On Wednesday, August 21, 1996 at 3:00:00 AM UTC-4, Jan Swafford wrote:
> : A few months ago, I happily plunged into Arthur Abell's "Talks With
> : the Great Composer's." Initially, the book seemed like a gold mine of
> : fascinating information about such composers as Brahms and Richard
> : Strauss. Abell claims to have recorded-- verbatim-- all these composers
> : had to say about their spiritual lives (a topic which Brahms rarely
> : discussed), the creative process, etc. In it an an account of a
> : conversation between Joseph Joachim and Darwin! Even Joachim and
> : Tennyson!
> : Later on, though, I stumbled upon a Brahms biography which mentioned the
> : book in a brief footnote. The author doubts the veracity of Abell's
> : conversations-- especially since the composers' spiritual beliefs jive so
> : much with his own.
> I'm writing a book on Brahms so was also duly excited a few years ago
> when I first ran across the Abell. But one quickly gets suspicious, for
> all kinds of reasons. The common wisdom is that it's a fraud.
> Still, somebody ought to do some sleuthing about the whole thing. Abell
> did know Brahms and Joachim and the other composers apparently, and did
> write a shorter, vaguer account of a Brahms interview back in the
> 30s--without the spiritualistic stuff. The best guess is that he cooked
> up his later "interview" from a few things Brahms told him, more things
> Joachim told him, and added some plugs for his own beliefs.
> Anybody out there have some solid info?
> Jan Swafford
There's clearly something wrong with Abell's 'recollection' of conversing with Brahms "a year before Brahms died" about the composer's alleged encounter with ragtime, reprinted in Schauffler's The Unknown Brahms, pp.176-77. Brahms died in 1897. The "well known tune which goes to the words: If you refuse me/Honey, you lose me" is from "Hello, Ma Baby" by Joseph E. Howard and Ida Emerson, 1899. (The actual lyrics are "Honey, you'll lose me".) Incidentally, your biography of Brahms is great!