Lateness and Brahms: Music and Culture in the Twilight of Viennese Liberalism
Margaret Notley
Abstract
Brahms's self-identity and public identity as a Liberal are the basis for the two historical perspectives in this book. One reconstructs his place in Vienna. The other draws on criticism conditioned by Western Marxism, on ideas developed in response to 19th-century Liberalism. Brahms appears not to have recognized a societal problem of late Liberalism: exaggerated emphasis on the individual. He did, however, recognize a related musical problem delineated by Adorno — individualized themes at the expense of the formal whole — and made it central to his lifework. Commentary on Brahms's chamber mu ... More
Brahms's self-identity and public identity as a Liberal are the basis for the two historical perspectives in this book. One reconstructs his place in Vienna. The other draws on criticism conditioned by Western Marxism, on ideas developed in response to 19th-century Liberalism. Brahms appears not to have recognized a societal problem of late Liberalism: exaggerated emphasis on the individual. He did, however, recognize a related musical problem delineated by Adorno — individualized themes at the expense of the formal whole — and made it central to his lifework. Commentary on Brahms's chamber music draws on other ideas articulated by Adorno and Lukács such as “second nature”, while discussion of ideology of the symphony applies Habermas's explanation of the “public sphere”, in both instances to move between social and musical problems associated with late Liberalism. Emphasis is placed on Brahms's diverse sources of renewal and on an under-explored facet of his music: his mastery of ways and degrees of establishing a key in this late period of tonality. With Brahms's works and his circumstances as exemplars, an addendum to late-style dialectics is proposed: late works are at once an expression of their time and alienated from the contemporary context. For better and worse, Brahms remained an orthodox Liberal. Thus, despite his allegiance to German nationalism he did not succumb to the tribalism that became critical around 1890.
Keywords:
Adorno,
chamber music,
German nationalism,
individualism,
late style,
late Liberalism,
Lukács,
Vienna,
Western Marxism
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2006 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780195305470 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: May 2008 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195305470.001.0001 |
