Variationen über ein Thema von Schumann fis-moll Op.9 - Brahms, Johannes

Brahms, Johannes : Variationen über ein Thema von Schumann fis-moll Op.9

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▼Overview

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▼Movements

▼Videos

▼Sheet Music

Work Overview

Music ID : 1541

Composition Year：1854　
Publication Year：1854
First Publisher：Breitkopf und Härtel
Instrumentation：Piano Solo　
Genre：variation
Total Playing Time：19 min 00 sec
Copyright：Public Domain

Commentary (1)

Author : Wada, Mayuko

Last Updated: July 1, 2007

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Note: This article is automatically translated from the original Japanese text. The author of the original work did not supervise this translation.

The theme was taken from the first piece of "Fünf Albumblätter" within Schumann's Bunte Blätter (meaning something like "Colorful Leaves" or "Colorful Pages"), Op. 99.

Brahms composed 16 variations based on this theme. Variations 1 to 9 and 12 to 16 were composed in June 1854, while Variations 10 and 11 were composed on August 12, St. Clare's Day, all in Düsseldorf.

Since being rescued from his attempt to drown himself in the Rhine, Schumann had already been admitted to a mental hospital, experiencing daily fluctuations in his condition. Meanwhile, Clara Schumann was dedicating all her efforts to supporting her family. It was at this time that Brahms composed these variations, dedicating them to Clara as a gesture of comfort to her and respect for Schumann.

In a letter from Clara to Brahms, she wrote: "I have read through the variations, but reading notes still strains my head, so I couldn't understand them as fully as I wished. However, I can tell that it is a very earnest and humorous piece, in a very Brahmsian way." Schumann, who was in the hospital, was delighted upon seeing the completed score that was sent to him, writing about its diversity and brilliance: "How clearly your deep study of counterpoint shines through in all the variations! How gentle, how firm in expression, how original, and how full of invention each of them is!"

Each variation in this piece adopts, so to speak, the style of a character variation, written quite freely without strictly adhering to the theme's structure, harmony, or bass line movement. For this reason, it is also important to recognize the origin of the connection between each variation and the theme. Through his thorough study of the possibilities of variation, Brahms later developed a different approach to variations compared to Schumann. That is, he began to avoid free variations with a tenuous connection to the theme. This piece is thus considered to mark a turning point or a transitional period in Brahms's composition of variations.

Writer: Wada, Mayuko