| The body of Johannes Brahms's output of secular choral-orchestral music centers upon four works which reflect the fatalistic vein in Brahms's personal philosophy: the Alto Rhapsody, Schicksalslied, Nanie and the subject of this project, the Gesang der Parzen.;This study attempts to assess the significance of this work in the context of its own genre and in Brahms's overall output. It includes a discussion of the relationship between Brahms's life in the early 1880s, his world-view and the philosophical outlook presented in the Gesang der Parzen. The impulses behind the work's creation are examined, including factors which drew Brahms to the classically-influenced poetry of Goethe in general, and to Iphigenia auf Tauris and Iphigenia's "Song of the Fates" in particular. Musical and extra-musical influences on the style of the work are discussed, and Brahms's philosophical and musical responses to the stance of the text are considered. In addition, aspects of motivic development and the work's somewhat problematical formal structure are examined.;The author also deals with a number of performance-practice issues which confront the conductor contemplating a performance of the Gesang der Parzen, including recent discoveries in Brahms scholarship and experiments in performance of the Brahms, choral-orchestral repertory. |
