:00:41. > :00:46.Tonight's prom promises to be a rare treat. Internationally
:00:46. > :00:49.acclaimed musicians, an impassioned Piano Concerto and a symphonic
:00:49. > :00:54.masterpiece all under one roof. Hello and welcome to the Royal
:00:54. > :00:59.Albert Hall for the second of two concerts devoted to the music of
:00:59. > :01:02.Brahms and with a stellar line-up. The Chamber Orchestra of Europe,
:01:02. > :01:07.the legendary conductor, Bernard Haitink, and one of the most sought
:01:07. > :01:12.after pianists of the 21st century, Emanuel Ax.
:01:12. > :01:20.Already on stage are the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Formed in 1981,
:01:20. > :01:30.they are celebrating their 30th anniversary with a sickle of Brahms
:01:30. > :01:30.
:01:30. > :01:33.concerts conducted by Bernard Bernard Haitink, one of the most
:01:33. > :01:36.reveered conductors in the world has been conducting Brahms for more
:01:36. > :01:46.than half a century and describes him as a composer who thinks with
:01:46. > :01:47.
:01:47. > :01:56.his heart and feels with his brain. Brahms's music and he is underrated.
:01:56. > :02:06.People say he's German, heavy, old- fashioned, he's traditional. But so
:02:06. > :02:08.
:02:08. > :02:18.much feeling in it and very often sadness in Brahms. He was a lonely
:02:18. > :02:21.
:02:21. > :02:28.man. Music was his way of telling people how much I loved humanity
:02:28. > :02:34.and people and how much he wanted to have his music telling them. I
:02:34. > :02:42.think that it's extremely human. Later, we'll hear Brahms's fourth
:02:42. > :02:52.and much-loved Symphony. First, this evening's prom opens with
:02:52. > :02:54.
:02:54. > :02:58.Emanuel Ax's second concerto. It combines work with combines
:02:58. > :03:01.intimate exchanges between piano and orchestra together with drama
:03:01. > :03:10.on an epic scale. Ax learnt the piece more than 30 years ago and he
:03:10. > :03:20.says he's been trying to get it right ever since. He is a poetic
:03:20. > :03:24.
:03:24. > :03:27.So, here comes tonight's soloist, Emanuel Ax and conductor Bernard
:03:27. > :03:37.Haitink to join the Chamber Orchestra of Europe for a
:03:37. > :03:37.
:03:37. > :52:24.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2926 seconds
:52:24. > :52:28.performance of Brahm's Second Piano A masterful performance by all on
:52:28. > :52:34.stage of Brahms's Second Piano Concerto.
:52:34. > :52:41.Emanuel Ax playing with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, conducted by
:52:41. > :52:46.Bernard Haitink. Wonderful sense of community on
:52:46. > :52:56.stage. So noticeable how Emanuel Ax communicated with every other
:52:56. > :53:15.
:53:15. > :53:21.musician he was playing with and of Emanuel Ax describes the Piano
:53:21. > :53:24.Concerto as the corner stone of any pianist's life, incredibly
:53:24. > :53:28.difficult but very much worth it. He said of the final movement, he
:53:28. > :53:35.finished with the suffering, the storm and stress and now we are
:53:35. > :53:45.playing in heaven. A sentiment shared by the audience here at the
:53:45. > :54:02.
:54:02. > :54:05.Royal Albert Hall and clearly by Emanuel Ax, Manny, as he's known,
:54:05. > :54:11.born in Poland, grew up in can darbgs then later in New York where
:54:11. > :54:14.he said he spent his teenage years listening to all the greats in
:54:14. > :54:18.Carnegie hall, a wonderful time for a budding musician, he says,
:54:18. > :54:22.listening to the likes of Arthur Rubinstein, Vladimir Horowitz and
:54:22. > :54:27.Ashkenazy. All these people were so great, you would go to a recital
:54:27. > :54:37.and the next day you would try and sound like them, which is of course
:54:37. > :55:00.
:55:00. > :55:04.what young pianists listening to It's international time here at the
:55:04. > :55:07.Royal Albert Hall and in the second half of the concert, we'll hear
:55:07. > :55:12.Brahms's fourth final Symphony. Nearly two centuries after his
:55:12. > :55:16.birth, love him or hate him, Brahms is still one of the most performed
:55:16. > :55:21.and recorded composers. But what do we know about this intensely
:55:21. > :55:31.private man? I headed off to Vienna to find out more about the Brahms
:55:31. > :55:44.
:55:44. > :55:50.There are two positions you can take on Brahms. You either find him
:55:50. > :55:58.impossible like some composers. are ready to test Brahms? Bores me
:55:58. > :56:08.to death. It's so thick. When it's good, sounds like Beethoven.
:56:08. > :56:12.
:56:12. > :56:22.Or you feel his music touches the sublime. You know anything more
:56:22. > :56:27.
:56:28. > :56:37.beautiful? As beautiful perhaps but A new generation of musicians has
:56:38. > :56:42.
:56:42. > :56:48.For me, Brahms is the most human composer in the best way. It gives
:56:48. > :56:52.me energy, exactly the same thing that if I go to the mountain and I
:56:52. > :57:02.get air, or go in front of the sea and you breathe and feel like
:57:02. > :57:06.
:57:06. > :57:09.stronger, Brahms for me is this. It's true that we feel something
:57:09. > :57:14.very comfortable. Unique. And very in the nature which is down-to-
:57:14. > :57:19.earth, which is the earth, the nature, the life, really how we are
:57:19. > :57:29.and how we make music. You could feel that this man was enjoying
:57:29. > :57:34.
:57:35. > :57:38.life and you can hear it in the Brahms was born in 1833 in a poor
:57:38. > :57:42.district of the port of Hamburg. He was a promising young pianist and
:57:42. > :57:46.earned his money playing in bars and brothels.
:57:46. > :57:50.While his mind was full of lofty artistic ideals, he was witnessing
:57:50. > :58:00.human life at its most brutal. He later said he saw things which
:58:00. > :58:00.
:58:01. > :58:05.left a deep shadow on his mind. This statue has Brahms peering down
:58:05. > :58:09.at a female mews. In later life, he was considered something of a
:58:09. > :58:14.misogynist who frequented prostitutes. He never married
:58:14. > :58:22.although he apparently claim close a few times. But there was woman to
:58:22. > :58:27.whom brams remained devoted his entire life -- Brahms. Clara was a
:58:27. > :58:32.brilliant pianist and the wife of composer Robert Shooman. When the
:58:32. > :58:36.20-year-old Brahms visited the couple, they were en tranceed by
:58:36. > :58:46.him. It was a meeting fit for a Hollywood movie and became one
:58:46. > :58:50.
:58:50. > :59:00.called Song of Love. Robert Walker played Brahms.
:59:00. > :59:00.
:59:00. > :59:05.Go on! Go on! Clara, come here. Listen. It's my wife. Shooman die
:59:05. > :59:11.add few years later and Clara remained devoted to his memory.
:59:11. > :59:18.Brahms clearly adored and respected her, but the film shows him
:59:18. > :59:23.daringly unsuccessfully proposing marriage. Dear Clara... I'm hurting
:59:23. > :59:28.you so... You can't help it. Clara reject Brahms as Hollywood
:59:28. > :59:38.suggests or was it possibly the other way around? We'll never
:59:38. > :59:40.
:59:40. > :59:47.Though Brahms had a deep respect for the past, he was always
:59:47. > :59:52.troubled by the shadow of his great predecessor, Beethoven, overawed,
:59:53. > :00:02.it took him over 20 years to write his first Symphony, only for it to
:00:03. > :00:07.
:00:07. > :00:14.It's not like Beethoven in the end. The solution that Brahms achieves
:00:14. > :00:19.is quite unlike Beethoven. The achievement of the first
:00:20. > :00:26.Symphony is to draw together the classical and the romantic and the
:00:26. > :00:30.extreme romantic. What it is that makes that Symphony unique is that
:00:30. > :00:34.it's able to draw together this intensity of feeling. A Symphony
:00:34. > :00:38.that actually, when you look at it, tells a kind of personal story.
:00:38. > :00:41.There is a theme strongly associated with Clara, his ideal
:00:41. > :00:51.love in the finale. That's the big turning point in the Symphony, the
:00:51. > :00:58.
:00:58. > :01:01.moment that turns it from darkness That's as romantic an idea as you
:01:01. > :01:05.could possibly look for, this is the moment of the redeeming love,
:01:05. > :01:11.the ideal woman who intervenes and the Symphony changes direction at
:01:11. > :01:20.this point. That does not fit with the image of Brahms as this
:01:20. > :01:23.backward looking classicist at all. Though Brahms is a very German
:01:23. > :01:32.composer, he's always had his champions in France. Take this
:01:32. > :01:38.novel by Sagan. A Brahms concert helps a Roman blossom. What are
:01:38. > :01:43.Brahms? Look over there. In the film version of the book, Brahms's
:01:43. > :01:53.3rd Symphony becomes a love theme for IngridBergman. Now the first
:01:53. > :02:07.
:02:07. > :02:17.The same theme was turned into a song by the notorious creator for
:02:17. > :02:20.
:02:20. > :02:30.Brahms also signified romantic passion for the foreign. Film
:02:30. > :02:42.
:02:42. > :02:45.director Louis Mall who used the Brahms was a handsome, beardless
:02:45. > :02:52.fellow when he made the inevitable move to Vienna, the city of bait
:02:52. > :02:57.hoifen and shoe Bert. But it seems everywhere he lived has since
:02:57. > :03:02.disappeared. This is where he first lived in 1862. Not here exactly,
:03:02. > :03:11.this building can't be more than 50 years old. This is where he lived
:03:11. > :03:15.in 1866. I think... In 1969 -- 1869, he took rooms at this hotel. But
:03:15. > :03:21.it's changed a lot. This is the site of his final
:03:21. > :03:31.address. He had an apartment four floors up. Well, at least there's a
:03:31. > :03:35.
:03:35. > :03:39.He'd look out of his window at this glorious building, he liked to walk
:03:39. > :03:46.from his apartment across a bridge that has also long since vanished
:03:46. > :03:53.to arrive where many of his greatest works were performed, the
:03:53. > :04:01.famous Music Verine. But Brahms also enjoyed the lighter
:04:01. > :04:06.side of the city, the Prata. The Woods. And he was very fond of the
:04:06. > :04:12.popular music of the day. One of his closest friends was none other
:04:12. > :04:16.than the waltz King himself, Johann Strauss II. In fact when Brahms was
:04:16. > :04:26.asked by Strauss's wife to autograph her fan, he wrote a few
:04:26. > :04:34.
:04:34. > :04:38.notes of tf Blue Danube and the The supporters of Richard Wagner,
:04:38. > :04:45.the great radical composer of music dramas were fiercely opposed to
:04:45. > :04:49.Brahms as a representative of a conservative, classical tradition.
:04:49. > :04:54.Sometimes there were even punch-ups between rival factions at concerts.
:04:54. > :04:59.It was a lively scene of the kind you don't tend to see at classical
:04:59. > :05:04.concerts these days. I wonder how much Brahms enjoyed being drawn
:05:04. > :05:08.into all this. It obliged him to take up a position. But there are
:05:09. > :05:14.certainly moments in Brahms's music where you can hear strong echoes of
:05:14. > :05:20.the kind of harmonic language, the kind of disillusion of tonality
:05:20. > :05:24.that is going on. He had more of an admiration for Wagner than he would
:05:24. > :05:29.have admitted in public. You may have heard that Brahms had
:05:29. > :05:39.his voice and piano playing recorded on a wax cylinder by a
:05:39. > :05:41.
:05:41. > :05:45.representative of Thomas Eddie son. -- Iddison. -- Eddison. That is a
:05:45. > :05:50.Hungarian dance that you can hear underneath all that crackle. It
:05:50. > :05:53.sounds as if someone is saying "I am Dr Brahms". Is that the voice of
:05:53. > :05:57.the man himself? It has been suggested it's the voice of the
:05:57. > :06:07.technician who was there at the time. As for whether it was Brahms
:06:07. > :06:15.
:06:15. > :06:20.playing the piano, again a secret When Brahms died in 1897, the city
:06:20. > :06:25.of Vienna gave him a spln did funeral. Thousands of people lined
:06:25. > :06:31.the streets as his coffin was brought from his apartment to this
:06:31. > :06:41.cemetery -- splendid funeral. Here, facing his predecessors, Beethoven
:06:41. > :06:45.and Schubert, lies Brahms. Side by side with Johann Strauss.
:06:45. > :06:47.Joining me now are Hannah French, a lecturer at the Royal Academy of
:06:47. > :06:51.Music and Matthew Rowe, the conductor. Hannah, let me start by
:06:51. > :06:58.asking you, what is it about tonight's performance of Brahms
:06:58. > :07:02.that makes it so special? It's simply because this magnificent
:07:02. > :07:06.ensemble resembles the historical counterparts in both size and
:07:06. > :07:12.reputation. It's a real treat to hear this music played with such
:07:12. > :07:15.clarity and elegance. And this is how Brahms would have heard it, I
:07:15. > :07:21.guess? Exactly. He conducted the orchestra in the premier of this
:07:21. > :07:23.work in 1885 and he said of the ensemble that he admired their
:07:23. > :07:28.spirit and sensitivity to playing his music.
:07:28. > :07:33.Now, Matthew, you and I have spent many, many hours discussing
:07:33. > :07:36.conducting and conducting style when you were trying to guide me
:07:36. > :07:44.through Maestro. Bernard Haitink is legendary, one of the greats, but
:07:44. > :07:48.what makes him so special? He's really a musician's conductor.
:07:48. > :07:53.Very economical. There is no flamboyant ness about him. He has
:07:53. > :07:56.this intensity and this wonderful integrity with his music-making. He
:07:56. > :08:00.always goes back to the score, always restudying things, finding
:08:00. > :08:04.new things there. That comes through in his conducting. Just
:08:04. > :08:14.take a look at this because this is Bernard Haitink conducting here at
:08:14. > :08:21.
:08:21. > :08:25.the Proms in 1973,. Let's have a Yes, so it really hasn't changed
:08:25. > :08:29.very much at all in all these years, still incredibly economy and you
:08:29. > :08:33.can see him listening so intently to the ensemble which he does so
:08:33. > :08:37.brilliantly and reacts to what he hears. There is no question that
:08:37. > :08:41.with an ensemble Reich this there is this mutual respect on stage
:08:41. > :08:44.which create this is wonderful security of sound? Absolutely.
:08:44. > :08:47.There is the most fantastic relautionship with this orchestra
:08:47. > :08:51.and he loves conducting them because there is so much give-and-
:08:51. > :08:54.take -- relationship. He has a wonderful ability to guide them in
:08:55. > :09:00.a very commanding way but seemingly with such a light hand and such a
:09:00. > :09:03.light touch and such a sense of peace which I love watching.
:09:03. > :09:08.So Hannah, with the fourth and final Symphony we are going to hear
:09:08. > :09:13.in the second half, what can we expect? We can expect to see the
:09:13. > :09:17.two sides of Brahms, the scholar side and the real passionate side.
:09:17. > :09:21.Really it's the combination of his symphonic writing, those the
:09:21. > :09:27.Chamber and the nature of the writing and the performance that we
:09:27. > :09:30.hear will be very evident. The scholar and the passionate. The
:09:30. > :09:34.scholarness comes through in his great historical model sin the
:09:34. > :09:39.Sizing the old with the new as he does in so many works but
:09:40. > :09:42.eespecially as he does here with the connection to Bh. All the
:09:42. > :09:45.things are brought together, the 18th century dance, the curtain
:09:46. > :09:51.call, the variations for the different characters and yet what
:09:51. > :09:56.Brahms disease with it is very much of his own time and romantic
:09:56. > :10:01.language hung on this framework if you like. Matthew, he's notorious
:10:01. > :10:04.for being obsessed by his own mortality. Do we hear that a lot in
:10:04. > :10:09.this work? The most striking thing is that it's the one Symphony that
:10:09. > :10:11.ends in the minor key, it begins and ends in the minor. There is a
:10:11. > :10:15.wonderful moment in the last movement where it goes into the
:10:15. > :10:19.major and seems a little brighter but still it returns to the minor
:10:19. > :10:22.and ends darkly and sombrely. way we are hearing Brahms tonight,
:10:23. > :10:25.this clarity and precision and lightness of touch that we are
:10:25. > :10:29.hearing from the Chamber Orchestra, is this a new trend, do you feel,
:10:29. > :10:34.that is going to become more and more mainstream, I guess, in terms
:10:34. > :10:39.of the playing of Brahms? Have we completely moved away from the
:10:39. > :10:44.heavy late 19th century, early 20th century style? I hope so, in many
:10:44. > :10:47.ways. I think that Henry Wood might have a thing or do to do with the
:10:47. > :10:53.way that the music has been received and obviously people have
:10:53. > :10:57.this sense of it being thick and heavy. A full Symphony orchestra
:10:57. > :11:01.twice the size of this ensemble has the power and intensity of the
:11:01. > :11:04.passion that we know that Brahms had heard in his lifetime but that
:11:04. > :11:08.perhaps he favoured this intricate feeling where we see the inner
:11:08. > :11:14.lines coming through. You will see that again as we did before with
:11:14. > :11:18.the violins. Well, we can see that Bernard Haitink is coming on to the
:11:18. > :11:28.stage now to conduct Brahms's fourth and final Symphony so
:11:28. > :11:28.
:11:28. > :51:12.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2926 seconds
:51:12. > :51:17.Matthew Rowe and Hannah French, A splendid performance of Brahms's
:51:17. > :51:27.Fourth Symphony, performed by the chaim we are orchestra of Europe,
:51:27. > :51:41.
:51:41. > :51:45.conducted by Bernard Haitink. His As he congratulates and thanks
:51:45. > :51:50.members of this wonderful Chamber Orchestra, it was formed back in
:51:50. > :51:53.1981 by a group of young musicians who'd all played together at the
:51:53. > :51:57.European community Youth Orchestra but were getting too old for that.
:51:57. > :52:01.They didn't want to stop playing together. One said, we all had
:52:01. > :52:09.someone we didn't want to say goodbye to, so it was either get
:52:09. > :52:16.married or form a new orchestra or, presumably in some cases, both.
:52:16. > :52:19.Their leader, Marieke Blakestijn there, one of the original members,
:52:19. > :52:27.there are 18 of the original members still playing in the
:52:27. > :52:33.Chamber Orchestra of Europe. That's Chris Parks on the horn there.
:52:33. > :52:37.Principal flute player there, played so beautifully in the last
:52:37. > :52:47.movement. The orchestra now considered to be the finest Chamber
:52:47. > :52:59.
:53:00. > :53:05.Orchestra in the world and adore As I said, Bernard Haitink
:53:05. > :53:10.conducting his 85th prom, but his very first exposure to the Proms
:53:10. > :53:13.was actually listening, as a young boy, living in Nazi-occupied
:53:13. > :53:17.Holland during the Second World War and he'd listened illegally to the
:53:17. > :53:22.BBC broadcasts on the radio. He says the reception was terrible,
:53:23. > :53:32.but he'd still manage to hear a few notes. He remembers especially
:53:33. > :53:56.
:53:56. > :54:04.hearing a Proms concert of Brahms, Bernard Haitink thanking the
:54:04. > :54:08.audience once more at the end of this wonderful prom. Haitink said
:54:08. > :54:11.Brahms was able to use music to express humanity. That's all from
:54:11. > :54:16.the Royal Albert Hall. You can hear a live prom every night on Radio
:54:16. > :54:20.Three. If you missed yesterday's prom given by this orchestra, it's
:54:20. > :54:26.available now on the BBC iPlayer. BBC Four will be back on the Proms
:54:26. > :54:32.tomorrow for the Verdi Requiem conducted by Semyon Bychkov. I'll
:54:32. > :54:38.be back next Saturday on BBC Two and BBC HD for a Proms first, Tim