Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms
Brahms in 1889
Born	7 May 1833 Hamburg, German Confederation
Died	3 April 1897(1897-04-03) (aged 63) Vienna, Austria-Hungary
Occupations	Composer Conductor Pianist
Works	List of compositions

Johannes Brahms (German: [joˈhanəs ˈbʁaːms]; 7 May 1833 – 3 April 1897) was a German composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor of the mid-Romantic period. Born to a musical family in Hamburg, he spent much of his professional life in Vienna. He wrote for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, voice, and chorus, including four symphonies, four concertos, one requiem, and many Lieder. Brahms is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music (after a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow).

Championed by Robert Schumann, an early supporter, his music was largely successful. Despite this, Brahms was self-conscious and sometimes self-critical. Some even cast him as the successor to Beethoven, an idea which Richard Wagner mocked. He premiered many of his own works and worked with leading performers, including pianist Clara Schumann and violinist Joseph Joachim, for whom he wrote; they and Brahms were all close friends. Richard Mühlfeld inspired his late clarinet music, and he also wrote music for cellist Robert Hausmann.

His music is rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of his Classical (and earlier) forebears. As both a traditionalist and an innovator, his contributions and craftsmanship were admired by a variety of composers, including Antonin Dvořák (whose music he enthusiastically supported) and Edward Elgar. Some, like Max Reger and Alexander Zemlinsky, reconciled elements of his style with that of Wagner, with whom Brahms had often been contrasted. Arnold Schoenberg and Anton Webern were inspired by the intricate structural coherence of his music, including what they saw as its developing variation. His music remains a staple of the modern concert repertoire.