Brahms and brothels
William Sommerwerck
Hamburg's Animierlokalen ("stimulation pubs"). This was more like a western
saloon than a brothel, but prostitutes did indeed ply their trade there.
Ian Pace
"William Sommerwerck" <gizzle...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:pLidna75Td-...@comcast.com...
recent 'Johannes Brahms: Life and Letters' by Styra Avins, she writes the
following:
'In the mean time, Johannes was attending school. The notion that Brahms
came from a poverty-stricken home and had no formal education is widespread
but entirely unfounded. The parents themselves were descended from modest,
simply educated, self-respecting families. Poverty was no more part of their
heritage than of Johannes's. Although money was always a nagging issue in
the Brahms household, the record unearthed by recent scholarship shows
mother and father regularly scraping together the rent, moving house
frequently in an effort to find more suitable living quarters, and educating
both Johannes and his younger brother Fritz Brahms (born in 1835) in the
best schools and by the best music teachers they could afford. There was
food on the table - even special foods for birthday celebrations and
holidays. The family lived among the respectable working poor, a category
which included people who are today classed as professionas: among his
neighbours were a number of musicians, including his piano teacher. The
Cossels, in fact, moved into a flat vacated by the Brahms family, an
unlikely event if the dwelling ahd been the dismal slum biographers have
presumed.
It is important to make this point, for many authors, borrowing from each
other, have told the same unsubstantiated stories of the poverty of the
young Brahms, and how, as a child, he was sometimes pulled out of bed at
night to play the piano in disreputable bars, or sailors' dives or brothels.
There is no evidence whatsoever to back up these stories, much as they
appeal to the romantic imagination.
Brahms's mother was a religious and intelligent woman, devoted to her three
children. She loved Johannes with a warmth and understanding reflected in
many of her letters to him, and in his own later letters to family and
freinds. If the father was less sophisticated, and more modest in his
ambition for his sons, he nevertheless devoted much hard-earned money to
their upbringing. It defies plausibility that, having expended so much
efforts and money on educating their children, these parents would then
require them to work in sailors' saloons and brothels that were dangerous
and unsavoury. Recent scholarship supports this view. modern researchers
have sifted through much primary documentary evidence on the subject and
paint a substantially different picture from that of the most widely quoted
biography of Brahms, by a contemporary of Brahms's named Max Kalbeck. One
distinguished historian writes: 'Even if Brahms himself speaks of having
"played the piano at night in bars", it is out of the question that these
were disreputable saloons. Kalbeck's remark [...the biographer expresses
deep emotion at the picture of the innocent, blond-haired, blue-eyed youth
playing in the worst possible company] is nowhere verified by him [Kalbeck],
and is simply false.'*
Not only is there no evidence that Brahms played in low-class dives of the
sailors' quarter (which was in the outlying area of St Pauli, while Brahms
lived in the city near the Alster Pavilion), there is also no evidence, only
perpetuated rumour, that Brahms played anywhere at all before he was 14
years old. In preparing her Brahms biography, the first to appear in England
and, like Kalbeck's, written soon after his death, Florence May had the
sensible idea of interviewing people who had known him. Christian Otterer
was a violist who lived a few doors away from the Brahms family on the
Dammtorwall and worked for years with Johann Jakob both at the Alster
Pavilion and in the Hamburg Philharmonic. He had even participated in
Johannes's first concert, a private subscription concert held when the
composer was a 10-year old, given in order to raise money for furthering the
education of the exceptional little boy. Otterer told her: 'With the best
will I cannot recollect that Johannes played, as a young child in 'Lokals'
[drinking establishments]. I was daily with his father at the time, and must
have known if it had been the case. Jakob was a quiet and respectable man,
and kept Hannes closely to his studies, and as much as possible withdrawn
from notice.'
*Kurt Hofmann, 'Johannes Brahms und Hamburg', 2nd rev. edn (Reinbek, 1986),
12. Among many recent scholars, the names of two Hamburgers stand out in
particular: Kurt Hofmann and Kurt Stephenson. their research makes use of
Hamburg City documents and hiterto inaccessible family letters. These men's
indefatigable researches into primary sources has put the record of Brahms's
early life on a sound footing for the first time. Especially informative is
the work cited here, and Kurt Stephensons's 'Johannes Brahms in seiner
Familie'.'
Now, there seems an obvious contradiction in the claim that there's no
evidence 'that Brahms played anywhere at all before he was 14 years old' and
the memories of a 'private subscription concert held when the composer was a
10-year old' given a few lines later. Nonetheless, there does seem to be
little if any evidence that the brothels rumour holds true, other than the
assertion by Kalbeck and other biographers. Has anyone read Hofmann, or now
where exactly the source is of Brahms's speaking of "having played the piano
at night in bars"? This very subject was an element in a text/music piece of
my own written a few years ago.
Ian
MINe 109
"William Sommerwerck" <gizzle...@comcast.net> wrote:
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Johannes%20Brahms
Kurt Hoffman, Johannes Brahms und Hamburg (Reinbek, 1986) (in German:
includes detailed refutation of the traditional story of Brahms playing
piano in brothels, using the writings of those who knew the young
Brahms, as well as evidence of the Hamburg's close regulation of those
places, preventing the employment of children)
End quote.
Alex Ross, reviewing Swafford in The New Republic, writes,
"Unfortunately, Swafford does not seem to have seen Hoffmann's study and
repeats several long-standing errors and myths that it corrects."
This is news to me. I recall an anecdote of the older Brahms complaining
of how prostitutes treated him as a child included in an article
concerning his view of women and his song cycle. On the other hand, I
also remember reading that the young Brahms' neighborhood wasn't as
squalid and impoverished as we've been told.
Jan Swafford, Did the Young Brahms Play Piano in Waterfront Bars? (1991)
Nineteenth Century Music
You'd think this might settle it! but it's a $12 download and predates
the biography. Is the distinction between "brothel" and "stimulation
pub" all there is to the controversy?
Stephen
Torgny Gustafsson
news:smcatut-74BB62...@news-fe-02.texas.rr.com:
This was discussed in rmc some years ago:
Swafford does address this in these postings to the group; You may like
to read for yourself and decide what makes sense and what does not.
TG
alanwa...@aol.com
I digress as always but Erik Satie was certainly the "downstairs
pianist" in a brothel (probably his biggest source of income at the
time) and I believe the late Edith Piaf was born and brought up in one.
There's quite a long alliance between music and prostitution you
know:):)
Are you available? How much do you charge?
Kind regards,
Alan M. Watkins
MINe 109
Torgny Gustafsson <gus...@physics.rutgers.edu> wrote:
Me:
> > Jan Swafford, Did the Young Brahms Play Piano in Waterfront Bars?
> > (1991) Nineteenth Century Music
> >
> > You'd think this might settle it! but it's a $12 download and predates
> > the biography. Is the distinction between "brothel" and "stimulation
> > pub" all there is to the controversy?
> >
> > Stephen
>
> This was discussed in rmc some years ago:
>
> http://tinyurl.com/93on7
Very interesting! Thanks.
I wonder if I read the article above: the case seems familiar.
Stephen
Steve Emerson
alanwa...@aol.com wrote:
> I digress as always but Erik Satie was certainly the "downstairs
> pianist" in a brothel (probably his biggest source of income at the
> time) and I believe the late Edith Piaf was born and brought up in one.
Leave us not forget Jelly Roll Morton.
SE.