Brahms in der Meininger Tradition

It is a small sensation: a typescript which was published in 1933 to mark the centenary of Brahms’s death and which has since lain undiscovered like the Sleeping Beauty, known only from references in footnotes, is once again available. Numerous musical examples from Brahms’s symphonic works meticulously preserve the performance directions of the conductor Fritz Steinbach (1855-1916). Steinbach was appointed on Brahms’s recommendation to succeed Hans von Bülow as court conductor in Meiningen in 1886, and stayed in this post for 17 years. His close musical affinity with Brahms was deepened through the composer’s regular visits to Meiningen. Steinbach became one of the most loyal and best known interpreters of Brahms’s work, continuing after the composer’s death to maintain his legacy. Steinbach died before it would have been possible to make a sound recording as an audible record of his conducting. Therefore these insights into the aesthetics of one of Brahms’s contemporaries as a musician and conductor are all the more fascinating. At the same time the book is practically a manifesto for historically informed performance practice at the dawn of the 20th century.