Janet Baker’s Brahms Alto Rhapsody

Brahms

The famous contralto singer, Janet Baker is 77. I remember listening to her from LP records in the early 1970s, recordings of Elgar (Sea Pictures), Mahler (Ruckert Songs & Kindertotenlieder) and Brahms (Alto Rhapsody) and being moved by the dramatic force of her voice. Recently I listened to a CD recording (The Very Best of Janet Baker) hearing as if from a long time past, her rendition of the Brahms Alto Rhapsody, recorded in 1971. She sang it with the John Aldis Choir (men’s voices) and the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir Adrian Boult.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

What is in this sublime work of art? For a start, in the lyrics, there is an extract from the poem Harzreise im Winter (Winter Journey in the Harz Mountains) by that genius of geniuses, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. A man is lost in the woods, so goes the poem (have we not all had this feeling?) and the alto woman’s voice observes “the barren waste swallows him up”, surely a reference, among other things, to acute depression, the dark night of the soul. Brahm’s opening music reflects this as we look down into the abyss. It is extraordinary. One feels as if one is teetering on a peak looking down into the depths. The solemn solidity of the music (the healing power of art) keeps us safe, fixed in our seats here on earth and yet we look down. She asks: “Who can heal the pains of a man for whom balm has become poison, who has imbibed hatred of mankind from the abundance of love?” The opposite of love is both hate and indifference, I recall. But from where do these two evils come, the one so passionate, the other so cold?

Edvard Munch, The Scream

The “dark foreboding” of this solo part, is followed by the uplifting message of the latter (in the major key) accompanied by a male choir. The melody of this section once heard is never forgotten, as it bubbles along, double notes on triple notes, a key component of Brahms’ compositions. Here is the healing. It has come from a female force and a chorus of males. But why is it in this format? I suggest that the format of female & males is representative of that Eternal Feminine Goethe refers to in the second part of Faust, a reference to the Virgin Mother, Isis/Mary/Sophia, Wisdom of the Cosmos, who watches over all of us with deep compassion and in suffering. I think of those powerful, harmonious four male parts as the voices of the four evangelists who have given us all that we can hold onto in the four Gospel revelations. This has been represented in paintings, by such great artists as Giotto in the thirteenth century, and onwards. We thank Mother Isis/Mary/Sophia (cosmic wisdom itself) and the evangelists, whoever they are, and all those artists all, who put pen to paper and paint on brush, before Giotto through Goethe, beyond Brahms, past Janet Baker, Sir Adrian Boult, the male chorus, and yes, the recording studio. They are all history now. From the eternal wisdom and compassion of art, their art shared with us, we can rise from the horrors of acute depression.

Here are links to Part 1 and to Part 2. You will be transported.

Giotto, c1267-1337