In his study of Brahms’ songs, Eric Sams entitled the chapter that includes the discussion of the Op. 91 Songs, “Resignation and Serenity.” Brahms was 51 when they were finished, and well settled into his bachelor’s life—in its contented lyricism, this music is eloquent testament to the maturity and stability he had won for himself by that time. The dark, burnished sonorities of alto voice and viola, complemented by a piano part that seldom rises above the middle of the keyboard, are essential to the sweet calm that lies at the heart of this music. Only in the central stanza of Gestillte Sehnsucht, where the music serves both to mirror the longing sentiments of the text and to provide a contrasting structural paragraph, is the halcyon mood of the Songs ruffled. Indeed, so thoroughly lyrical is the writing for both voice and viola that Walter Niemann categorized the Op. 91 songs among the accompanied vocal duets in his biography of the composer. Their musical style, which blends melodic simplicity and directness with harmonic and expressive sophistication, is a perfect match for the gentle, loving words of Rückert and Lope de Vega. “Here,” wrote Eric Sams, “art-song and folk-song are blissfully at one.”

Though the E-flat Sonata was inspired by and conceived for the clarinet, its style and dark coloring also make it appropriate for the viola, and Brahms made an arrangement for that instrument which he instructed Simrock to publish as part of the music’s original issue. The autumnal opening movement follows the traditional sonata model. The first theme, suffused with cool sunlight, is an almost perfect example of melodic construction—rapturously lyrical in its initial phrases, growing more animated and wide-ranging as it progresses, and closing with a few short, quiet gestures. After a transition on the main subject followed by a brief moment of silence, the second theme, another gently flowing melodic inspiration, is introspectively intoned by the viola. The development section is compact and lyrical rather than prolix and dramatic, and leads to the balancing return of the earlier materials in the recapitulation. The Sonata’s greatest expressive urgency is contained in its second movement, a curious stylistic hybrid of folkish Austrian Ländler, sophisticated Viennese waltz, and Classical scherzo. The movement’s principal, minor-mode formal section flanks a brighter central chapter which Brahms marked forte ma dolce e ben cantando—“strong but sweet and well sung.” For the finale of this, his last chamber composition, Brahms employed one of his most beloved structural procedures, the variation. The theme is presented by the viola with two echoing phrases from the piano alone. This spacious melody is the subject of five variations, the last of which, a sturdy strain in a portentous minor key, is largely entrusted to the piano. An animated coda brings this splendid and deeply satisfying Sonata to its glowing conclusion.

Clara’s father, Friedrich, a noted teacher of piano and voice, operator of a music-lending library and a piano store, and a former preacher, vowed even before the girl was born that he would develop her into a consummate artist, and he showed considerable restraint by not beginning her lessons until she was five. His instruction fell upon a fertile talent—Clara made her public debut at the Leipzig Gewandhaus on October 20, 1828 (she was nine-and-a-quarter years old), gave her first complete recital two years later, and made her debut international tour the following season. By 1835, she was acclaimed throughout Europe as a child prodigy.

In 1829, the 19-year-old Robert Schumann met Friedrich Wieck, and he was accepted by the pedagogue as a student; the following year, Robert moved into the Wieck household. He was at first amused by his teacher’s gifted daughter, but over the course of the following years, the couple’s relationship developed into true love (“Clara grows more charming, inwardly, outwardly, every day, every hour,” Robert wrote in 1835) and became one of the great romances of the 19th century. That story—Papa Wieck’s nearly irrational resistance to the union, the lovers’ court battle to receive legal permission to marry, their passionate devotion to each other during their 16 years of wedded life, Robert’s mental collapse and untimely death in 1856—is well-known and carefully chronicled in a half-dozen books. Clara put her domestic duties before her professional ambitions during those years (she gave birth to eight children between 1841 and 1854), concertizing only occasionally and composing just a piano trio and a handful of songs and solo piano pieces, including her Variations on a Theme of Robert Schumann in 1853. Following her husband’s death in 1856, she resumed touring and teaching, but never composed again.

Though Clara Schumann achieved her fame as a pianist, she also showed considerable talent as a composer, producing a piano concerto between 1833 and 1835 (a one-movement concertino sketched in 1847 as a birthday gift for Robert was never completed), a piano trio, Three Romances for violin and piano, two dozen songs, and twenty pieces for solo piano. Clara’s music also provides a fascinating societal glimpse into the mores of Biedermeier, Germany. Though she was one of the most talented and ambitious women of her time, her attitude toward composition, which she confided to her diary in 1839, was indicative of the constraints placed upon women in the 19th century: “I once thought that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not desire to compose—no one has been able to do it, and why should I expect to? It would be arrogance, although, indeed, my father led me into it in earlier days.”

Other than a few teenage attempts, Clara Schumann wrote her two dozen songs, all on German texts, between her marriage to Robert in September 1840 and his death sixteen years later, when she stopped composing entirely. Robert, inspired by his love for Clara, wrote some 120 Lieder in 1840, his “Year of Songs,” and encouraged his new bride to join him in that creative endeavor. For the next four years, Clara duly wrote songs as gifts for her husband at Christmas and his birthday (June 8), which he admired but critiqued carefully. Between 1840 and 1843, Clara composed 14 songs, six of which she and Robert chose for publication and submitted to the distinguished Leipzig firm of Breitkopf und Härtel; they were published in 1844 as Clara’s Op. 13 with a dedication to the Danish Queen Caroline Amalie, who had expressed her admiration of Clara’s playing when she performed in Copenhagen in 1842. The Op. 13 Lieder comprise settings of poems by Heinrich Heine (1797–1856, one of the most beloved of German Romantic poets, who lived much of his life in Paris and died there after years of debilitating illness; Robert set his verses at least 35 times) and Emanuel Geibel (1815–1884, poet, playwright, translator, University of Munich faculty member, and a supporter of the political upheavals of 1848) whose lyricism and poignancy are perfectly matched to the love, loss and longing of the poems.

Thompson first focused his career on conducting and education, serving as Director of Choral Studies at Andrew College in Cuthbert, Georgia from 2013 to 2015 and teaching at Holy Innocents’ Episcopal School in Atlanta for the following three years, but he has increasingly turned to creative work. His compositions, many of which reveal an acute social awareness and often include voices, have been commissioned by, among others, the New York Philharmonic, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Aspen Music Festival, Los Angeles Master Chorale, San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus, Kansas City Symphony, and Sphinx Organization, and performed by orchestras, ensembles and choruses across the country. He has served as Composer-in-Residence for the New Haven Symphony and in 2022 began a five-year residency with Houston Grand Opera, which has commissioned an operatic adaptation of author and illustrator Ezra Jack Keats’ The Snowy Day, one of the first mainstream children’s books to feature a Black protagonist; The Snowy Day won the 1963 Caldecott Medal for Keats’ collage artwork. Thompson, with Valerie Coleman and Jessie Montgomery, is one of three Black composers commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera to develop new works in collaboration with the Lincoln Center Theater. Thompson’s awards include a Sphinx Medal of Excellence, Aspen Music Festival’s Hermitage Prize, and an American Prize for Choral Composition and an Emmy for his Seven Last Words of the Unarmed (2014), each of whose movements is set to the final words of an unarmed Black man before he was were killed by police or authority figures.

Ariana Benson, who describes herself as a “Black, Southern ecopoet,” was born in Norfolk, Virginia, graduated from Spelman College, and holds master’s degrees in poetic practice and scriptwriting from both Royal Holloway, University of London and Washington University of St. Louis. Her debut collection, Black Pastoral (University of Georgia Press, 2023), won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize and was a finalist for the John Leonard Prize for Best First Book, presented by the National Book Critics Circle. As a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellow, she is also won the 2024 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets, Furious Flower Poetry Prize, and Graybeal-Gowen Prize for Virginia Poets. Arian Benson facilitates creative writing and storytelling workshops for students at historically Black colleges and universities.

Composer Joel Thompson addressed the following letter to those who share his song cycle On Mars, which was inspired by Benson’s verses and composed in 2024 for mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton:

“Dear Listener,

It’s a struggle to describe exactly why Ariana Benson’s poetry speaks to my soul—it just does. I’ve read her first book, Black Pastoral, several times this year, each poem revealing more of itself (and myself) in each re-reading. There are many poems in this collection that I dare not bother with my music as they are perfect just as they are, but On Mars immediately sang to me right off the page. Why? It’s futile to try to explain the alchemical. But, I suppose that, while this Earth slowly burns and its most powerful governments seem intent on war and genocide and metastatically feeding off of our despair, it makes sense that I’d be drawn to Benson’s subtle urgings to hold onto hope by allowing my imagination to extend beyond the bounds of this atmosphere. Her words remind me and many other Black Americans that it is a revolutionary act to imagine a place that truly feels like home. It is a revolutionary act to dream of a life unfettered by concerns of brutality, poverty and prejudice. It is a revolutionary act to seek (and hold on to) our peace. I hope this piece functions not only as a reminder that our imaginations are fundamental tools for our collective liberation, but I also hope these songs serve as an invitation for us to use them as we seek a more just future.

With love, jt

November 2024”