Great composers of music

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Part of The Young Citizen: The Magazine for Young People

Title: Great composers of music
Year: 1940
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Fulltext: THE YOUNG .CITIZEN Dmmber, 1940 MUSIC APPRECIATION SECTION GREAT COMPOSERS OF MUSIC By BERT PAUL OSBON• X. BRAHMS, INTELLECTUAL COMPOSER Brahms in Earlier Life THERE is a As a boy, Brahms' first teacher in group of three music was his father. Later he studied of the world's with other music teachers, who gave him greatest mu· excellent training in piano-playing and sical compos· music-writing. His regular schooling ers who are and his study of music went steadily for. known as "the ward, and his strong desire for writing three B's." music was carefully developed. T h e y a r e Opportunity knocked at the door of Bach, Bee· the youthful Brahms when Remenyi thoven, and (ray-men-yee), a famous Hungarian Brahms. You violinist, took the twenty-year old boy h ave r ea d on tour as an accompanist. Through this perhaps about . great vielinist Brahms learned the gypsy Bach, "the mefodies which he later used in his well· father of modern music" in the January, known compositions known as Hungarian 19+0, issue. of THE YOUNG CITIZEN, and Dances. about Beethoven, the. musical genius, in . Brahms was a youth in Germany when the July, 1940, issue. Now you shall Liszt and Schumann were leaders in the learn about Brahms, the third of "the musical world. (Liszt is mentioned in three B's," who, as a musical composer, .the November, 1940, issue of THE YOUNG was, indeed, a most intellectual composer. CITIZEN in the Music Appreciation Sec· Brahms was an intellectual genius. tion, and there is an article on Schumann In listening to his great symphonies in the September, ·1940, issue.) one must pay very close attention to the You will remember, perhaps, that music and listen as hard as he can Schumann was a music critic. It was Johannes Br;hms (pronounc~d yo· Schumann who brought Brahms to the hahn-es brahmz) was born in Hamburg, attentio.n ?f the public, for his. articles Germany, in 1833. His first twenty in music Journals drew attention to the years were years of rigid discipline. His excellent compositions of Brahms. Schu· father was a dou·ble-bass player in a mann's encouragement spurred him on theater orchestra. The father's income to greater effort, for he hailed Brahms was hardly enough to support the family, as "a musical prophet," a writer of so young Brahms, in order to increase music. "the like of which he had never the family income, did all manner of odd heard before." jobs from blacking boots to playing in his During the early part. of Brahms' father's band. career he appeared frequently as a pian· ist and conductor; he also spent a few •Formerly Supervisor· of Public School Music, years in teaching music and composing Mount Lebanon, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, . U.S.A. it, and then we see him a mature genius. December, 1940 THE YOUNG CITIZEN The latter part of his life was given over entirely to composition. Like Beethoven, he passed most of his life in Vienna, which was then the musical center of the world. He never wrote an opera an"d was never married; he once said, "I do not have the courage to make a start in either." Brahms' music stands beside that of mastery of music was like that of Beethoven. In the time of Brahms other composers were trying new ways of writing music. In the excitement of these new ways of developing musical composition, Brahms quietly recalled to the public mind that nobility of thought and beauty of form are. necessary in great music. Brahms is·known as a "conservative" composer, but his music always shows great intellectual ability. A player must have excellent tecl\nic in order to per f or m music composed by Brahms. He always used imagination in his music, as well as dignity. In some ways, his music shows a blending of the old and the new way of writing music. Bach and Beethoven. To their classic method of composition he added all the beauty and richness of the instrumentation of a modern symphony orchestra. He wrote four glorious symphonies, some pieces called H11ngar-ian Dances, a Re- · quiem (a setting of the mass for the dead), much chamber music · (music to be played by a small group of instruments), many piano compositions, and many songs. His art songs take their place beside those of Schubert. (See JOHANNES BRAHMS As a writer of songs, choral works, string quartets, and s y m p h o n i e s, Brahms r.anks as the chief master in His lost picture, taken ]u11e 15, 1896 the article about Schubert in the June, 1940, issue of THE YOUNG CITIZEN.) Brahms was a man of exceedingly broad Intellect. That is why he is sometimes refer.red to as "the intellectual composer." However, he was always cordial with his friends, and magnanimous with other musicians of his time. He was somewhat like Bach, inasmuch as he took his work seriously, but his the period just after 1850. His work is of great interest and value to all good musicians. REVIEW QUESTIONS I. Can you name the music composers who are called "the three B's"? 2. Can you sp.ell and pronounce each · name correctly? (bahk, ba-to-v'n, (Please turn to page 477.) Decemher, 1940 THE YOUNG CITIZEN 477 SHIP OF THE DESERT BRAHMS PUPPET THEATER (Continued from pag; 465) (Continued from page 463) ( Conti~ued from page 474) traveling 250 or more-miles brahmz) Much of our scenery is a day across the burning 3. Can you t e 11 of homemade. Our favorite sand and rocky hills. Then Brahms' early life? scenes are those we painted the baby camel is put into 4. What music critic ourselves. Some pieces of a hammock, and is carried bro u g ht the music of scenery are glued on· blocks by one of the freight camels. Brahms to the attention of of wood, like huge boulders This freight camel may car- the p"ublic? How? for the center of the stage. ry many other things' besides 5. Can you give a list of Our ch~racters are most -leather bags of water, compositions by Brahms? of them either of our own bales of cloth and dates, designing or cut from jugs of oil, and blocks of . d d . h magazines and mounted. rock salt. · ared provh~ he wit d spongy (This is a good occupation Th . . pa s w 1c sprea some- f 1 h"ld ) ere 1s a curious reason h h . lk or a conva escent c 1 . why the baby camel is not w at as .t e. ammal wa s They move on stiff wires, put on his mother's back. on the yieldmg sand.. pushed or pulled invisibly. Camels are so stupid that _There are no record~ of Some stages have grooves if the mother could not see ~ild camels, _so d~mesl!ca- for the figures to move in, her baby, even if he were on lion '?ust have oeen ac- but o1.1rs can move freely all her own back, she would c~mphshed early. In the over the stage. The wires be apt to think he ha"d been Bible we read that Abra- are soldered to flat pieces of left behind. Then she might ham took on his journey zinc with upright bent turn and run back to the last "she e p a n d oxen and ; pieces soldered to the center camping place. If the baby camels." We read also that. to hold the. figures. We is on another camel she can Job at one time had 6,000, have about a dozen wires. see him, and she ' follows camels. In niodern times 1 1 (Figure 4) contentedly. some Arabian and African If two persons manipuAfter the day's march tribes own hundreds of; late t?e "'.ires, standi_ng at she has her baby all to her- I thousands of these animals. op~osite sides of the stage self. She nurses him and I · (hidden by the curtains), pets him with her sensitive - - - they can work v~ry efficientsplit lip. He cuddles up to REVIEW ly _and also g1v~. greater. her for warmth for after I I. Why is the camel variety to the voices than the terrible heat 'of the day, called "the ship of the des- if only one person puts on the desert nights are often ert"? the P!ay. . cold. 2. How is the camel It IS lots of fun to have a There are two kinds of adapted to desert life? puppet theater. First make camels.-the Arabian, or 3. Tell of the camel's t~e the:\ Then write the single-humped camel of disposition. IP ay. adefithe necessary A · S . . . scenery an gures. Pracrab1a, yria,. and Africa; 4. ~hy ao Y?u th~nk the tice speakin the words and and the Bac~rian ~amel of camel 1s a stupid ammal? operating t;e figures. Then western Asia. with two 5. How is the camel use- you are ready to have an humps. The feet of both ful to man? audience.