Brahms Symphony No. 4- 2nd movement
WHO SAYS THERE IS NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN?
By Brahms’ time, a great gulf existed between music theory and musical practice. The essence of musical composition lies in creativity, and discoveries made by the human mind, including discoveries of new possibilities in the musical system, such as scales and keys. Music theory often leaves the human mind out of it, and presents scales, keys, and chords as fixed and unchanging, as "The Law." (In the 20th century there were many law-breakers, but you really want "not to overthrow the law, but to fulfill it.")
New Modalities in the Second Movement
In the first movement, we heard an unprecedented development of the “motivfuhrung”—the “Principle of Least Action” in music. Do we get a break from this idea and its gravitas in the second movement? No way, it intensifies! Brahms is fighting against the romantic idea that artistic creativity lies in an arbitrary notion of freedom to do whatever one wants.
I will explain this in words as much as possible, but the accompanying audio is indispensable. Some things have to be heard.
(Audio link: https://drive.google.com/.../14q7ApMEVFrEvdxS364V.../view...)
The first movement began in a bare-bones way, but the opening of the second movement is even more stark. While the first movement flowed in up-and-down motions of an interval and its inversions (with other instruments playing related things), the second movement is even more restricted. It begins with a solo horn playing an unaccompanied phrase. Other instruments join in, but either in unison or at the octave. There is only one theme. It centers around the tone E, moving up by a half-step and a whole step, and then down by two whole steps—an up and down motion that cannot but help remind us of the first movement.
E E F G, E E D C, E E F G, EE F G E (hear it in the audio)
It is relentless, unique and challenging.
What should our reaction be, A or B?
A. Brahms is challenging us with something that cannot be comprehended from any known theory! He gives us the key signature of E major, with its 4 sharps, and immediately, all 4 of them are negated in that opening. F# C# G# and D# all become naturals. What is he doing, and where is he going with this?
B. No worries. It's in the Phrygian mode.
Brahms is posing a problem for us to solve. Most musical theory avoids problem-solving. If we cannot explain something, we feel uneasy, and slap a name on it. That allows us to relax, and feel that we understand what is going on. Do we really understand it though, just by naming it?
In analyzing music, one has to have the courage to experiment, to re-situate the tones, and examine how they might have been done differently. This helps us understand the nature of the actual creative discovery made by the composer.
The opening tones (E E F G, E E D C, E E ) are more of a question than a statement. Let us assume for a minute that we have never heard of the Phrygian mode. How then does one account for these tones? They sound somewhat like e minor, but that key has F# as the second step, and here we have F natural instead. They could also be in C major, or A minor (as demonstrated in the audio). That ambiguity brings us into the realm of hypothesis. It is not a theme in one mode based on sense-certainty, like a simple statement in the indicative mood in language; it has the potential to exist in many modes, and its meaning differs in each mode. That potential sets our minds on fire, in a way that a "self-evident" simple statement of a single meaning could not.
What Brahms does is more like a play on words by Shakespeare. Take, from the opening of King Lear, the pun on the verb "to conceive", in Gloucester's acknowledgment of his bastard son Edmund:
KENT
Is not this your son, my lord?
GLOUCESTER
His breeding, sir, hath been at my charge: I have
so often blushed to acknowledge him, that now I am
brazed to it.
KENT
I cannot conceive you.
GLOUCESTER
Sir, this young fellow's mother could...
This is not Shakespeare entertaining himself with his own wit. The question of "what is legitimate" grows, as the play proceeds. Likewise, the ambiguities introduced by Brahms, develop and grow in their importance.
After the first 8 measures, the theme repeats a 3rd higher, on the clarinet, in the key of E major. Should we now say:
A. "It is as if he started on the Earth, and now is on the Moon. How, exactly, did he get there?"
or,
B. " No worries. He begins in the Phrygian mode, then continues in E major."
Further Enigmas in this Movement
This author has seen failed attempts to explain this movement from standard theory, where keys become absurd, and chords absurder. You have to step outside of the musical system as taught and invoke a principle.
How did he get from the Phrygian mode to E major, from earth to the moon? One of the great principles in science, including musical science, is that of inversion. Inversion usually works by inverting themes, then developing the ironies invoked. Brahms revived inverting entire scales. Now you are practicing the role of inversion in the entire musical system itself.
What is the relationship of the Phrygian mode to E major? It is a mirror image! Take the E major scale, E F# G# A -B C# D# E, and invert it. That is, make it descend by the same intervals as it ascends (WT WT HT- WT WT HT), and you obtain E D C B -A G F E, the Phrygian mode. (see example 1)
Aha! Now we have the two modes as "a One" (just as a violinist's two hands, though different, function as a one), through the process of inversion. Does the second movement begin then, in the Phrygian mode, and proceed to its inversion E major, or vice-versa? Can we now just slap names on scales and keys, or must we comprehend a process of transformation as fundamental?
Again, should our verdict be:
A. " This helps, but there is something unsettling about this E major."
B. "Worries solved! E major and the Phrygian mode are inversions of one another. Let's go home, and watch TV!"
There is indeed something unsettling in the supposed E major section that begins at measure 5! Brahms advances the process of inversion further. The major scale has two symmetrical tetra-chords. Both proceed WT WT HT: In the case of E major:
WT WT HT
E F# G# A and,
WT WT HT
B C# D# E.
The Lydian interval, or tritone (in this case A#), lies between them (see audio).
What if we invert the tetra-chords? If we match the ascending
WT WT HT
pattern E F# G# A, with the same intervals descending. That gives us:
WT WT HT
E D C B from the e minor scale, another mirror image!
That gives us a scale of E F# G# A / B C D E . That is exactly what Brahms employs! This author has heard Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven play between major and minor, invoking their in-betweenness. He has never heard any of them dwell in that "uncomfort zone" of both modes at once. Brahms is not in both major and minor in some nebulous way. With only a couple of exceptions, this passage is major in the first tetra-chord (E F# G# A), and minor in the second (B C D E).
As far as I know, that is an invention of Brahms. Again, please listen to the audio, where we help clarify that quality, including by demonstrating how the passage might sound in either E major or e minor.
Stay tuned for part 2, where we will follow the development of the movement!
