Chapter 38

BALLADE IN G

MINOR FOR

PIANOFORTE

(SEE SUPPLEMENT NO. 60)

Although the most important factor in Brahms’s pianoforte
pieces is Brahms himself, a careful examination of his works
in this field shows that his style is fashioned from an intelligent,
and by no means slavish assimilation of important features in the
works of his great predecessors. Thus we find the same melodic
warmth as in Schubert, the rhythmic vitality and massive har-
mony so prominent in Schumann and the extended arpeggios
and chords, the color and richness, peculiar to Chopin. From
among the numerous and beautiful compositions of Brahms for
solo pianoforte we have selected the Ballade in G minor because
it represents a somewhat unusual and hence seldom recognized
side of his genius—the specifically dramatic. When a composer
calls his piece a Ballade, as in the case of compositions so en-
titled by Chopin and Liszt, we may assume that there is some
dramatic or subjective meaning behind the notes; and the hearer
is at liberty to give play to his own imagination and to receive
the message as something more than music in the ordinary ab-
stract or absolute sense. From the inner evidence of this Ballade
of Brahms it seems to the writer[267] not too fanciful to con-