Brahms’s Op. 76 cycle: An entangled ending to an entangled story
This cycle is the ultimate anti-programmatic work. Unlike Mendelssohn, Schumann, Liszt, and even Chopin, many of whose works were accompanied by extramusical ideas, Brahms was somewhat averse to programmatic music, in a century musically defined by works such as Pictures at an Exhibition, Zarathustra, and the New World Symphony. In the midst of all these great programmatic works, Brahms found an almost materialistic oasis of self-describing music. Unhindered by any extramusical ideas, Brahms’s Op. 76 cycle finds its own path, writes its own plot, and declares its own endings. And that is precisely what we love so much about Brahms.