailable and altogether better it
mustchamber
Classical climax, Nohl treated the be. Post-Beethovenian themes do not bear
works of Schubert and Schumann together
such in
close scrutiny."4
one sentence.2 Mendelssohn meritedSlow movements
only pass- as such have received little
attention
ing notice, and Brahms (along with in recent music criticism, but it seems
any number
of lesser-known post-Classical composers) that the Adagioheshould hold a more central
ignored altogether. As part of what amounted
position in musicological accounts of late-nine-
to a blanket critique of modern society, teenth-century intellectual history. In 1852 the
Wagnerites tended to reject most chamber mu- cultural historian Wilhelm Riehl called the
sic after Beethoven as the result of an unin- point in the previous century at which "we
spired "materialist" approach to composition. acquired an ear for the Adagio" an "epoch-
Conversely, they elevated the Classical Ada- making" moment: before then musicians had
gio, with its associations of subjectivity and risked boring listeners with a "slow, mourn-
spirituality, above other kinds of movements. fully serious musical work dying away in quiet
Richard Pohl, for instance, claimed in 1890passion."5 Audiences had long since learned to
that an Adagio presented an even greater com-listen to Adagios, and with the surge in the
positional challenge than did a finale, and he number of professional chamber groups after
took a sweeping view of the problem, declaring the middle of the nineteenth century they be-
that "we no longer have Adagio profundity."3 gan to hear more frequent and better perfor-
Critics who otherwise had little in common mances; the sense of loss centered on the com-
with the Wagnerian or so-called progressivistposition of new repertory. In brief, the cult of
camp also acknowledged the peripheral posi-the Adagio bore the traces of a later generation's
tion of the post-Classical string quartet and the idealization of an earlier time, coupled with a
special difficulty of writing an Adagio after perception of its own shortcomings.
Beethoven. In an overview of Robert
Volkmann's six string quartets that appeared
in 1868, Louis Ehlert wrote that "[their] princi-
4Louis Ehlert, "Robert Volkmann: Ein Portrait," Leipziger
pal weakness lies in the slow movements.
allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 3 (1868), 308: "Die
Hauptschwiche
Volkmann cannot write an Adagio in the strict-liegt in den langsamen Sitzen. Ein Adagio
im strengsten Beethoven'schen Sinne kann Volkmann nicht
est Beethovenian sense. But who can do so schreiben. Aber wer kann es nach Beethoven, ausser etwa
after Beethoven, except perhaps Schumann?"
Schumann? Und ist selbst Schumann dem gewachsen....
Auch Mendelssohn hat unseres Erachtens niemals ein Ada-
After questioning whether even Schumann had
gio geschrieben, sondern nur Andantes. So sonderbar es
been equal to such a task, Ehlert turned to
klingt, es liegt ein wesentlicher Unterschied zwischen
Mendelssohn who, he concluded, "never wrote
beiden. Je langsamer ein Thema vorgetragen wird, je
an Adagio but only Andantes. As strangewuchtiger,
as it je kerniger und geschlossener, je unangreifbarer
und positiver muss es sein. Die nachbeethovenschen Themen
halten eine so nahe Betrachtung nicht aus." This article was
reprinted in Louis Ehlert, Aus der Tonwelt: Essays (Berlin,
2"11Der Totaleindruck der nachbeethovenschen Kammer- 1877), pp. 251-80. I would like to thank Birgit Lodes for
musik kein so reiner und concentrirter ist wie der der
responding to my translations of this passage and that cited
classischen. Aber wer wollte verkennen, dass in den
in n. 68; I am grateful to Glenn Stanley for his reactions to
einzelnen Zugen Franz Schubert wahrhaft Herzer- my translations of passages cited in nn. 60 and 89.
quickendes und Robert Schumann geistvoll Pathetisches 5W[ilhelm] H[einrich] Riehl, "Das musikalische Ohr"
die Fuille gebracht haben?" (ibid., p. 135; Nohl mentions (1852), in Culturstudien aus drei Jahrhunderten (Stuttgart,
the reception of Haydn by Schubert and Mendelssohn on 1859): "Vor hundert Jahren galt es fiir ein WagniB, dem
p. 79). Publikum ein Adagio im Concertsaal vorzufiihren.... Ein
3Richard Pohl, "Die Kammermusik der letzten drei getragenes, schwermtithig ernstes, in stiller Leidenschaft
Jahrhunderte," Neue Zeitschrift fir Musik 86 (1890), 505- vergluihendes Tonstiick.... Der Moment aber, wo wir ein
08, 517-19, 529-31, 541-43, 555-56, at 541: "Scherzo LauneOhr fiir's Adagio gewonnen, bleibt culturgeschichtlich
haben wir zur Geniige-aber keine Adagio Tiefe mehr." epochemachend" (pp. 95-97).
34
If Adagios had become difficult to compose symphony."6 As Carl Dahlhaus has noted, other
MARGARET
NOTLEY
in the late nineteenth century, they seem to be late-eighteenth-century writers had played the
The Classical
equally difficult to write about in the late twen- "sublime" symphonic Allegro off against the
Adagio
tieth century. Those few modern scholars who "sentimental" (not necessarily symphonic) Ada-
consider slow movements at all usually do not gio, an opposition that could be made to work
differentiate between Andantes and Adagios (as to the advantage of either type of movement,
was also true of some nineteenth-century writ- depending on the perspective of the particular
ers), instead focusing their efforts on classify- critic.7 The "soul-stirring Adagio," for example,
ing this repertory according to formal types- became a favorite topos in German novels of
ABA, sonata form with or without develop- the period, which served, in the words of Ruth
ment, theme and variations, rondo-and cre- E. Mfiller, as "the aesthetic symbol of melan-
ative deviations from these. Yet many late- choly soliloquy and sentimentally excessive
nineteenth-century musicians appear to have feelings of love."8
regarded such a movement less as an example With the canonization of the Classical rep-
of a formal type-for instance, a modified so- ertory in the nineteenth century, the slow move-
nata form in the tempo of an Adagio-than as a ment-and especially the Adagio-seems to
work grasped more basically as a tempo or tex- have acquired loftier connotations for many
ture-as an Adagio, that is, that also happened listeners. In 1859 Adolf Bernhard Marx ignored
to be in a modified sonata form. In other words, any earlier implications of mere sentimental-
the Adagio often seems to have constituted an ity and linked the slow movement more nar-
elevated genre unto itself, distinguished not rowly with introspection, declaring that after
only by its tempo but also by its melodic style the act of assertive creation manifested in a
and quality of expression. If this is so, then first movement the composer retreated to the
much current slow-movement analysis (which second in order to ask, "Who am I?"9 Nohl, in
focuses so often on large-scale structural inno- the passage cited at the outset of this article,
vations and peculiarities) might inadvertently likewise regarded the Adagio as the vehicle for
have reversed the original, nineteenth-century subjective inwardness and, indeed, came close
priorities. Formal innovation per se may not to ranking it above the first movement and the
have been the primary goal at all. Rather, seem- finale in importance. Several nineteenth-cen-
ingly unusual forms within Adagios may have tury critics went even further, to view the Clas-
resulted secondarily, perhaps almost inciden- sical slow movement as offering the purest ex-
tally, from more fundamental conceptions of pression of intimations of transcendence. Hec-
the phrase-to-phrase attributes of the "Adagio" tor Berlioz wrote in 1862 of the "otherworld-
texture itself. liness" of Beethoven's Adagios: "There there
are no human passions, no more earthly im-
TOWARD THE RECEPTION HISTORY
OF THE CLASSICAL ADAGIO
6Aesthetics and the Art of Musical Composition in the

The slow movement did not always enjoyGerman so Enlightenment: Selected Writings of Johann Georg
Sulzer and Heinrich Christoph Koch, ed. Nancy Kovaleff
high a status. In a frequently cited discussion
Baker and Thomas Christensen (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 106-
of the symphony from the late eighteenth cen-
07.
tury, Johann Georg Sulzer had assigned to the
7Carl Dahlhaus, The Idea of Absolute Music, trans. Roger
Lustig (Chicago, 1989), pp. 58-64.
outer Allegros the "expressions of grandeur,
8Ruth E. Miiller, Erzdihlte T6ne: Studien zur Musikiisthetik
passion, and the sublime" considered suitable
im spiiten 18. Jahrhundert, Beihefte zum Archiv fir
for the symphonic genre as a whole; the "an-
Musikwissenschaft, vol. 30 (Stuttgart, 1989), p. 52: "Zum
dante or largo movement that comes in be-isthetischen Symbol fiir melancholischen Monolog und
sentimental iiberh6hte Liebesgefiihle." I would like to thank
tween the first and last allegro movements does
Jane Stevens for calling my attention to this monograph.
not have so determined a character." This in- 9Adolf Bernhard Marx, Ludwig van Beethoven: Leben und
ner slow movement "is often of pleasant, pa- Schaffen, 2 vols. (Berlin, 1859), I, 124: "Diese Einkehr in
die eigne Brust, dies sinnige Betrachten seiner selbst, das
thetic, or sad expression," though still in "a
die Frage 'Wer bin Ich?' auf den Lippen tragt, kann nur im
style that is appropriate to the dignity of the
stillen Adagio beantwortet werden."
35
19TH ages, no innocent songs, no tender whispering; It was in this atmosphere that the Adagio of
CENTURY
MUSIC
there no sparks of wit flash, no humor bubbles Bruckner's String Quintet was received at its
over . .. he stands exalted above humankind
premiere in Vienna in 1885. Many critics found
and has forgotten it! Removed from the earthly
the Adagio ineffably beautiful, while deploring
sphere, he hovers alone and peaceful in the the weakness of the compositional logic in the
ether."10 Wagner's apostle Heinrich PorgesQuintet as- as a whole. For example, Max Kalbeck
serted in 1872 that "almost every Adagio(Brahms's by future biographer) called the work
Beethoven" could support Arthur Schopen- Offenbarungsmusik: "pure music of revelation
hauer's claims about the "profound relation- ... composed without any worldly addition of
ship between philosophy and music."" Draw- profane logic, art, or reason."'6 As a late-nine-
ing on the distinction between the sublime teenth-century
and liberal, Kalbeck prided himself
the beautiful made by Schopenhauer (and on oth- being a freethinker in religious matters, and
ers before him)12-and with Eduard Hanslick's he was obviously deriding Bruckner's Catholi-
"musically beautiful" as a target-another cism by referring to his compositional approach
Wagnerite, Arthur Seidl, cited the Adagio of as a kind of musical automatic writing. But
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony in 1887 as his Kalbeck was not simply being malicious: he
central example of the "musical sublime."13 In considered Bruckner "by far the most danger-
a related vein, Antonin Dvohik composed an ous of today's musical innovators."17 His lib-
"Andante religioso" for string quartet in 1870.14 eral colleagues concurred, and Gustav Dompke
And in 1886 Hans von Btilow, an agnostic and went so far as to deem the Quintet proof of "a
by then a friendly colleague of Brahms, report- very grave crisis of musical ideas and inclina-
edly had requested incense to be burnt, in an tions . . . unprecedented in its kind and scope
attempt "to heighten the mood," as he con- in comparison with the controversies in other
ducted the slow movement of Beethoven's arts."18 Such a level of vehemence can be at-
Ninth.'15 tributed to Bruckner's having dared to compose
chamber music, to enter, in Dimpke's words,
"this pure shrine of German instrumental mu-
'0Pohl, the German translator of Berlioz's writings,sic."
thus19
cited him in "Die Kammermusik der letzten drei
Inhas
Jahrhunderte," p. 541, after having stated that "no one his review of the Quintet, Kalbeck devel-
opedofat some length the sarcastic trope of
more beautifully conveyed the characteristic quality
the Beethovenian adagio than Berlioz." The passage Pohl
Offenbarungsmusik, of revelation as Bruckner's
quotes is from Hector Berlioz, "Einige Worte uber die Trio's
und Sonaten von Beethoven," Gesammelte Schriften,supposed
trans. approach to composition, by suggest-
Richard Pohl, 4 vols. in 2 (Leipzig, 1864), I, 72. A ing that he transcribed the whisperings of both
travers
chant, of which this essay forms a part, had appeared in
an angel and a devil.20 But Offenbarungsmusik
French in 1862.
"Heinrich Porges, Die Aufffihrung von Beethoven's
Neunter Symphonie unter Richard Wagner in Bayreuth
(22. Mai 1872) (Leipzig, 1872): "In neuester Zeit ist beim langsamen Satze Weihrauchdiifte in den Konzertsaal
mehrfach im AnschluB an Schopenhauer die tiefe leitete, um die Stimmung zu erh6hen." Brahms commented
Verwandtschaft von Philosophie und Musik hervorgehoben that "he would really like to know if that was true" (Er
worden. Fast ein jedes Beethoven'sche Adagio kann als sagte, er m6chte gerne wissen, ob das wahr ist).
Beweis der inneren Wahrheit dieser Ansicht dienen" (p. 16Max Kalbeck, Die Presse, 28 January 1885: "reine
19). Offenbarungsmusik . . . ohne jede profane Zuthat von
'2Arthur Schopenhauer: Schriften fiber Musik, ed. Karl weltlicher Logik, Kunst und Vernunft."
Stabenow, Deutsche Musikbicherei, vol. 40 (Regensburg, '7"Bruckner ist beiweitem der Gefahrlichste unter den
1922), pp. 77-89, "Das isthetische Wohlgefallen: Das musikalischen Neuerern des Tages" (ibid.).
Sch6ne und das Erhabene." '8Gustav D6mpke, Wiener allgemeine Zeitung, 17 January
'3Arthur Seidl, Vom Musikalisch-Erhabenen: Prolegomena 1885: "Wir leben in einer sehr ernsten Krisis der
zur Aesthetik der Tonkunst (Leipzig, 1887). musikalischen Begriffe und Sympathien. Sie ist nach Art
140n this movement, see Hartmut Schick, Studien zu und Umfang unerh6rt im Vergleich zu den Controversen
Dvoidks Streichquartetten, Neue Heidelberger Studien zur anderer Kiinste."
Musikwissenschaft, vol. 17 (Laaber, 1990), pp. 102-08. '9"Dieses reine Heiligthum der deutschen Instru-
"SRichard Heuberger, Erinnerungen an Johannes Brahms: mentalmusik" (ibid.).
Tagebuchnotizen aus den Jahren 1875 bis 1897, ed. Kurt 20Kalbeck, Die Presse, 28 January 1885: "So sind es doch
Hofmann (2nd edn. Tutzing, 1976), p. 155, from diary en- vielleicht ein Engel und ein Teufel, welche sich um seine
try for 14 November 1886: "Letzhin erzihlte Brahms, datB Seele zanken. Zu schwach, um eine entscheidende Wahl
Bilow (angeblich) bei einer Auffuhrung der 9. Symphonie zwischen ihnen zu treffen, leiht er Beiden sein Ohr, und
36
has another, more obvious meaning, which is Late-eighteenth-century music theorists MARGARET
had
NOTLEY
this: music that makes a profound effect, whose associated the expression of the serious and The
theClassical
impact can be likened to that of divine revela- Adagio
sublime with certain types of melodic writing.
tion. Kalbeck himself turned to this part of the Heinrich Koch, for instance, had quoted Sulzer's
linguistic figure when he discussed the distinction between the quality of expression
Quintet's slow movement, taking an image in the outer Allegros and inner slow movement
from Dante's Divine Comedy: "If the three of the symphony and then located "the most
previously mentioned movements belong to the important external difference" between them
Inferno, the Adagio nevertheless comes directly in characteristic kinds of phrase structure: in a
from the Paradiso. Pure light issues forth, light slow movement "melodic ideas are less ex-
in a thousand colors and nuances-the reflected tended and not so often compounded; thus more
splendor of an ecstatic vision right into sev-
formal phrase-endings are used than in the alle-
enth heaven."21 With the sudden change in tone
gro. "22 (It may be that in Koch's view the sym-
phonic slow movement partook more in the
from sarcasm to wonder, compositional logic,
that linchpin of the Brahmsian aesthetic, tem-phrase-structural qualities and humbler expres-
porarily ceased to be an issue. Kalbeck mustsive world of sonatas, the more frequently dis-
have found the Adagio to be the only compe- cussed binary opposite of symphonies.23) But
tently composed movement, but that is notKoch's assertions would be substantially al-
how he chose to write about it. At least this tered in subsequent generations. A number of
time, he suspended his merely technical judg- later musicians took the opposing position, fo-
ments; never again would he react so spontane-cusing on the less confined approach to phrase
ously to a work by Bruckner. The conclusion structure in many Classical Adagios, which, in
seems inescapable: the Adagio was a genre untoan iconic transference, had widened the expres-
sive range of slow movements and made them
itself, a special case that transcended the usual
standards of composition. Bruckner's Adagio centrally important. After Wagner introduced
conveyed a sense of the beyond even to the the phrase unendliche Melodie in the essay
freethinking materialist Kalbeck. "Zukunftsmusik" in 1860,24 some of these mu-
sicians found that that concept conveyed their
THE ADAGIO AND UNENDLICHE MELODIE experience of the Adagio both as an emotional
and/or spiritual revelation-the latter poten-
tially equivalent to the former-and as a musi-
Such a transmutation in the significance of the
slow movement could not have resulted sim- cal-textural type whose forms were to be sub-
ordinated
ply from thinking about an unaltered genre in a to a more fundamental, overrid-
ing melodic ideal.
new way, nor could Haydn's setting of Christ's
"seven last words" as a series of slow move- Within the Germanic tradition this convic-
ments-all Adagio or slower-nor even tion lasted well into the twentieth century.
Beethoven's much-noted designation of the
Ernst Kurth, for example, evinced little enthu-
Adagio in his A-Minor String Quartet, op. 132,
as "Heiliger Dankgesang" by themselves ac-
count for so fundamental a change. Surely, its
22Heinrich Christoph Koch, Introductory Essay on Com-
music-technical terms had been transformed,
position: The Mechanical Rules of Melody, Sections 3 and
as well. To what extent may we clarify the
4, trans. Nancy Kovaleff Baker, Music Theory Translation
attributes of the "new" Adagio? Series, vol. 7 (New Haven, 1983), p. 201. Johann Philipp
Kirnberger had also noted that "short phrases are best
suited for gentle, tender, agreeable, and particularly for
fleeting, frivolous, and playful pieces. But long phrases are
ihre Einfliisterungen werden gewissenhaft protocollirt auf suited for emphatic and very serious sentiments, particu-
dem fiinflinigen System-dem einzigen, das Bruckner larly for the expression of something quite pathetic" (The
anerkennt. " Art of Strict Musical Composition, trans. David Beach and
2111Geh6ren die drei erwihnten Satze dem Inferno zu, so Jurgen Thym, Music Theory Translation series, vol. 4 [New
stammt das Adagio ... direct aus dem Paradiese. Es str6mt Haven, 1982], p. 416).
eitel Licht aus, Licht in tausend Farben und Nuancen-der 23Koch, Introductory Essay on Composition, p. 204.
Abglanz einer bis in den siebenten Himmel verziickten 24Richard Wagner, "Zukunftsmusik," Gesammelte
Vision" (ibid.). Schriften, 10 vols. in 5 (3rd edn. Leipzig, 1897), VII, 127.
37
19TH siasm for much late-eighteenth-century music, all in later Beethoven do not allow exact deri-
CENTURY
MUSIC
the symmetrical forms and frequent cadences vation from any one of the fixed formal types.
of which he linked to its secular... orientation,
Just as Classical composers, generally speak-
but in a brief survey of the precursors ing, sought the greatest elevation above the
of unend-
ing melody from 1923, he suggested earthly that
in the the
Adagio, so also do their forms
melodic style of Classical music soar approached
furthest beyond the fixed outlines there."27
endlessness "in some adagio movements To be sure, Kurth of offered no elucidation of
Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, thus, charac-
what unendliche Melodie might mean in an
teristically, where the expressive purposeAdagio (as opposed
rises to its presence in a music
above an emphasis on sensuousness and
drama) earthy
other than this oblique hint of a con-
nection between
vigor into the spiritual."2s His discussion of the Wagner's phrase techniques
use of unendliche Melodie in Wagnerian and the formal freedom of some late-Classical
music
drama offers a useful summary slow of techniques
movements. Still, what these observations
that goes beyond the most obviousimply is that in
strategies ofthe highest type of Adagios
musical Unendlichkeit, the methods of under-
melodic process prevails over points of struc-
mining or bridging over cadences. tural
According to
articulation. Both on the level of the phrase
Kurth, unending melody above and all on
has to formal
larger do levels, it was a freely un-
with the subordinating of individualfolding musical
melodic process that was to determine
the most
ideas to a larger motion; it finds its overall natu-
shape, possibly by distorting "one
ral placement on the weak partsofof themeasures.
fixed formal types."28 Unlike the sonata-
Such a melody arises from an ongoing po- movements or the symmetri-
allegro of first
lyphony, an intense interweaving callyof voices,
grouped binary forms of the minuet/
rather than a single line, as wellscherzo-plus-trio,
as from theno single form was ever asso-
ciated with
overflowing of one potentially closed slow movements. In the Adagios
formal
section into the next in order to blur
that begin-
Kurth had in mind, the general concept of
nings and endings, to make them overcoming
difficult normative
if barriers via thematic
generation
not impossible to determine. In such may be more important than the
a texture,
motives and themes have no primary, stable
closest formal type itself.
From this
shapes and remain in flux; their continual point of view, the Cavatina (Ada-
elabo-
ration and interpenetration causes unending
gio molto espressivo) from Beethoven's String
melody to seem almost synonymous Quartet in B6the
with (op. 130) may be taken to illus-
trate For
fluid process of making transitions.26 "proto-Wagnerian"
Kurth techniques in a (late)
many of these Wagnerian elements seem
Classical to
slow movement. Despite the prestige
have been implicit in Beethoven's ofAdagios.
the Cavatina, critics have tended toward ex-
Thus the concept of the Adagiocessive
camecasualness
to su- in describing its melodic
structure.
persede traditional questions of form. InDahlhaus,
1925 for one, referred to the
Kurth made this explicit: the expressive
"first subject" im-
as "an eight-bar 'period,' the sim-
pulse that had motivated the quasi-unending
plicity and regularity of which is unaffected by
melody of many Classical Adagios also lay
a one-bar be-
introduction and the repetition of the
hind their idiosyncratic shapes, which "above
27Kurth, Bruckner, 2 vols. (Berlin, 1925), I, 497: "Vor allem

beim spiteren Beethoven, in mehr als einem Falle die
genaue Ableitung aus einem der festen Formtypen .
25Ernst Kurth, Romantische Harmonik und ihre Krise in
Wagners "Tristan" (3rd edn. Berlin, 1923), p. 448: "In Wie im Adagio uberhaupt die Klassiker die starkste
einigen Adagio-Sitzen bei Haydn, Mozart und Beethoven,Erhebung uber das Erdhafte suchten, schwebte auch ihr
kennzeichnenderweise also da, wo sich der Ausdruck aus Formen hier am weitesten uiber ihre festen Grundrisse
der betonten Sinnlichkeit und Erdkraft wieder ins hinaus."
Obersinnliche hebt." The other forerunners included 281 use "theme" to refer to a discrete melodic unit,
oper-
atic recitative, instrumental cadenzas, and certain "melody"
works as a more general term for the treble line of a
large formal section or entire movement. "Thematic pro-
by Chopin. In these, Kurth noted only technical features
of unendliche Melodie, not its implications of music-as-
cess" likewise refers to a manipulation of the smaller unit,
revelation (ibid., pp. 448-49). while "melodic process" refers to ongoing events in the
26Kurth, Romantische Harmonik, pp. 453-62. treble line, which may encompass all of a movement.
38
a. Mm. 1-9. MARGARET
NOTLEY
Cavatina.
The Classical
Adagio molto espressivo.
sotto voce
Adagio
Vn.sotto
sotto voce voce -
I
Vn. 2
sotto voce
Vb. Mm 47-5
S ,cresc
cec..P
y--- r~--- ~
b. Mm. 47-50.
47 sotto voce
3, sotto voce
cresc.
Example 1: Beethoven, String Quartet in Bb Major, op. 130, Cavatina.
last bar."29 (See ex. la.) But is it really possible cadentially articulated antecedent and conse-
to divide mm. 2-9 into the symmetrical, quent implied by "eight-bar period"? Indeed,
Beethoven almost consistently undercuts strong
29Dahlhaus, Ludwig van Beethoven: Approaches to His cadential progressions, even in m. 8, where the
Music, trans. Mary Whittall (Oxford, 1991), p. 234. dominant chord moves to its first inversion
39
19TH before resolving in m. 9;30 the composite line Kurth's twentieth-century idealization of the
CENUTRY created by the intertwining of the two violins slow movement represented a late (and very
further ensures the continuity of the melody. limited) phase in a broader nineteenth-century
And musicologists routinely write of a "second cult of Classicism. The deepening of the Ada-
subject" (mm. 23ff.) in the Cavatina, even gio served as a unifying topic in Theodor Helm's
though this emerges from the preceding widely disseminated survey of Beethoven's
Fortspinnung at the moment of an (unstressed) string quartets, which appeared first in the
"evaded" cadence (V-I6),3' only gradually gain- Musikalisches Wochenblatt as a series that ran
ing the status of a separate theme, perhaps not from 3 October 1873 through 21 September
even until it is repeated (mm. 32-39).32 This 1882. In the book version-in which Helm
second thematic statement does not quite added an introductory discussion of Haydn and
finish, for it is interrupted in m. 40 by the Mozart and an epilogue, "The String Quartet
extraordinary beklemmt vision or memory. after Beethoven"-this concern emerged with
Daniel Chua has characterized this "excursion even greater clarity, for the new chapters, espe-
into a different world" as a "structural disloca-
cially the latter, showed an extraordinary focus
tion in which the centre does not connect up on the Adagio both before and after Beethoven.35
with the rest of the song": although this overt With regard to Beethoven himself, Helm noted
representation of emotional anguish-through that, already in the first quartet of op. 18, the
melodic gestures borrowed from accompanied slow movement "is longer than any quartet
recitative-implies A6 minor, it never cadences, Adagios by Mozart and many by Haydn" and
nor does a dominant chord appear to indicate called it "a peculiarity of Beethoven to make
the impending return of the opening theme in the slow movement the crux of a composi-
Eb major.33 While the expressive "dislocation" tion."36 Returning repeatedly to this topos,
is undeniable, Beethoven's renouncing of a nor- Helm spun a narrative of inevitability within
matively clear harmonic articulation in favor Beethoven's spiritual/artistic development that
of motivic/linear connections (mm. 47-50; see culminated in the final slow movement, that
ex. Ib) joins the sections smoothly, in a "dis- of the F-Major Quartet (op. 135).37 Although
tinctly asymmetrical" Adagio that is, as John Beethoven marked his last slow movement
Daverio puts it, "at once an affirmation and a "Lento assai, cantante et tranquillo," Helm
denial of a simple ABA song form."34 The ir- termed it an "Adagio": at least as he conceived
regularities of phrase formation carry over into it, the Classical Adagio seems to have been a
the large-scale shape; Kurth's observations about genre that could override literal instructions of
unendliche Melodie and formal liberties have tempo, as well as overriding the constraints of
relevance to each other in this Adagio. Butboth form and medium. Along similar lines,
which feature is prior to the other? while current musicians would most likely re-
fer to the opening movement of the C#-Minor
Quartet (op. 131) as a fugue, for Helm-here
following
30William E. Caplin calls this an "abandoned cadence" in Wagner himself-it was an Adagio,
Classical Form: A Theory of Formal Functions for which
the apparently only incidentally displayed
Instrumental Music of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoventhe characteristic opening moves and pervasive
(New York, 1998), pp. 106-07.
31Ibid., pp. 101-06.
32Furthermore, in a review of the book by Dahlhaus cited
in n. 29 above, John Daverio suggests that this theme
"promises to unfold as a variation of the opening idea,
only to head off in another direction." See "Dahlhaus's
Beethoven and the Esoteric Aesthetics of the Early Nine-
teenth Century," in Beethoven Forum 2 (1993), 189-204, 35Theodor Helm, Beethoven's Streichquartette: Versuch
at p. 202. einer technischen Analyse dieser Werke im Zusammen-
33Daniel K. L. Chua, The "Galitizin" Quartets of hange mit ihrem geistigen Gehalt (Leipzig, 1885). A sec-
Beethoven: Opp. 127, 132, 130 (Princeton, 1995), pp. 193- ond edition appeared in 1910 and a third in 1921.
98, at p. 193. Chua argues that in the passage Beethoven 36"Es ist die Eigenthtimlichkeit Beethoven's, gerade den
"writes over" the Arioso dolente of his Ab Piano Sonata langsamen Mittelsatz zum Centralpunct der Composition
(op. 110). zu gestalten" (ibid., p. 10).
34Daverio, "Dahlhaus's Beethoven," p. 202. 37Ibid., p. 295.
40
imitative texture of a fugue.38 Once again, con- of this Adagio comes about through the breadth
MARGARET
NOTLEY
cerns of tempo and melodic style were priori- and expressive coherence of its three themes,
The Classical
tized over seemingly less significant generic or and the rhetorically truncated restatements
Adagio
formal references. At several points, Helm drew (mm. 102-13, 138-68) between them and at the
slow movements outside the string quartet rep- end that guarantee continuous meaningfulness.
ertory into the discussion, grouping the varia- Helm heard endlessness even in the Molto
tions of the EL Quartet (op. 127) with the so- Adagio of the E-Minor Quartet, op. 59, no. 2: "a
nata-form Adagio sostenuto of the "Hammer- wonderful hymn, deeply religious and yet with
klavier" Sonata (op. 106), the Benedictus of the an earthly fervor, a long-breathed, rapturous
Missa solemnis, and the double variations of work, its periods not coming firmly to a close
the Ninth Symphony (op. 125),39 all presum- but rather always connecting with transitional
ably exemplifying the late-Beethoven Adagio, chords, in a word, one of those 'unending melo-
for many Wagnerites the final stage in the de- dies' that become more and more frequent in
velopment of the genre and of unendliche the second half of Beethoven's creative work.'"42
Melodie within it. Although he did not object to its cadences as
When he addressed the Cavatina from op.such-these are in any case audible throughout
130, Helm wrote that "from the timid begin- this Molto Adagio, more so than in many other
ning to the softly fading final chord [it] consti-slow movements-or even to the symmetrical,
tutes a single unending melody in which there eight-measure period that opens the movement,
are no merely formal connecting links, no so-
Helm did write that when Beethoven put "his
called passages; rather, everything appears with-entire soul" into a gliding passage in triplets
out exception as most tenderly eloquent song."'40(appearing first in mm. 36-46, but prepared in
This conviction-the view that every momentthe previous two measures), later called the
within an Adagio had to be "song" (significant "triplets of transfiguration," he could not bring
lyrical and motivic process)-also emerges in himself to "stop at all." The gliding phrase
his description of the Adagio from the E6 Quar- takes twelve measures to come to a cadence,
which overlaps with the beginning of a new
tet, op. 74: "Here there are no longer filling-out
or transitional passages in the older sense, ev- theme, also in triplets but expressing "wonder-
erything sings (or speaks) much more, everyful calm." At the end these "'triplets of quiet-
measure, every note; although an opening and ing' transform into the 'triplets of transfigura-
a secondary theme, then a middle section aretion' . . . and the latter-now full of the most
quite graphically distinguishable in the move- sublime calm-lead the Master home."" Helm's
ment, these themes nevertheless fall into such understanding of "unending melody" in this
long-breathed, broad periods, and their devel- Adagio focused most fundamentally on the
opment is brought forth in so continuous amusical representation of the varying intensi-
flow dominated by one impulse, that no mea-
sure could be removed without damaging the
sense of the whole."41 The "unending melody" Haupt- und ein Seitenthema, dann ein Mittelsatz ganz gut
plastisch zu unterscheiden sind, sind doch diese Themen
so langathmig-breit periodisirt und ihre Entwickelung ist
in so steten, von einem Zuge beherrschten Fluss gebracht,
38Ibid., pp. 223-24. In 1854 Wagner wrote an explanatory dass man kein Taktglied entfernen k6nnte, ohne dem Sinne
program for the C#-Minor Quartet, which he later incorpo- des Ganzen zu schaden" (ibid., p. 127).
rated into the centenary essay "Beethoven" of 1870 42"Ein wunderbares Hymnus, tief religi6s und doch irdisch
(Gesammelte Schriften, IX, 61-126). gluthvoll, ein Tonstfick langathmig, iiberschwinglich, seine
39Helm, Beethoven's Streichquartette, p. 163. Perioden nicht fest abschliessend, sondern stets durch
40"Diese ganze Cavatine vom schiichtemen Anfang bis zum Ueberleitungsaccorde verbindend; mit Einem Worte eine
leise verhallenden Schlussaccord eine einzige 'unendliche jener 'unendlichen Melodien,' wie sie in Beethoven's
Melodie' ausmacht, in der es keine blos formellen zweiter Schaffenshilfte immer haufiger auftreten und di-
Bindeglieder, keine sogenannten Ginge gibt, sondern Alles rect auf R. Wagner weisen" (ibid., p. 82).
ausnahmslos als seelenvollst sprechender Gesang 43"Unversehens wandelt sich die 'Triole der Beruhigung',
erscheint" (ibid., p. 214). in die 'Triole der Verklirung' . . . und leitet die Letzere-
41"Hier gibt es gar keine Ausfiill- und Ueberleitungsstellen jetzt selbst erhabenster Ruhe voll-den Meister heim"
im ilteren Sinne mehr, hier singt (oder spricht) vielmehr(ibid., p. 89). Helm also uses "unendliche Melodie" in ref-
Alles, jeder Takt, jede Note; obgleich in dem Satze ein erence to the theme of the variations in op. 127.
41
19TH ties of a single, sustained emotional and/or spiri- Beethoven's E-Minor Quartet. Does Brahms's
CENUTRY tual experience. Here the prevailing mood did use of Wagner's phrase imply that he conceptu-
not change abruptly or frequently-mercurial alized these events in Haydn as more melodic
states of mind tended to be more appropriate than formal? Although the letter offers few clues
within other movement types.44 Beethoven con- as to what Brahms had precisely in mind, the
veyed the continuity of this experience in part appearance of Wagner's words in this appar-
through the nearly constant recycling of mo- ently incongruous context-to extol a rather
tives from the opening theme and through the plain Andante by Haydn-does suggest that the
occasional suppression of an expected cadence connection between the concept of unendliche
at a pivotal moment.45 Melodie and certain features of Classical slow
No doubt Brahms had similarly technical movements had entered the public domain.
aspects in mind when he wrote to Joseph Already in 1866 the critic Hermann Deiters
Joachim in October 1871 about a copy that he had co-opted Wagner's phrase for a favorable
had made for him of a slow movement from an review of the slow movement (Andante, un
early symphony by Haydn (No. 16, in Bb): "Topoco Adagio) of Brahms's own F-Minor Piano
me this little piece seems a paragon of beauty, Quintet (op. 34). Noting that its first section
and I know of no better example of the newly (presumably mm. 1-23) was "really just one
invented 'unending melody'."46 In this passagelong, broadly elaborated period," Deiters ad-
Brahms was not treating Wagner's phrase as amired the varied punctuation and contours of
pejorative term-although surely there is a the four-measure phrases and the way in which,
touch of sarcasm present. Rather, he was refus- at the same time, the limited motivic material
ing to acknowledge that it referred to anything "expands in luxuriating gracefulness like an
new. But what does "unending melody" have unending melody (here one could use this ex-
to do with this modest "little piece," a sonata-pression)."48 Deiters probably added the paren-
form Andante? The only unusual effect of con- thetical clause to emphasize that he did con-
tinuity arises from the lack of emphasis on the sider this expansive yet symmetrically articu-
arrival at the secondary key;47 the transition, lated section to be a melody; as has been noted
which is based on the opening theme, leads more than once, critics had often questioned
into additional spinning-out of fragments from whether "unending melody" constituted
it, making this Andante motivically even more melody at all.49
homogeneous than the Molto Adagio from Curiously, before Wagner provided a useful
label in "Zukunftsmusik," some of these
critics had complained about the extended, sup-
44Ibid., p. 163. posedly obscure phrase structures in
45Helm did not strengthen his point by noting the omis-
sion of other cadences in this "exceedingly free" sonata- Beethoven's final quartets and their deleterious
form movement (ibid., p. 88): the transition leads directly effects on contemporary composers.50 Thus in
into the so-called second theme (m. 26), and only a half
cadence marks the end of the exposition (m. 54). In con-
trast to his treatment of other movement types, Helm
seemed reluctant to acknowledge the formal schemata that 48"Der erste [Theil] ist eigentlich nur eine lange, weit
lay behind this and other Adagios by Beethoven. ausgesponnene Periode, aus [einem] Motiv des Claviers
One of the "antiprogressivist" critics, Selmar Bagge, on gebildet, . . . welches in Abschnitten von je vier Takten,
the other hand, had asserted the utter simplicity and or- durch Hebung und Hinabsteigen sowie durch die
thodoxy of the form in the same movement ("Beethoven's Abschlisse verschieden, von abgebrochenen Achteln der
E-moll-Quartett, op. 59," Deutsche Musik-Zeitung 2/37 Instrumente begleitet, in schwelgender Anmuth wie eine
[16 Sept. 18611, 289-91). A central issue in the musical unendliche Melodie (hier konnte man diesen Ausdruck
controversies of the time was clearly at stake. anwenden) sich ausdehnt" (Allgemeine musikalische
46Johannes Brahms: Life and Letters, trans. Josef Eisinger Zeitung 54 [1866], 142).
and Styra Avins (Oxford, 1997), p. 427. This letter had not 49Thomas S. Grey, Wagner's Musical Prose: Texts and Con-
been published before. texts (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 242-57.
47For a related discussion, see the treatment of "The Two o0Ibid., pp. 112-13. Although Wagner himself had only be-
Exposition Types" (especially the concept of the "continu- latedly come to appreciate Beethoven's last works, other
ous exposition") in James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, composers, including Mendelssohn, Schumann, and the
"The Medial Caesura and Its Role in the Eighteenth-Cen- aforementioned Volkmann, had been considerably quicker.
tury Sonata Exposition," Music Theory Spectrum 19 (1997), For Wagner's reception of the late quartets, see K. M.
115-54. Knittel, "Wagner, Deafness, and the Reception of Beet-
42
1853 an anonymous Viennese journalist, after had not addressed at all in his Lexikon): "For
MARGARET
NOTLEY
praising the warmth and depth of feeling in the the slow tempo, much more than a quick, The Classical
Adagio
throws into bolder relief any feature that either
Adagio non troppo from Mendelssohn's $, String
Quartet (op. 44, no. 3), criticized the move- in itself is not sufficiently meaningful or does
ment for lacking "any rhythmic articulation, not suit the overall character of the composi-
any caesura in the melodic line," a style "un- tion. Furthermore, a slow movement easily be-
fortunately quite popular with more recent com- comes exaggeratedly broad, ponderous, and, if
posers, Beethoven having led the way in his there is not a satisfying richness of ideas, very
final quartets."5' Whether musicians consid- boring."53 Dommer's cautionary observation
ered unendliche Melodie to be revolutionary or that every feature in an Adagio had to be mean-
rooted in tradition, to be merely a matter of ingful and expressively suitable foreshadows
technique or also of expression, and whether Helm's description shortly thereafter (in the
they wrote approvingly or not, the phrase-and series that began in 1873) of "unending melody"
the midcentury controversies that had preceded in Beethoven's later Adagios. But elsewhere in
Wagner's coining of it-had a resonant aptness the dictionary Dommer stressed that, because
with respect to slow movements, in which of the slower tempo, the composer should use
"melody," broadly conceived, was most obvi- simpler and less extended phrase structures than
ously the point.52 in other movement types or risk the incompre-
hension of audiences.54 It appears that the de-
THE CULT OF THE ADAGIO AND mands on the composer of an Adagio were many
BRAHMS'S "FIRST MATURITY" and sometimes contradictory.
A well-known anecdote about Brahms also
The opinion that Ehlert had voiced in 1868 suggests the conceptual rigors of Adagio com-
about the challenge of composing an Adagio position in the late nineteenth century. In 1889
apparently represented a new attitude toward a young man, Gustav Jenner, brought a piano
the genre. In Koch's Musikalisches Lexikon of trio that he had written to the middle-aged
Brahms,
1802, a great deal of space had been devoted to who proceeded to point out its many
the effective performance of an Adagio, but in shortcomings: "Naturally these weaknesses
the second edition, which appeared in 1865- stood out most glaringly in the slow move-
thoroughly revised by Arrey von Dommer-- ment. ... And thus, to my bitter disappoint-
much of the emphasis had shifted to the suc- ment, all the splendor of this beloved Adagio
cessful composing of an Adagio (which Koch
53Heinrich Christoph Koch, Musikalisches Lexikon welches

die theoretische und praktische Tonkunst, encyclopddisch
bearbeitet, alle alten und neuen Kunstw6rter erkldrt, und
hoven's Late Style," Journal of the American Musicologi- die alten und neuen Instrumente beschrieben, enthdlt, 2
cal Society 51 (1998), 49-82; for Schumann, Bodo Bischoff, vols. in 1 (1802; rpt., Hildesheim, 1985), "Adagio," cols.
Monument ffir Beethoven: Die Entwicklung der Beethoven- 62-66. Musikalisches Lexicon auf Grundlage des Lexicon's
Rezeption Robert Schumanns (Cologne-Rheinkassel, 1994), H. Ch. Koch's, ed. Arrey von Dommer (Heidelberg, 1865),
esp. pp. 306-10; for Mendelssohn, Friedhelm Krummacher, "Adagio": "Denn die langsame Bewegung lisst jeder Zug,
Mendelssohn--der Komponist: Studien zur Kammermusik der entweder an sich nicht hinlinglich bedeutend ist oder
fiur Streicher (Munich, 1978), esp. pp. 70-72. weniger zum ganzen Character des Tonsatzes passt, bei
s1"Das Adagio in demselben Quartette ist von edlem, weitem merklicher hervortreten als eine schnelle. Aus-
warmen und tiefen [sic] Geffihle eingegeben; allein es serdem kann ein langsamer Satz leicht uibertrieben breit,
schadet sehr der Wirkung desselben, datB es so ganz und schwerfillig und, wenn nicht genuigende Gedankenffille
gar aller rhythmischen Gliederung, jedes Ruhepunktes in vorhanden ist, sehr langweilig werden" (pp. 20-21).
der melodischen Ftihrung entbehrt. Diese Weise ist leider 54Dommer, Lexicon, "Sonate I (die moderne), 2 (Zweiter
eine bei den neuern Tonsetzern durchaus beliebte, denen Satz)": "Die langsame Bewegung ... die Aufmerksamkeit
hierin Beethoven in seinen letzten Quartetten voranging" des H6rers nicht so andauernd rege zu erhalten vermag als
(Neue Wiener Musik-Zeitung 2 [1853], 200). eine rasche. Ebenso wird die Periodenbau straffer zusam-
52Wagner himself seems to have associated "unending mengefasst, die Gliederungen miissen, um der Klarheit
melody" with Beethoven's first movements. See, for ex- und Uebersichtlichkeit willen, kleiner und einfacher sein.
ample, the account in Grey, Wagner's Musical Prose, pp. Derartige zusammengesetzte Perioden- und Gruppen-
251-52. See, also, Grey's discussion of the concept and the bildungen, wie in schnellen Sitzen sehr gut stehen konnen,
long previous history of regarding form as melody (pp. wiirden im Adagio durchaus nicht iibersichtlich sein und
270-78). nothwendig der Auffassung sich entziehen" (p. 785).
43
19TH collapsed before my watching eyes into an year he had sent the Adagio of his D-Minor
CENTURY empty void." The older composer tempered his Piano Concerto (op. 15) to Joachim with this
criticism with the remark that creating "such a apparent expression of self-doubt: "If only I
long Adagio is the most difficult thing of all."'ss could finally take pleasure in a successful Ada-
Brahms himself had come of age as a composer gio!"59 When he mailed the slow movement
in the first decade and a half or so after the
of the A-Major Serenade (op. 16) to Clara
middle of the century, during approximately Schumann on 10 September 1859, Brahms
the same years in which the melodic style in
sounded tentatively proud of his work: "I look
Beethoven's late music had become a topic of
forward to hearing from you at last about the
controversy and the Classical Adagio seems to
Adagio for the new serenade. I hope you'll write
have achieved cult status. what you mean, just as though you were speak-
Young Brahms's letters from the mid and ing freely. If it's only worth all the effort I've
late 1850s mention Adagios with surprising fre-put into it. In any case I would like it back to
quency. On 27 June 1855, he reported to Clara me as soon as possible! That unfortunately is
Schumann that Joachim's quartet had played necessary."60
five Haydn string quartets the night before: At the time, musicians did not distinguish
"For me it became almost or actually too much.between Adagios and Andantes with any con-
... These quartets are nevertheless amazingly sistency61 and also indicated gradations between
fine and accomplished, with an abundance of the two: Andante moderato, Andante un poco
beautiful and original ideas, especially in theAdagio, Poco Adagio, Adagio non troppo.
splendid Adagios, that is incredible."56 On Brahms
8 himself sometimes changed or quali-
December 1855, he told her that the Adagio offied his own markings for tempo and expres-
the C-Major Symphony was his favorite move-sion: for example, in the autograph for the slow
ment in all of her husband's symphonies, add- movement of op. 34b, the two-piano version of
ing-in words that prefigure those of Ludwig what had been a string quintet and would be-
come the F-Minor Piano Quintet (the piece ad-
Nohl cited at the beginning of this article--
that "only a German can compose such an mired by Deiters), he altered the indication
Adagio."57 At the conclusion of a letter to "Andante" to "Andante, un poco Adagio."62
Joachim from 11 July 1857, he wrote that he Still, it does not seem inconsequential that all
was enclosing an organ concerto (assumed to of the passages from his letters cited above
be) by Wilhelm Friedemann Bach "because of refer to Adagios, for he appears to have been
the beautiful Adagio."58 In January of that same
struggling with the demands of this more diffi-
cult kind of slow movement during the same
years in which he was grappling with orches-
55Gustav Jenner, Johannes Brahms als Mensch, Lehrer und tration and other aspects of musical craft. Be-
Kfinstler: Studien und Erlebnisse (Marburg in Hessen,
1905): "Naturgemiiss traten diese Mingel im langsamen
Satz besonders stark hervor ... und so fiel denn die ganze
Pracht dieses geliebten Adagios als eine bittere cording to the Neue Bach Ausgabe, the concerto was in
Enttiuschung vor meinen sehenden Augen in ein leeres fact an arrangement by J. S. Bach of a violin concerto by
Nichts zusammen. ... 'Ein so langes Adagio ist das Vivaldi, with a slow movement marked "Largo e spiccato."
Schwerste"' (p. 7). 59"Kbnnte ich mich doch endlich iiber ein gelungenes Ada-
56Clara Schumann-Johannes Brahms: Briefe aus den Jahren gio freuen!" (ibid., V, 166).
1853-1896, ed. Berthold Litzmann, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1927): 60"Ich freue mich darauf, endlich tber das Adagio in der
"Es wurde mir fast oder wirklich zu viel. ... Wundersch6n neuen Serenade von dir zu h6ren, ich hoffe, Du schreibst
und meisterhaft sind doch diese Quartette, und ein recht, als ob das Ziingelein ganz los- und ausgelassen ware.
Reichtum sch6ner und origineller Ideen, namentlich in Wenn's nur der Miihe wert ist. Ich bitte es mir iibrigens
den grofgartigen Adagios, der unbegreiflich ist" (I, 118-19). baldm6glichst wieder! Das mug leider sein" (Schumann-
57"Solch Adagio kann nur ein Deutscher komponieren" Brahms Briefe, I, 277).
(ibid., I, 160). 61According to Dommer's Musikalisches Lexicon, p. 785,
58Johannes Brahms Briefwechsel, 19 vols. to date (consist- "Adagio" was often used to refer to any slow movement.
ing of 16 original vols. [Berlin, 1907-20] and a Neue Folge On the other hand, certain critics-e.g., "H--." in the
consisting of 3 vols. to date [Tutzing, 1992-]), vols. 5-6: Neue Wiener Musik-Zeitung, which lasted from 1852 to
Johannes Brahms im Briefwechsel mit Joseph Joachim, 1860-persistently referred to "Adagios" as "Andantes."
ed. Andreas Moser, V, 183: "Ich lege ein Orgelkonzert von 62The autograph of the Sonata for Two Pianos in F Minor,
Friedemann Bach bei des schinen Adagios wegen." Ac- op. 34b, is in the Pierpont Morgan Library (Cary 4).
44
tween the late-1850s and the mid-1860s, he sonata form," at which point "the movement MARGARET
NOTLEY
produced significantly more Adagios than An- reveals itself as an original synthesis of A B A The Classical
dantes, a higher proportion than during any structure and sonata style."65 In what seems to Adagio
comparable period before the late 1880s (see be the only essay devoted exclusively to
Table 1)-and those from the later period tend Brahms's slow movements, Elaine Sisman con-
not to be "such long Adagios" as those from cluded: "Brahms thus fully reinvented the ABA
the earlier years. form by demonstrating that one can no longer
For his very early piano sonatas (ops. 1, 2, take for granted its most basic premises: what
and 5) Brahms had composed Andantes, before is A and what is B, where the return is, and
essaying Adagios for his first published cham- what transitions mean. These mixed signals
ber work, the "confused" B-Major Piano Trio also turn up in his slow sonata-type move-
(op. 8, completed in January 1854), and the next ments, often resulting in a kind of synthesis of
three instrumental pieces, the D-Minor Con- sonata and ABA. "66
certo and the two serenades (op. 16 and op. 11, The Adagio above all demanded a certain
in D major, completed in 1858, the slow move- type of melodic and phrase treatment, and the
ment by September).63 While the Adagios in technical problems that nineteenth-century mu-
the Concerto and the First Serenade are a major sicians wrote about, when they chose to be
advance on the technically immature Piano explicit, had to do with themes and phrase
Trio, the Adagios in the Second Serenade, the structure. This melody-centered principle raises
A-Major Piano Quartet (op. 26), and the Horn the question of whether the large-scale formal
Trio (op. 40), sound not only mature but also novelty of these Adagios from Brahms's "first
highly individualized.64 With their characteris- maturity" (Tovey's designation for this period)
tic concern to examine broad architecture, mu- might be secondary, a complementary by-prod-
sicologists have stressed Brahms's innovative uct of more primary, melodic concerns.67 From
approach to large-scale form in these slightly this standpoint the unusual forms were not
later slow movements. (Brahms had composed ends in themselves. Instead, Brahms's choices
the Adagio of the Concerto as a straightforward might well have been impelled more by an
ABA form, that of the First Serenade as a text- aesthetic specific to slow movements, one that
book sonata form.) About the Adagio non troppo centered on thematic continuity and the con-
of the Second Serenade James Webster wrote stant transcending of both small-and large-scale
that "until the very end one can hear it in formal barriers. Indeed, what fundamentally dis-
tinguishes these three Adagios from the earlier
ones is a qualitative difference in melodic style.
63After Brahms had recomposed the Trio in 1889, he wrote
It is even likely that the forms in ops. 16, 26,
to Clara Schumann that it was no longer as confused as it
had been ("So wrist wird es nicht mehr sein wie friiher"); and 40 would not have been possible with the
letter of 3 September 1889, Schumann-Brahms Briefe, II, themes from the Concerto and First Serenade.
393.
64Brahms wrote "January 1854" at the end of the auto-
The themes in the later Adagios, for instance,
graph for op. 8. Brahms sent a slow movement for the D- are likely to strike us as less conventional,
Major Serenade, scored at the time as a nonet, to Joachim more arresting. Consider, for example, the open-
in September 1858. Although Joachim refers to it as an
ing of the A-minor Adagio non troppo from the
Andante, it was probably the Adagio non troppo; Brahms
im Briefwechsel mit Joachim, V, 207. Brahms rescored the Second Serenade, in which the winds play an
work for orchestra in 1859. Here I am writing only about asymmetrical melody in the treble, over a two-
the Adagios from this period. When musicians made a
distinction between the two, an Adagio was considered a
measure ostinato in the strings (without vio-
greater compositional challenge than an Andante. And I
do not write about the Adagio of op. 36, a set of variations
with tempo changes, though a comparison with the varia- 65James Webster, "Schubert's Sonata Form and Brahms's
tions of op. 18 (Andante, ma moderato) is suggestive. Ap- First Maturity (II)," this journal 3 (1979), 52-71 at p. 60.
parently by 1869 (according to the opus number and evi- 66Elaine Sisman, "Brahms's Slow Movements: Reinvent-
dence in the letters), Brahms had completed the two string ing the 'Closed' Forms," in Brahms Studies: Analytical
quartets, op. 51, but he revised them in 1873 before finally and Historical Perspectives, ed. George S. Bozarth (Ox-
allowing them to be published. The Poco Adagio of the C- ford, 1990), pp. 79-103 at p. 99.
Minor String Quartet (op. 51, no. 1) takes to an extreme 67Donald Francis Tovey, "Brahms's Chamber Music," in
certain of the stylistic features discussed below. Essays and Lectures in Music (London, 1949), pp. 243-44.
45
19TH Table 1
CENTURY
MUSIC
Tempo Designations for Brahms's Slow Movements*
Piano Sonata in C Major, op. 1 Andante 1853

Piano Sonata in F# Minor, op. 2 Andante con espressione 1852
Piano Sonata in F Minor, op. 5 Andante; Andante molto 1853
Piano Trio in B Major, op. 8 Adagio non troppo 1854
Serenade in D Major, op. 11 Adagio non troppo 1858
Piano Concerto in D Minor, op. 15 Adagio 1857
Serenade in A Major (op. 16) Adagio non troppo 1859
String Sextet in Bb Major, op. 18 Andante, ma moderato 1860
Piano Quartet in G Minor, op. 25 Andante con moto 1861
Piano Quartet in A Major, op. 26 Poco Adagio 1861
Piano Quintet in F Minor, op. 34 Andante, un poco Adagio 1864
String Sextet in G Major, op. 36 Adagio 1865
Cello Sonata in E Minor, op. 38 1865
Horn Trio in &E Major, op. 40 Adagio mesto 1865
String Quartet in C Minor, op. 51, no. 1 (Romanze) Poco Adagio 1873
String Quartet in A Minor, op. 51, no. 2 Andante moderato 1873
Piano Quartet in C Minor, op. 60 Andante 1874
String Quartet in B1 Major, op. 67 Andante 1875
Symphony in C Minor, op. 68 Andante sostenuto 1876
Symphony in D Major, op. 73 Adagio non troppo 1877
Violin Concerto in D Major, op. 77 Adagio 1878
Violin Sonata in G Major, op. 78 Adagio 1879
Piano Concerto in Bb Major, op. 83 Andante 1881
Piano Trio in C Major, op. 87 Andante con moto 1882
String Quintet in F Major, op. 88 Grave ed appassionato 1882
Symphony in F Major, op. 90 Andante 1883
Symphony in E Minor, op. 98 Andante moderato 1885
Cello Sonata in F Major, op. 99 Adagio affettuoso 1886
Violin Sonata in A Major, op. 100 Andante tranquillo 1886
Piano Trio in C Minor, op. 101 Andante grazioso 1886
Double Concerto in A Minor, op. 102 Andante 1887
Violin Sonata in D Minor, op. 108 Adagio 1888
Piano Trio in B Major, op. 8 (revised) Adagio 1889
String Quintet in G Major, op. 111 Adagio 1890
Clarinet Trio in A Minor, op. 114 Adagio 1891
Clarinet Quintet in B Minor, op. 115 Adagio 1891
Clarinet Sonata in F Minor, op. 120, no. 1 Andante un poco adagio 1894
Clarinet Sonata in &E Major, op. 120, no. 2 1894
The years in which the works were completed, rather than published, are given. Brahms
works through op. 79; his letters provide information on the others. See "Ein eigenhiin
Brahms: Ein wichtiger Beitrag zur Brahmsforschung," Die Musik 29 (1936-37), 529-4
*Brahms had written a slow movement for op. 38, which he removed before publica
hypothesis that the Adagio affettuoso of op. 99 derived from it, see my "Brahms's F-Ma
in Half-Step Relations," in Brahms Studies, vol. I, ed. David Brodbeck (Lincoln, Neb., 199
Sonata, like op. 38, a three-movement work, concludes with variations marked Anda
internal slow movement.
**According to Brahms's inventory (p. 538), he finished the string quartets, op. 51, "for the second time" in 1873; most likely
he had completed an earlier version by 1869.
46
MARGARET
Adagio non troppo - NOTLEY
The Classical
Adagio
p molto espr.
2 Ob. _ _ _ _
1. Cl. in %B-"6," p molto espr.
2. Cl. in B6
p molto espr.
2 Bsn.
2 Hn. in E6 _ _""
a. IO
p legato
p legato
p legato
Example 2: Brahms, Serenade in A Major, op. 16, Adagio non troppo, mm. 1-4.
lins) that emphasizes the half steps, diminished In these movements from his first maturity,
fourths, and tritones of the minor mode (ex. 2). Brahms seems to have aimed at a style in which
every measure would be, as Helm put it a few
In these slightly later Adagios, furthermore,
individual thematic statements do not last as
years later, "song." One strategy common to
the Second Serenade's Adagio non troppo, the
long. This contrasts with Brahms's earlier ap-
Poco Adagio of the A-Major Piano Quartet, and
proach in the Adagios of the Concerto and First
the Adagio mesto of the Horn Trio involved
Serenade, in which he had fashioned very ex-
pansive themes or thematically homogeneousdevising a (seemingly) subsidiary motive or
sections, with cadential overlaps at their bound-
aries. Such long-breathed melody in an Adagio,
however, posed difficulties for the listener, chief
as melody. During a conversation about the formal "bold-
among them being the task of apprehending
ness" of composers before and after Beethoven, Brahms
music at a slow tempo. A move toward smallerexclaimed: "Just look at a sarabande by Bach! From begin-
ning to end one splendid melody, wonderfully articulated.
constructive units in the later Adagios (com-
A similar kind of melodic construction, of a piece, with-
bined also with more vivid melodic materials)
out beginning anew, is seldom or never found later" ('Sehen
might have been a logical solution to the prob-Sie sich einmal eine Sarabande von Bach an! Von Anfang
bis zum Ende eine herrliche Melodie, wundervoll gegliedert.
lem, even though the ultimate goal may still
Eine iihnliche Art der Melodiebildung aus einem GuB, ohne
have been the impression of a single, broad
frisch anzusetzen, findet man sp~iter selten oder nie).
melody.6s Heuberger, Erinnerungen an Brahms, p. 23, from diary
entry for 21 November 1883.
The reduction in instrumental forces, from the large
orchestra of the Concerto and the First Serenade to the
68A remark made by a much older Brahms to his friend small orchestra of the Second Serenade and then the cham-
Richard Heuberger in 1883 implies this ideal, as well as ber ensembles of ops. 26 and 40, may also have been a
the related tendency to think of form in a slow movement factor in the stylistic change.
47
19TH Poco Adagio con sordino
CENTURY
MUSIC
con sordino
Via.
pdolce -
con sordino
Vc.
p dolce
Poco Adagio 3
1P p espress. e dolce 3
:,: LZ? .r N,
-. -'
Example 3: Brahm
theme that would

evoke a refrain being strummed on a folk in-
of (apparently) strument, perhaps a small harp. In all three
mor
rials and movements,
also each recurrence unobt
of these accompa-
movement. nimental/transitional
In figures helps
the to provide S
this role "atmosphere"
is and, at the same time, has the
fulfille
the Piano important formalQuartet
function of keeping the me-
melodic statement is surrounded by a lodic impulse in motion, resisting full-stop clo-
heterophonic haze of eighth notes in the mutedsure.
strings; this eighth-note motion continues even This illusion of formal continuity and
after the cadence in m. 10 and subsequent tinuous meaningfulness in each moveme
codettas in mm. 10-13, undercutting the ef- typically bolstered by still other features.
fects of those gestures of completion.69 Theample 5 illustrates some of these at work i
middle section of the Second Serenade's Ada-
opening measures of the Horn Trio (ex. 4), which
return a number of times, always in the piano, gio non troppo-a section that begins after eight
statements of the ostinato have closed on an
imperfect authentic cadence in C major (m.
69For codettas, see Caplin, Classical Form, p. 16. 17). The new section, prepared rhythmically at
48
Adagio mesto MARGARET
NOTLEY
Vn. _
The Classical
p espress. Adagio
Hn. in E6
Adagio mesto p espress.
una corda
tre corde
Example 4: Brahms, Horn Trio in Eb Major, op. 40, Adagio mesto, mm. 1-5.
a. Mm. 18-21 (hypothetical unexpanded version).
1 " ON.w
.. . .. .. . ..o
Example 5: Brahms, Serenade in A Maj
that cadence by the sixteenth-note

text, the expandedtremo
seque
two-measure
the low strings, opens model,
by suggesting re
a strai
forward model (mm.longer
18-19)
theme
and sequence
(mm. 18-
withExample
will lead to A? minor. a new theme, als
5a shows
(mm. 30-42).70
model and a hypothetical, In a proc
simpler treatmen
the sequence. But thistion, this
is not leadsBrahms
what to a relat
ch
Instead (ex. 5b), the shaped theme,
completion after
of the tw
seque
48, 49-57)
is deferred, as the exact intervalof which,
from the hm
lapses onto
(a minor second, derived fromthe the domina
ostinat
tives from the ostinato return.
replaced by a new interval, a third, introdu
in the bassoon (m. This viewand
21) of musical form, which stresses
immediately ta
up by the upper the moment-to-moment
winds, followed seeming self-perpetu-
by an outb
on the horn (mm.ation
23-25)
of musical content-themes,
and a motives,cadence i
(m. 25). On repetition, the thirds plus the o
burst more clearly become a theme (mm.
30), which leads to a long-delayed cadenc
70The following remark by Sisman, applied on a local level,
Ab major (mm. 29-30).
may be relevant:In the
"In Brahms's space
slow movements, one must opene
the initial alteration in
always m.
mediate 21,
between a musical
the received brief messages them
evolved-though oneand theirthat
unexpected resolutions-a
probably step-by-step process-
can be
and the larger sections and their assigned weights and
prehended as such only, as in Beethove
relationships-a retrospective process"; "Brahms's Slow
Cavatina, when it Movements,"
is repeated. p. 102. In a larger
49
19TH b. Mm. 20-31.
CENTURY
MUSIC
20
Fl.
Ob.
Fl. ... ____ ___.
C1. in B6 b,& R--g p'C

dim.
Bsn. dim. Solo . -,

zu 2
Hn. in E6 F
Sf f- P f
Via.
Vc. o :-
' _ ,_
dim p
23 dim . p
Cb.
dim. p
1.
p -----------
P I I ' - ' __1_ -
)~~ simil
~ _
-i -
Example 5
50
b. Mm. 20-31 (continued). MARGARET
NOTLEY
The Classical
26 zu2 , Adagio
S29II
-tf f
C: - -I f F - - -- I -
p ,....-
S1 r II
-ff
i- p49
P L. O o 1
....p
Example 5 (continued)
51
19TH characteristic harmonies, and so on-has for section. But is the generation of the variants an
end in itself? The unobtrusive true return of
CEMNUTSICRY some time been a mainstay of Brahms criti-
cism, formulated in various ways, often with the "A" theme over a new motive form (rhyth-
reference to Schoenberg's term "developing mically altered and avoiding the tonic chord,
variation." In a discussion of Brahms's sonatamm. 75ff.) allows the gradual regaining of the
forms, Dahlhaus overstated his case by describ-
original configuration of treble melody and bass
ing "motivic development, the elaboration ostinato,
of which eventually come together-for
the only time in the movement-in two per-
thematic ideas" as "the primary structural prin-
ciple" in them.71 Taking a more measured ap- fect authentic cadences in the tonic, A minor
proach, Walter Frisch wrote that in the first(mm. 87 and 89): the melody of the outer sec-
movement of op. 26 and succeeding works tionsby is finally complete. Dahlhaus himself im-
Brahms, "the conventional divisions of sonataplied that unending melody and developing
variation
form begin to be ... supplemented, or reinter- are not incompatible concepts, since
preted" by developing variation. But he foundeach has to do with continuous melodic mean-
motivic procedures to have more fundamental ingfulness.74 Their significance with respect to
importance in the Adagio of the Second Sym- the Adagio non troppo may come down again
phony: "Brahms has fashioned a splendid im- to a question of emphasis: is the manipulation
age of how the principle of developing varia-of motives or the ongoing melodic line pri-
tion can permeate-can seem actually to gen- mary-or is it, indeed, the large-scale formal
erate-all levels of a sonata structure."72 Frisch anomalies that matter most?
recognized that form in an Adagio differs from The E-major Poco Adagio from the A-Major
form in a fast movement. Piano Quartet-whose structure Christopher
The concepts of both developing variation Wintle characterized as "elemental, section-
and unending melody are relevant to unusual alized"-might at first seem to avoid partici-
formal features in the A-Major Serenade's Ada- pating in an Adagio aesthetic that privileged
gio non troppo, in particular the apparent con- continuity.75 Despite the lush variety of its me-
flict between ABA and sonata signals. The melodic materials, however, none of the sections
lodic process in the middle section seems too is complete in itself, and this through-com-
lengthy, gradual, and complex to bear recapitu- posed element at the boundaries serves to con-
lation, which rules out hearing the section as a nect the diverse ideas into a larger whole.
possible "second group" and the movement as Brahms organized this Adagio around four ap-
a whole as a potential sonata form.73 Yet Brahms pearances of the opening theme, which takes
has clearly referred to the conventions of so- two forms, both of them characterized by at
nata form in the brief development that fol- least one blurred border: the initial version (mm.
lows the long section in A6, as well as in the 1-14 and 86-99) with its inconclusive ending
false return of the main theme in C minor and a second (mm. 24-37 and 127-40) in which
the beginning, as well, is destabilized by a quick
(mm. 68-70). Could the short stretch of devel-
opment serve some purpose other than formal rise in register over a functionally ambivalent
complication? In fact, several new variantsE4 ofchord (see ex. 6a). Another "section," a dra-
matic model and sequence suffused with the
the ostinato are generated in the development
sound of diminished-seventh chords (mm. 15-
23, 100-08), manifestly is transitional: harmoni-
cally unstable and thematically fragmentary.
71Dahlhaus, "Issues in Composition," in Between Roman-
ticism and Modernism: Four Studies in the Music of the And a secondary theme, which appears first in
Later Nineteenth Century, trans. Mary Whittall (Berkeley B minor (mm. 42-57) and then in F minor (mm.
and Los Angeles, 1980), pp. 40-78.
72Walter Frisch, Brahms and the Principle of Developing
Variation (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1984), pp. 83, 128.
73Webster, "Schubert and Brahms's First Maturity (2)," p. 74Dahlhaus, "Issues in Composition," p. 61.
60: "In retrospect one realizes ... that the 'second group,'"7Christopher Wintle, "The 'Sceptred Pall': Brahms's Pro-
besides being in a most unlikely key, is so long and so gressive Harmony," in Brahms 2: Biographical, Documen-
heterogeneous that it could not possibly bear full recapitu-tary and Analytical Studies, ed. Michael Musgrave (Cam-
lation. " bridge, 1987), pp. 197-222, at p. 212.
52
NOTLEY
23 poco a poco tutte corde e una corda The Classical
Adagio
Vn.
espress.
Via. "
dim. pizz.
Vc. _ ___ __ _ _ _
dim.
v0 =-
Pf.
/----- f--
6
4 V? I
b. Mm. 125-28.
pepp
-12
A I -
esress.
- PL-4:. ...
5
006
4 V?
4 V? I
Example 6: Brahms, Piano Quartet in A Major, op. 26, Poco Adagio.
109-26), is cut off at the dominant seventh of note figure works as an agent of flux and of
each key. After the interruption of the B-minor continuity-at times a subterranean presence,
statement, an extended passage (mm. 58-85), at other times more in the foreground-linger-
less theme than Fortspinnung, turns B minor/ ing between thematic statements, then rising
major into the dominant of E major to prepare and falling within them.
the return of the opening theme; the C7 (m. For the Adagio mesto of the Horn Trio, in Eb
125), on which the F-minor statement breaks minor, Brahms devised three short themes,
off, resolves belatedly to the 6 of the destabi- which he then combined, developed, withheld,
lized version of the opening theme (the Bb in m. expanded, and dissolved to create the
125 becomes A# in m. 126; see ex. 6b). Through- movement's treble line. For example, the con-
out most of the movement the persistent eighth- clusion of the principal theme, given to the
53
19TH a. Mm. 13-22.
CENTURY
MUSIC 13
Vn. rpm w .
Hn.
in E6" pp--
Pf.j
p sempre p e legato
Example 7: Brahms, Horn Trio in
ished fifth between

violin and horn (first the fifth and second scalein mm
appearing
degrees, no dominant
11-15), shares pitches with is available
the in theopening
Phrygian
mode, and
piano's quasi refrain in Brahms
m. has suppressed
9 and dominant
again
During the latter, function in the section
part of from anm. 19 through
extend m.
overlap, Brahms31 finesses
generated by fugal thematicthe comple
procedures. The
full cadence: this answer
is the (mm. 21-22; only authentic
ex. 7a) outlines an Eb-mi-
effect, perfect ornorimperfect,
triad, locally the subdominant. in From a con- ent
the
ment (ex. 7a).76 trapuntal
The refrain
combination of the first and continu
the sec-
customary half ond measures of the subject
cadence (m. arises17)
a series of
to i
the third "theme": a chords,
third-related two-measure
preceded by "applied sub- fu
dominants" (mm. 24-26;
ject outlining a B6-minor ex. 7b), which brings
triad.
Remarkably, the fugato
the fugato itself
to a close. The sequence sugg
that follows
Phrygian, which (mm. 27-31)
has the likewisesame
derives frompitches
overlapping as
ral minor; the (partial) statements
Adagio of the fugue subject,
mesto never still m
finitively to without reference
another key. to a dominant.
Because of th
With the restoration of dominant function
come more familiar-sounding formal processes:
76In Daniel Harrison's theory, the augmented-sixth-to-tonica feint at a modulation to BM minor (mm. 32-
cadences in m. 10 and m. 52 would be quasi-plagal. See his
"Supplement to the Theory of Augmented-Sixth Chords,"35), which, on repetition, becomes a retransition
Music Theory Spectrum 17 (1995), 170-95, at 187 and 193.(mm. 36-42). The refrain enters as at the begin-
54
b. Mm. 23-31. MARGARET
NOTLEY
23 The Classical
Adagio
p sempre e legato
27
3V i A, W,,- __W
0-6" No
P dim
dim.
6 P1d1
8 d..m.:
ning, with the fugue subject-ppp, quasi This Adagio mesto shows an array of ma-
niente-now providing a counterpoint to it. nipulations and combinations of its brief themes
When this reprise reaches the point at which (these are not compact enough to be
the "hidden" authentic cadence had occurred Schoenbergian Grundgestalten). Brahms has
earlier, Brahms withholds the refrain and de- been praised and criticized for a similar level of
rails the cadential 6 (mm. 59-60; ex. 7c). Al- detail in other works. His friend Elisabeth von
though the refrain eventually does reappear, Herzogenberg, for example, did both at once
over another 4 chord (m. 77; ex. 7d), an unor- when she wrote in a famous letter to Brahms
thodox resolution again undermines the that the opening movement of the Fourth Sym-
cadential status of the chord, and the refrain phony seemed to be "aimed for the eye of the
begins to unravel. Suppressing and then dis- microscope-user."77 But according to Dommer
solving the refrain enables the climactic over- and Ehlert, listeners' perception of an Adagio is
riding of cadences and phrase expansions (mm. different from that of a faster movement: the
53-68, 73-86) central to the Adagio aesthetic, slow tempo tends to place local events in relief.
and the movement concludes with an extraor- Perhaps the intricacies of Brahms's thematic
dinary plagal cadence (mm. 82-83; only a per-
formance on the natural horn that Brahms stipu-
lated can produce the full effect here) and the77"Auf das Auge des Mikroskopikers berechnet" (Brahms
Briefwechsel, vols. 1-2 (1907), Johannes Brahms im
resolution of the leading tone-by this point,
Briefwechsel mit Heinrich und Elisabet von Herzogenberg,
all that is left of the refrain. ed. Max Kalbeck, II, 86).
55
19TH c. Mm. 58-62.
CENTURY
MUSIC 58
molto p
molto P
V4 I
d. Mm. 76-78.
76 poco rit .................................. tempo primo
I.I, I I A . P
S poco ritb... __ _ _ _ _ _ _ _r_ __,e I _I _ -_

tempo primo
fp p
work are best appreciated at the tempo

out development) of an
for the D-Minor String Quar-
Adagio. Certainly, these tet (op. 34), which heshow
movements composed in 1877 and
the
originality with which hepublished with a dedication
responded to the to Brahms
re- in 1880.
Yet seems
quirements of a genre that aspects of to
the more
have melodically
been enriched
Adagio are
dominated first and foremost byalso in evidence. Inideal
a textural the exposition,
of continuous, even overlapping, thematic
the opening theme establishespro-
D major through
a succession
cesses subsumed within one of thwartedmelodic
prevailing cadences, especially
line. deceptive cadences, before modulating to F#
minor for the transition theme (mm. 23-30).
CODES OF THE ADAGIO The second group is even less decisive tonally.
Spinning out motives from the opening (like
For the young Brahms, a looser approach tosymphonic Andante by Haydn that Brahms
the
had admired), almost the entire second group
what Kurth would call "the fixed formal types"
takes place over a series of dominant pedal
became a prerequisite to fulfilling the demands
points, beginning with an F#7 (mm. 31-38) and
of the Adagio. It is true, of course, that many
later moving to an A7 (mm. 50-55) and then a
Adagios in the later nineteenth century were
composed with more traditional schemata D7in(mm. 59-62) that becomes a D triad (mm.
mind. Dvohik, for instance, wrote a remark-63-66). Even here, is formal novelty the goal or,
rather, a means to the long-breathed melodic
able D-major Adagio that generally follows the
line that results?
norms of "slow-movement" form (sonata with-
56
ppP
NOTLEY
35 zu Vieren portato sempre The Classical
Adagio
Vn.1 1v ppp
01 1portato
. . .-, sempre
I I I i ! cresc.
F F pp cresc. dim.
portato sempre
A I-------- --
Vn. 2 E
pp cresc. dim.
immer hervortretend
Solo lang gezogen
Via. 1
portato sempre p cresc. dim

S- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Via. 2
cresc. pp cresc. dim.
VC. I do
Example 8: Bruckner, String Quintet in F Major, WAB 112, Adagio.
In the epilogue to his book on Beethoven's How did Bruckner's Adagio communicate, in
quartets, Helm connected the expansive phrase Kalbeck's words, "an ecstatic vision right into
structure of Dvohik's Adagio to-what else?- seventh heaven"? While a definitive response
late Beethoven.78 He did not, however, attribute to this question is hardly possible, partial an-
to it the revelatory power of the Adagios from swers can be offered. Bruckner, first of all, took
the late string quartets. Helm, who worked as a sufficient time to develop the universe of sound
critic in Vienna, reserved this ultimate acco- in the Adagio and, in doing this, to stress the
lade for a review of Bruckner's String Quintet meaningfulness of each consecutive event. For
in which he called the Adagio one of example, the entrance of the movement's sec-
ond theme-the more chromatic of the two
the most exalted, radiant, tender, and sonorously themes-is prepared by portato chords played
beautiful written in recent times altogether. ... ppp (mm. 35-36; ex. 8a). Similarly, in the cen-
What a rapturously heartfelt outpouring of feeling, tral section (mm. 77-114), sudden dynamic ex-
flowing forth in one truly "unending" stream! This tremes underscore the increasing chromatic
Adagio has approximately the same effect as if it
mutation and rhythmic diminution of motives
were a newly discovered piece from Beethoven's es-
from this second theme. Although the first
tate, originating in the master's final period and ani-
mated by his full inspiration.79 theme is not implicated in the movement's
crisis, serving instead as a calm foil, a shared
feature between it and the second theme-their
head motives invert each other-is, like other
78Helm, Beethoven's Streichquartette: "Ein D moll-
Quartett, aus dem namentlich das langathmige, ganz und
instances of motivic relationship and transfor-
gar dem Periodenbau des 'letzten Beethoven' nachgebildete
Adagio fesselt" (p. 319). mation, invested with an aura of significance,
79Theodor Helm, Deutsche Zeitung, 8 April 1884: as in the stretto in mm. 77-82 that leads from a
"Eines
der edelsten, verklartesten, zartesten und klangsch6nsten,
partial restatement of the first theme to the
die in neuerer Zeit uberhaupt geschrieben wurden .
climactic development of the second (ex. 8b).
Welch' iberschwinglich inniger, in einem wahrhaft
Monothematicism-or at least the unmis-
'unendlichen' Zuge dahinstromender GeftihlserguB! Diese
Adagio wirkt ungefahr so, als ware es ein erst jetzt in
takable reappearance of motives from the open-
Beethoven's Nachlaf vorgefundenes, aus der letzten Zeit
ing in other themes-seems to have had a higher
Meisters stammendes und von dessen vollster Inspiration
beseeltes Stuck." value in Adagios than in other movement types,
57
19TH b. Mm. 77-84.
CENTURY
MUSIC 77 gezogen
mf cresc.
p gezogen immerfort fi cresc.
p gezogen mf cresc.
P gezogen immerfort
p gezogen mf cresc.
81
f dim. g
f dim. p
p sehr hervortretend
portato
dim. pp gezogen
matic
an apparent consequence ofAdagio of his D-Min
conceptualizing a
108),
Adagio as the generation ofshe
onestated that
melody "in a
repre-
senting a single innertinuity of sentiment
experience. In a letterabov
to
Brahms, Elisabeth von theHerzogenberg
Adagio of the wrote
Violin
about the Adagio of out the one theme
his G-Major String in two
Quin
tet: "Middle sections of
with which modulateschar
a contrasting to t
nant. He also showed
acter are always somewhat an inclination for
painful to theme, an
plagal inflections,
here one color is set off fromcontrapuntal
another (evaded or aban- in
only
order to intensify thedoned) cadences, and imitation
luminosity of between
each, over-
the
feeling flows to the lapping
end phrases
in thatthe
Beethoven preferredgrand
same in such
pulses."80 Regarding late-period
the Adagios as the Cavatina.monothe
similarly Rather than
evoking the stylized immediacy of recitative,
as Beethoven had done in the Cavatina, the
so"Mittelsitze von gegensitzlicher Natur tun mir immer
ein bigchen weh, und hier setzt nur eine Farbe von der
andern ab, um die Leuchtkraft jeder zu verstirken, die
81s"In einem Adagio geniege ich die Kontinuitit der
Stimmung fliegt bis zum Ende in gleichen grotien Pulsen"
(Brahms Briefwechsel, II, 240). Empfindung mehr als alles andre" (ibid., II, 212).
58
finale of the Ab Piano Sonata (op. 110), and String Quintet, monothematicism sounds like
MARGARET
NOTLEY
several other late works, Brahms relied on the an unavoidable fate. The Classical
emotionalism of Gypsy style at climactic mo- In his comments on the Adagio after Adagio
ments in the Violin Sonata (mm. 19-24, 51- Beethoven, Ehlert had written: "Just as we de-
62).82 mand from tragedy different proportions, dif-
From beginning to end, the Adagio of the ferent actions, and a different scope than from
String Quintet features many more of the spe- comedy, so do we require of an Adagio greater
cial effects considered to mark a work as a depth, grander proportions, and a broader out-
l'hongroise (short subphrases, dotted rhythms,look than we do of an Andante, which, it must
augmented seconds, tremolos that imitatebethe said, does not call forth and resolve a con-
cimbalom).83 The movement seems, moreover, flict, but rather is simply a 'Lied,' an instru-
to simulate the Gypsy performance practice mental song."85 Many Adagios do seem to por-
tray an inner experience that includes some
(described in the extremely influential mono-
graph on this music published under Franz struggle: the conflicts within Bruckner's Ada-
gio, the Cavatina, and the Poco Adagio of
Liszt's name) of allowing a soloist to emerge
Brahms's A-Major Piano Quartet crystallize,
from the band and play an elaborate improvisa-
respectively, in the chromatic sequences, the
tion.84 This might account for the unique shape:
five presentations in wildly varying lengths of
central broken line, and the two appearances of
one open-ended theme, the fourth of which the turbulent and incomplete minor-mode
theme. But other Adagios convey a state of
culminates in a dramatic prolonged dominant.
Much of the movement's impact derives from transcendence after the conflicts in previous
the inevitable returns to the same beginning,
movements, as in the Adagios of Beethoven's
despite each internal intensification andNinth
ex- and his E-Minor Quartet-this was
pansion of the theme. In the Adagio of the Berlioz's understanding of the Beethovenian
Adagio.
The greatest imponderable in how and what
an Adagio expresses has to do with the quality
of the basic melodic idea. In a letter from the
82In a review of the D-Minor Violin Sonata, Richard Pohl fall of 1893, Brahms's friend Theodor Billroth
tersely connected the two middle movements to the two reminded him of a conversation in which
halves of the Austro-Hungarian Empire: "Das Adagio ist Billroth had asserted the impossibility of defin-
transleithanisch, das Scherzo cisleithanisch empfunden"
("Von der 26. Tonkiinstler-Versammlung zu Wiesbaden. ing "melody" and even less "why a melody is
27-30 Juni 1889. (Schluss)," Musikalisches Wochenblatt beautiful or not, rich or empty, boring or inter-
19 [1889], 379). But Brahms's contemporaries were by no
means consistent in discerning ethnic accents in music.
esting," an opinion that Brahms had by no
Though Helm noted the Hungarian sound in Brahms's means shared. Billroth had recently heard a
finale, he heard late Beethoven as the "godfather" of the performance of Volkmann's A-Minor String
Adagio. (Deutsche Zeitung, 29 November 1890: "Brahms Quartet (op. 9) and wrote of his dissatisfaction
1ii3t im Finale seines G-dur-Quintetts auf ungarischem
Grund und Boden Zigeuner aufspielen ... das Adagio [D- with the slow movement: "The Adagio, though
moll] des neuen Quintetts, bei dem wohl auch der 'letzte made completely in the broad Beethovenian
Beethoven' zu Gewatter gestanden.") Hanslick likewise style, did not really please me, soon became
heard the "slightly Hungarian coloration" of the finale,
but referred to the Adagio as "perhaps Slavically tinged"
("Neue Quintette von Brahms und Dvoidk" [Neue freie
Presse, 1891], rpt. in Aus dem Tagebuche eines Musikers
[Berlin, 1892], pp. 316-20, at p. 318: "Sanft und innig klagt
das Adagio, ein schwermiithiger, etwas slavisch
angehauchter Gesang in D-moll").
83Jonathan Bellman delineates a "lexicon" of Gypsy/Hun- 85"Ebenso wie wir von der Trag6die andere Maasse, andere
garian idioms in The Style Hongrois in the Music of West- Bewegungen und einen anderen Horizont verlangen wie
ern Europe (Boston, 1993), pp. 93-130; he does not men- von der Kom6die, ebenso verlangen wir vom Adagio
tion this movement in his discussion of Brahms's applica- gr6ssere Vertiefung, grossere Verhiltnisse und grosseren
tions of the style, pp. 201-13. Umblick als von dem Andante, dem wir es gern gestatten,
84Franz Liszt, Die Zigeuner und ihre Musik, Gesammeltedass es keine Konflikte heraufbeschw6rt und schlichtet,
Schriften, vol. 6, ed. and trans. L. Ramann (Leipzig, 1883),sondern nur ein 'Lied,' ein instrumentaler Gesang sei"
pp. 288-89 and p. 294. (Ehlert, "Robert Volkmann," p. 309).
59
19TH boring. But why? "86 Brahms visited his friend innate feeling for the art in question."88 The
CENUTRY three days later to explain "the signs of the invention of a compellingly beautiful melody
'beauty' of a melody." Sarabandes by Bach had long been considered the preserve of the
served as his exemplar of melodic beauty, and genius, a member of an inspired elite. Billroth
he prefaced with a discussion of Goethe's short saw a similar distinction in those who were
poem "Ober allen Gipfeln." According to able to discern the beauty of a melody: for
Billroth, Brahms analyzed this "in the most instance, a gifted upper-middle-class amateur
interesting way," focusing first on the poem's like himself.
sustained mood and semantic integration and Nor was he alone in attributing such sensi-
then on its many subtle technical details: "The tivity to one or more special groups. About the
beautiful cadences . . . the beautiful interrup- Adagios of Haydn's string quartets Ludwig Nohl
tion of the meter . .. the beauty of the rhymes, had written not only that "the German tem-
the 'breath [Hauch]' that lies over the whole: perament expressed itself in sound" in them,
no word could be changed without destroying but also that Haydn's "immediate surroundings
it. The simplicity and conciseness of the whole. [in Hungary] supported this; the Magyar under-
A beautiful Adagio in the form of a poem."87 stood this trait, as one can tell just from the
Goethe's poem a beautiful Adagio: utter perfec- splendid folk melodies that exist in Hungary
tion. Melody and the Adagio were once again and that ensure a certain moving human reso-
locked together-and excluded by this crite- nance, beyond its otherwise bare and primitive
rion, once again, were the Adagios of sensual appeal, even for Gypsy music."89 Hun-
Volkmann's string quartets. garians, who had produced fine folk melodies
In his explication Brahms himself apparently
capturing their own essence, were naturally ca-
ignored weaknesses in Volkmann's Adagio,pable of appreciating "the German tempera-
ment" as expressed in the Adagios of Haydn's
choosing instead to talk about the strengths of
Bach's sarabandes, for the most part focusing
string quartets. Nohl thus allowed Hungarians
on fine points in Bach's voice leading and han-into his select group of sensitive souls, even as
dling of cadences. Billroth was delighted that he more or less excluded Gypsies.
Brahms did not provide a specific answer to his In 1933 (among other things, the centennial
question, for he believed that the perception of
of Brahms's birth), the Hungarian musicologist
melodic beauty depended on the responsive- Lajos Koch devoted a monograph to describing
ness of the listener: "Any analysis concerned
Brahms's ties to Budapest and his enthusiasm
with the beauty of a work of art makes sense
for Gypsy bands. After finding Gypsy idioms in
a large number of works that Brahms com-
only to someone who already has a particular,
posed between 1854 and 1880 for piano (two
86Billroth und Brahms im Briefwechsel, ed. Otto Gottlieb-

Billroth (Berlin, 1935), pp. 473-74, from letter of 16 No-
vember 1893: "Du wirst Dich kaum noch erinnern, dafg
wir einmal diber die Definition von 'Melodie' sprachen,
und dafg ich es fir unm6glich erklarte, eine solche in 88"Es bestitigt das alles die Meinung, die ich mir schon
Worten zu geben; noch weniger scheint es mir moglich zu gebildet hatte. Zu der letzten Ursache, warum etwas
sein, zu definieren, warum eine Melodie sch6n oder poetisch oder musikalisch sch6n ist, kann man nicht
unsch6n, gehaltvoll oder leer, langweilig oder interessant vordringen, weil es Sache der individuellen Empfindung
ist. Du warst nicht meiner Meinung. . . . Ich h6rte ist. Jede Analyse eines Kunstwerkes auf seine Sch6nheit
vorgestern abend ein Streichquartett von Volkmann in A- ist nur demjenigen verstindlich, der ein gewisses
Moll. Das Adagio, ganz im breiten Beethovenschen Stil spezifisches Gefuhl ftir die betreffende Kunst angeboren
gemacht, hat mir aber nicht recht gefallen wollen, wurde hat" (Billroth und Brahms im Briefwechsel, p. 476, from
mir bald langweilig. Warum eigentlich?" notes dated 19 November 1893).
87"Ober Zeichen der 'Sch6nheit' einer Melodie"; 89"Das deutsche Gemiith t6nte sich aus ... kam ihm seine
"analysierte dasselbe in interessantester Weise"; "Die nahere Umgebung entgegen, diesen Zug verstand der
sch6nen Kadenzen. ... Die sch6ne Unterbrechung des Magyar ... und wenn man es nur aus den wundervollen
Versmafges.... Der sch6ne Klang der Reime, der 'Hauch,' Volksweisen wiisste, die in Ungarn leben und die selbst
der iiber dem Ganzen liegt: man k6nnte kein Wort andern, der Zigeunermusik iiber ihr sonstiges blosses
ohne zu zerst6ren. Die Einfachheit und Kirze des Ganzen. Natursinnenwesen hinaus einen gewissen menschlich
Ein sch6nes Adagio in Liedform" (ibid., pp. 475-76, from ergreifenden Widerhall sichern" (Nohl, Entwickelung der
notes dated 19 November 1893). Kammermusik, p. 61).
60
and four hands) and for various chamber en- Some of the thorniest problems in musicol-
MARGARET
NOTLEY
sembles, Koch made this revealing assertion: ogy inevitably converge in any discussion of
The Classical
the Adagio that attempts to go beyond formal Adagio
If the process of assimilation that had taken place in categorization: the dilemma of how to write
Brahms's spirit up until then had showed itself above about melody9' and the difficulty of dealing
all in quick movements, one can see in his later with questions of expression, in particular, the
works that now he devoted himself to the Hungar- often-shared experience of "depth" and special
ian thematic style in slow movements, as well. Just
significance in this repertory. I confess to count-
as, in the beginning, Brahms had been impressed by
ing myself among the "sensitive souls" to
music in the Gypsy style, now he absorbed the true,
whom Adagios speak powerfully. And after in-
unadulterated essence of Hungarian folk music and
assimilated it into his chamber works. The most vestigating nineteenth- and twentieth-century
commentaries on them, I have come to sympa-
beautiful examples of this are the slow movements
of the Piano Trio in C Major, op. 87, the Stringthize with the idea that melodic process and
texture may indeed be more telling features
Quintet in G Major, op. 111, and the Clarinet Quin-
tet in B Minor, op. 115.90 than any such work's adherence to, or devia-
tion from, a presumed formal type. It now
What Brahms had listened to in Budapest and makes a certain amount of sense to me to group
in Vienna's Prater was presumably popularthe opening fugue of Beethoven's C#-Minor
music composed, for the most part, by Hungar- Quartet with the Adagio of the "Hammer-
ians and performed by Gypsies; certainly, klavier"
he Sonata rather than the Grosse Fuge,
did not hear any of the "authentic Hungarian" and the variations-Adagio, ma non troppo e
folk music that Bart6k had uncovered well be-
molto cantabile-from the Eb Quartet (op. 127)
fore Koch wrote his essay. Why, then, did Kochwith the former two movements rather than
suddenly make an ungrounded and seemingly with the variations-Andante ma non troppo e
irrelevant distinction between Gypsy music and molto cantabile-from the C#-Minor Quartet
Hungarian folk music? Clearly, it was because (despite the tempo changes in both sets of varia-
Koch was now treating slow movements that tions). At some level the Adagio molto semplice
Brahms's style became pristinely Hungarian: e cantabile from the C-Minor Piano Sonata (op.
the link between the mystique of the Adagio 111) has "always" sounded like transcendence
and a national or ethnic essence had shown upto me-or, at least, it began to sound that way
in (what should have been) an unlikely place. after I had listened to Beethoven for a while.
For extended exposure to this repertory and an
attitude of nonresistance to traditions of musi-
9?Wolfgang Ebert, "Brahms in Ungarn: Nach der Studie
'Brahms Magyarorsag6n' von Lajos Koch," in Studien zur cal expression-rather than Billroth's "particu-
Musikwissenschaft: Beihefte der Denkmdaler der Tonkunst lar, innate feeling"-must be overwhelming fac-
in Osterreich, vol. 37 (Tutzing, 1986), pp. 103-64 at 155: tors in all of this. The "deepest" moment in art
"Hat sich der Assimilierungsvorgang, der in Brahms' Seele
wirkte, bisher vor allem in schnellen Satzen gezeigt, so music may thus be saturated with dilemmas
kann man in seinen spiteren Werken beobachten, dafg er
and problems. Is it any wonder that we 04.
nun auch in langsamen Sitzen sich der ungarischen avoid writing about Adagios? W
Thematik zuwendet. Ebenso wie Brahms anfangs von der
Art der Zigeunermusik beeindruckt wurde, nahm er jetzt
die wahre, unverfalschte Eigenart der ungarischen
Volksmusik in sich auf und verarbeitete sie in seinen
Kammermusikwerken. Die sch6nsten Beispiele sind
die langsamen Sitze des Klaviertrios in C-Dur op. 87,
des Streichquintetts in G-Dur op. 111 und des
91Ruth A. Solie pinpointed this problem more than two
Klarinettenquintetts in h-Moll op. 115." Ebert has trans-
decades ago in her Metaphor and Model in the Analysis of
lated from the Hungarian and provided some commentary
on Koch's original essay. Melody (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 1977).
61

Late 19th Century Chamber Music and The Cult of The Classical Adagio

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Late-Nineteenth-Century Chamber Music and the Cult of the Classical Adagio

Author(s): Margaret Notley

6Aesthetics and the Art of Musical Composition in the

27Kurth, Bruckner, 2 vols. (Berlin, 1925), I, 497: "Vor allem

Example 1: Beethoven, String Quartet in Bb Major, op. 130, Cavatina.

53Heinrich Christoph Koch, Musikalisches Lexikon welches

Piano Sonata in C Major, op. 1 Andante 1853

1. Cl. in %B-"6," p molto espr.

theme that would

Adagio mesto p espress.

a. Mm. 18-21 (hypothetical unexpanded version).

Example 5: Brahms, Serenade in A Maj

that cadence by the sixteenth-note

C1. in B6 b,& R--g p'C

Bsn. dim. Solo . -,

P I I ' - ' __1_ -

Example 6: Brahms, Piano Quartet in A Major, op. 26, Poco Adagio.

Example 7: Brahms, Horn Trio in

ished fifth between

76 poco rit .................................. tempo primo

S poco ritb... __ _ _ _ _ _ _ _r_ __,e I _I _ -_

work are best appreciated at the tempo

portato sempre p cresc. dim

cresc. pp cresc. dim.

Example 8: Bruckner, String Quintet in F Major, WAB 112, Adagio.

p gezogen immerfort fi cresc.

86Billroth und Brahms im Briefwechsel, ed. Otto Gottlieb-

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