Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel

Historical context

Johannes Brahms’s “Handel Variations” were published by Breitkopf & Haertel, as Brahms himself noted in 1861. Brahms sent his “Handel Variations” to Albert Dietrich in January 1863. Dietrich recalled an occasion when Brahms delighted an orchestra by playing his variations the night before a concert, raising their enthusiasm. The variations were described as “wonderfully beautiful and full of true genius,” closing with a “perfectly fascinating” fugue.

Brahms himself performed his “wonderful variations on a theme by Handel” at a concert in Oldenburg on April 4, 1868. Albert Dietrich, who was present, noted that Brahms’s playing was “distinguished by lucidity and poetical expression.”

Drawn from ALBERT DIETRICH; J.V. WIDMANN, Recollections Of Johannes Brahms (1899) — public domain, archive.org.