Brahms’ Serenades.

 

Brahms:

  • Serenades 1 and 2, Overtures, and Haydn Variations.

This recording brings together Brahms’ symphonic works, except for his four symphonies: the two Serenades, full of youthful energy and feeling, the magnificent Haydn variations, and the two popular overtures, the Tragic and the Academic Festival Overture.

Brahms:

Performed by the Dresdner Philharmonie, London Symphony Orchestra and the Berliner Sinfonie‐Orchester, Heinz Bongartz, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos and Günter Herbig conducting.

These are excellent performances from the Berlin Classics archives featuring the best East German orchestras: Dresden Philharmonie and The Berliner Sinfonie‐Orchester, Heinz Bongartz and Günter Herbig conducting.

Brahms wrote the following to his friend, violinist Joseph Joachim, while arranging the Second Serenade into the form of a piano duet. In those days such arrangements were the means by which most people could appreciate the music of Brahms without attending orchestral concerts:

“I was in a perfectly blissful mood. I have seldom written music with such delight.”

Here is the Serenade No. 2 in A Major, Op. 16 by Johannes Brahms:

 

 

Tags: Johannes Brahms, Serenades, the Dresdner Philharmonie, London Symphony Orchestra, Berliner Sinfonie‐Orchester, Heinz Bongartz, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Günter Herbig