Symphony No. 3 in F Major

Brahms spent the summer months of 1883 in Wiesbaden, where he focused most of his creative energies on composing his Symphony No. 3. Its world premiere was given in Vienna at the end of the same year. Much debate surrounds Brahms’ exact intentions with regard to this deeply personal work. A number of his closest friends claimed that a hidden programme generated the emotional trajectory of the Third Symphony. Brahms, on the other hand, steadfastly resisted imposing any extra-musical connotations on the work. Nevertheless, the fact that a number of striking musical ideas in the first two movements reappear completely altered in character in the finale is noteworthy. Perhaps the most potent of these occurs at the very opening, when the two surging chords in the woodwind and brass act as a powerful launching pad for the muscular and rhythmically dynamic theme in the violins, an idea which recurs with increasing vehemence throughout the first movement before attaining a semblance of serenity at the close. The two middle movements are more introverted in character, especially the heartfelt and melancholic “Poco allegretto”. With the Finale, the struggles already encountered in the first movement reach an even greater fever pitch before the music collapses into a mysterious and withdrawn coda notable for the return of the main theme from the first movement, which brings the work to a calm and reassuring conclusion.