Clarinet Sonatas (Brahms) - Background

Background

By 1890, Brahms vowed to retire from composing, but his promise was short lived. In January 1891 he made a trip to Meiningen for an arts festival and was captivated by performances of the Weber Clarinet Concerto and the Mozart Clarinet Quintet. The solo clarinetist was Richard Mühlfeld, and Brahms began a fond friendship with the man whom he so admired. The beautiful tone of “Fräulein Klarinette” (as Brahms would nickname Mühlfeld) inspired him to begin composing again less than a year after he retired. The fruits of their friendship were a few remarkable additions to the still modest clarinet repertoire of that time, including the Clarinet Sonatas. In the summer of 1894 at his Bad Ischl retreat, Brahms completed the sonatas. They were first performed privately for Duke Georg and his family in September of that year. Brahms’s experience in writing his Clarinet Quintet three years earlier led him to compose the sonatas for clarinet and piano because he preferred the sound over that of clarinet with strings. It is interesting to note that the keys of the sonatas—F minor and E-flat major—correspond to the keys of the two clarinet concertos Weber produced. Brahms also produced a transcription of these works for viola with alterations to better suit the solo part to a string instrument.