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Joachim by John Singer Sargent, 1904

1) In 1853, Joachim was invited to perform as a soloist at a music festival where he played the Beethoven violin concerto and gained renown in Germany. Robert and Clara Schumann were impressed by his performance. 2) Joachim introduced the then unknown 20-year old Brahms to the Schumanns and strongly recommended him. The Schumanns were enthusiastic about Brahms after meeting him. Joachim, Clara, and Brahms became lifelong friends. 3) Joachim provided feedback and criticism to Brahms as he composed his first piano concerto over four years, which helped shape the final work. Joachim frequently performed with Clara Schumann in recitals and

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41 views1 page

Joachim by John Singer Sargent, 1904

1) In 1853, Joachim was invited to perform as a soloist at a music festival where he played the Beethoven violin concerto and gained renown in Germany. Robert and Clara Schumann were impressed by his performance. 2) Joachim introduced the then unknown 20-year old Brahms to the Schumanns and strongly recommended him. The Schumanns were enthusiastic about Brahms after meeting him. Joachim, Clara, and Brahms became lifelong friends. 3) Joachim provided feedback and criticism to Brahms as he composed his first piano concerto over four years, which helped shape the final work. Joachim frequently performed with Clara Schumann in recitals and

Uploaded by

Reo28
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Also in 1853, a committee headed by Schumann invited Joachim

to the Lower Rhine Music Festival.[28] At the Festival, Joachim


again soloed in the Beethoven violin concerto.[29] His success
made him, it is said, "the most renowned artist of Germany".[28]
Robert Schumann and his wife Clara were deeply impressed, and
formed a "close connection" with Joachim.[30] Joachim met the
then publicly unknown 20-year-old Brahms, and wrote of him that
his playing "shows the intense fire...which predicts the artist" and
"his compositions already betoken such power as I have seen in no
other musician of his age".[31] Joachim strongly recommended
Brahms to Robert.[32] Brahms was received by the Schumanns
with great enthusiasm. After Robert's mental breakdown in 1854
and death in 1856, Joachim, Clara, and Brahms remained lifelong
friends and shared musical views. Joachim's performing style with
the violin, like Clara's at the piano, is said to have been Joachim by John Singer Sargent,
"restrained, pure, antivirtuosic, expressing the music rather than 1904
the performer."[33]

In December 1854, Joachim visited Robert at the Endenich asylum where he had been since February,
Joachim being his first visitor.[34] Early on, Brahms already played and composed for the piano, which
"he had mastered in a supreme fashion", but he felt deficient in orchestration.[35] In 1854 he began
composing what was to become his first piano concerto, his first orchestral piece. He sent a score of the
first movement to Joachim, requesting his advice.[36] After getting Joachim's response, Brahms wrote
to him "A thousand thanks for having studied the first movement in such a sympathetic and careful
manner. I have learned a great deal from your remarks. As a musician I really have no greater wish
than to have more talent so that I can learn still more from such a friend."[37] Later in the composition
of the concerto, which took four years, Brahms wrote to Joachim "I am sending you the rondo once
more. And just like the last time, I beg for some really severe criticism."[38] The final manuscript of the
concerto "shows many alterations in the handwriting of Joachim".[39]

Joachim's time in Hanover was his most prolific period of composition. Then and during the rest of his
career, he frequently performed with Clara Schumann. For example, in October–November 1857 they
took a recital tour together to Dresden, Leipzig, and Munich.[40] St. James's Hall, London, which
opened in 1858, hosted a series of "Popular Concerts" of chamber music, of which programmes from
1867 through 1904 are preserved.[41] Joachim appears a great many times. He visited London each
year from 1866 on.[42] In March 1898 and in 1901–1904 Joachim appeared in his own quartet of
players, but otherwise far more often he appeared with resident Popular Concerts artists Louis
Ries,[43] second violin, J. B. Zerbini,[44] first viola, and Alfredo Piatti, first cello, reputed to be "one of
the most celebrated cellists" of the time. George Bernard Shaw wrote that the Popular Concerts had
helped greatly to spread and enlighten musical taste in England.[45] Joachim had been a mainstay of
the chamber music Popular Concerts.

At 18 of the Popular Concerts at least, Clara Schumann performed along with Joachim, Zerbini and
Piatti, presumably playing piano quartets (without second violin), or sometimes piano trios (for piano,
violin, and cello). (The programs of those concerts very likely also included string quartets in which she
of course did not play, as Ries is also listed.) A favorite piece of Clara's was Brahms's Piano Quartet in
A major. She wrote to Brahms 27 February 1882 from London that the piece had received "much

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