time flies

{Hamburg, Germany ~ 2003}

On the steps of the Opera house, where Brahms played his famous lullaby, I hummed it to my sweet baby, Markus. He's 13 now and I although I don't get the chance to sing it to him anymore, the hospital has a custom of playing Brahms' Lullaby whenever a baby is born. So all night over the PA system I get to hear the melody and think of the words. I read about the similarity between the 2nd theme Brahms wrote for the first movement of his Symphony No. 2 and the most famous melody Brahms ever wrote - his "Lullaby." He wrote it for his old girlfriend, who had just given birth to her second child. In the biography of Brahms, where he writes about the Lullaby, "...the ingenuous little tune unfolds as counterpoint to a lilting Viennese Ländler that his Bertha used to sing to him in Hamburg [when Brahms conducted the women's chorus pictured above], when Bertha was young and he loved her, before he let her slip away. The Lullaby is entirely symbolic then, as Brahms hinted when he sent the song to her in July: 'Frau Bertha will realize that I wrote the "Wiegenlied" for her little one. She will find it quite in order... that while she is singing Hans to sleep, a love song is being sung to her.'" 
 
That was in 1868. What his biography also mentions but without drawing any "conclusions" from the observation is that in the summer of 1877 - when he composed the 2nd Symphony - he spent the first of 3 very happy summers at Pörtschach on Lake Worth "near Bertha Faber's summer place." This was the woman for whom he'd written the Lullaby 9 years earlier! 

Coincidence? Maybe, but it might've been on his mind, again. 

And yes, the symphony was composed in four months that summer - unlike the 1st Symphony which he spent 15 years on (there had been another 5-10 years spent on other attempts at getting a symphony started, but 15 years on the music that became the REAL 1st Symphony).

Whether you want to sing in English or German, here are the words to this sweet song about love...

Lullaby and goodnight, with roses bedight
With lilies o'er spread is baby's wee bed
Lay thee down now and rest, may thy slumber be blessed
Lay thee down now and rest, may thy slumber be blessed

Lullaby and goodnight, thy mother's delight
Bright angels beside my darling abide
They will guard thee at rest, thou shalt wake on my breast
They will guard thee at rest, thou shalt wake on my breast

(original German)
Guten Abend, gute Nacht, Mit Rosen bedacht,
Mit Naeglein besteckt, schlupf unter die Deck'
Morgen frueh, wenn Gott will, wirst du wieder geweckt
Morgen frueh, wenn Gott will, wirst du wieder geweckt

Guten Abend, gute Nacht, Von Englein bewacht
Die zeigen im Traum, dir Christkindleins Baum
Schlaf nun selig und suess, Schau im Traum's Paradies
Schlaf nun selig und suess, Schau im Traum's Paradies