MASTERCLASS

Folk dance and fireworks all feature in Antoine Tamestit’s discussion of the third and fourth movements, in the second of two articles about the complete F minor Sonata

From Brahms Clarinet Sonatas op.120. Urtext edition with additional viola part, paperbound. Eds. Egon Voss, Johannes Behr. Pf fingering Klaus Schilde. Va fingering and bowing Tabea Zimmermann. Order no. HN 988, ISMN 979-0-2018-0988-5. €24.50. Printed with permission of G. Henle Verlag, Munich © 2013

When pianist Cédric Tiberghien and I came to record the Brahms Sonatas together last year, we talked and rehearsed for hours. We always finished playing later than we had planned, and we wrote down many things about expression, direction and tempo. These conversations helped us dig deep into the music, the notes and the harmony, until we knew every little corner and indication in the score. Knowing it so well meant that we could adapt our sound and timing to our emotions in any given day or moment, and also to different acoustics. It also impacted on how we played each phrase, even if we didn’t always do exactly what we had discussed, and that affected everything that followed.

A rustic, dancing third movement

The first note of the Allegretto grazioso is a continuation of the last note of the final, peaceful A of the Andante un poco adagio, but one dynamic level higher. We love to emphasise this by carrying that sweetness through into the piano opening bars.

I think of the countryside when I play this, although it shouldn’t sound heavy or rough. It’s like a noble folk dance or ländler, with an Austrian, waltz-like swing to it, and it needs taste and refinement, with lightened second and third beats. It also needs a very good legato and a release at the end of each bar, without building in dynamics. That is a combination far easier to achieve on the clarinet than on the viola! Then, from the up-beat to bar 17, we can play with a more rustic feel, with full, engaging first beats, and a liberated, joyous sound. Now is the time to slap our thigh and have a beer!

It isn’t easy to make the exchange of voices between the viola and piano in bars 17–21 heard, so Cédric and I swap our dynamics on the repeat, to help our listeners make the connection. Sometimes Cédric lets me come out clearly in bar 17 and then plays more in the bass in bar 19. At other times he brings out his right-hand theme more clearly. Just a small gesture is enough to indicate to each other what we want to do.

Finding a seamless legato

A passage that I find particularly beautiful and difficult is the grazioso e dolcissimo sempre from bar 33. This shows a real refinement to Brahms’s music that is not often seen. Again, it’s far easier to play on the clarinet, in one seamless, legato breath. On the viola, we have to practise creating a smooth effect without audible string-crossings or the sound of our fingers tapping on the fingerboard. This is especially difficult in bar 39, when we are all alone. I try to sing smoothly through the first two notes of each bar, staying in one position where possible, although I do slide up in the middle of bar 33. I also keep my right arm relaxed, with the elbow low and stable, only letting my hand adapt to the shape of the bridge and each string. That helps me to hide the string-crossings while phrasing every note and interval with expression. It’s not easy!

The trio and return to the theme

The whole trio, from bar 47, is difficult to approach because of all the syncopations in the piano. These should be understood as waves, rather than as distinct rhythmical units, so that we hardly know where the beats are. The repeated E flats in the viola part allude to the bell-like notes in the next movement, so I play them with resonance and without sustaining too much, as a premonition of what is to come.

I love the teneramente return to the theme in bar 90, because now we can play it even more tenderly than at the beginning. Cédric and I don’t take this too fast – perhaps at allegretto ma non troppo – so that we can play with more freedom, as if lost in memory. It is helpful to think of this place when choosing the tempo for the beginning of the movement, so that we allow enough room to play the theme a little more slowly when it returns. We start at q= 138–144, then come down to around q= 126–130 in bar 90. Any slower and we’d lose the swing and flow of the initial ländler. We pick up the tempo again from the up-beat to bar 107.

Movement four: a liberated vivace

Now, after the mystery, darkness and nostalgia of the Sonata’s F minor start, we move into the brighter key of F major. Here the repeated, accented forte bells in the piano part are clear from the beginning. We can finally play with liberation, after all the grazioso, poco forte, espressivo and dolcissimo markings that came beforehand. I play bar 5 with an intensity and quickness of the bow, before falling back into a rounded, smooth legato grazioso for the up-beat to bar 9. Here I try to play in the same style as the passage from bar 33 of the third movement, with a steady bow and silent left-hand fingers.

It is difficult to produce a really smooth legato in bars 21–22 and 93–94. I use a fingering that avoids too much string-crossing. Instead of thinking in quavers from the up-beat into bar 21, I also find it helpful to imagine a smooth crotchet (q), dotted minim (d), crotchet and three minims, to help me follow the melodic thread. We have to phrase as though we are playing a clarinet, or a viola with one very long string!

We have to phrase as though we are playing a clarinet, or a viola with one very long string

To make sure that we don’t play with too much harshness or brilliance for the dots from the up-beat to bar 27, Brahms writes leggiero, before asking for a brighter, more joyful sound again from the forte of bar 29. There are two viola voices here: one for the D, E, F of bar 29, the G to begin bar 30, the F, G to end it, and the A first beat of bar 31. The second voice is the undulating quaver (e) accompaniment that comes in between. I stay legato but try to bring out the two voices slightly differently through my string-crossings.

Rhythm and contrast

Some of my favourite parts of this sonata include the crotchet triplets that come in the viola part from bar 42 and again from bar 150. After the rhythmic quavers of bar 36 it suddenly feels as though we are floating without down-beats.

We can forget about bar-lines and just focus on the melodic line. Brahms and Schumann both used this effect to create the illusion of the bar expanding slightly so that more than two beats could fit within each half. In reality, of course, there is no change in tempo or pulse, but the triplets allow us to create another sensation of time.

Perhaps my favourite part of the whole piece is the new theme that comes out of nowhere from bar 119. The piano right hand here repeats the same bell-like minims that we hear at the opening, but now they’re completely changed by the quaver sicilienne rhythm around them.

To me this feels very Schubertian. It is so simple, naïve and extraordinary after the loud, direct passage that comes before it! It’s suddenly soft, smooth and nostalgic, without any corners or sharpness any more, and I love this contrast.

Sometimes violists and clarinettists make the mistake of entering from bar 123 as though they are playing a new theme, when this material is actually the end of a longer, eight-bar phrase that begins in the piano in bar 119. It’s important to play this lightly from the beginning of the bar, with minimal vibrato and without a ritenuto, to show that the new phrase doesn’t begin until bar 127. Only in bar 127 do I add a little more vibrato for sweetness.

Going out with a bang

The bells return again in the accented minims from bar 207. After the sforzandos in bars 211 and 212, we can really burst into song in bar 214. I try to make a very clear contrast between these accents, sforzandos and the final forte. To finish – as a little bit of a joke –I imagine standing up from my chair on the second chord and falling back down again for the last note, so that I know my timing will be exactly right. We have to finish with a firework!

INTERVIEW BY PAULINE HARDING