7 The 100 Most Influential Musicians of All Time 7Schumann was first taken mentally ill in 1854, Brahms
assisted Clara Schumann in managing her family.
Between 1857 and 1860 Brahms moved between the
court of Detmold—where he taught the piano and con-
ducted a choral society—and Göttingen, while in 1859 he
was appointed conductor of a women’s choir in Hamburg.
Such posts provided valuable practical experience and left
him enough time for his own work. At this point Brahms’s
productivity increased, and, apart from the two Serenades
for orchestra and the first String Sextet in B-flat Major
(1858– 60), he also completed his turbulent Piano Concerto
No. 1 in D Minor (1854–58).
By 1861 he was back in Hamburg, and in the following
year he made his first visit to Vienna, with some success;
he settled in Vienna in 1863, assuming direction of the
Singakademie, a fine choral society. There, despite a few
failures and constant attacks by the Wagnerites, his music
was established, and his reputation grew steadily. By 1872
he was principal conductor of the Society of Friends of
Music (Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde), and for three
seasons he directed the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
In between these two appointments in Vienna,
Brahms’s work flourished and some of his most significant
works were composed. The year 1868 witnessed the com-
pletion of his most famous choral work, Ein deutsches
Requiem (A German Requiem), which had occupied him
since Schumann’s death. This work, based on biblical texts
selected by the composer, made a strong impact at its first
performance at Bremen on Good Friday, 1868. With the
Requiem, which is still considered one of the most signifi-
cant works of 19th-century choral music, Brahms moved
into the front rank of German composers.
Brahms was also writing successful works in a lighter
vein. In 1869 he offered two volumes of Hungarian Dances
for piano duet; these were brilliant arrangements of Roma