The Brahms-Keller Correspondence

The Brahms-Keller Correspondence by Bozarth, George. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780803212381.

For two decades, beginning in the early 1870s, Robert Keller, music editor for N. Simrock Verlag in Berlin, worked with diligence and devotion to usher into print most of Johannes Brahmss major compositions, including all four of his symphonies, the Violin Concerto, the Double Concerto, the Second Piano Concerto, and numerous chamber, choral, and vocal works. This volume collects for the first time the complete extant correspondence between Brahms and Keller, as preserved in the collections of the Library of Congress and the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna. To read their correspondence is to witness a relationship of mutual respect and increasing friendship and to gain an appreciation for the meticulous labor that went into the publication of Brahmss masterpieces. Keller’s admiration for the composers genius was answered by Brahmss affection for Keller’s diligence and musical expertise. The vicissitudes of the publication process from composer’s manuscript to printed score are documented in fascinating detail. This edition includes a transcription of the letters in the original German.