Abstract

The nineteenth century was the age of the Romanticism. The main characteristics of Romantic music in solo piano included advocating nature, more personal and emotional , and freedom of form and design.

In contrast to the stormy, powerful expression of emotion works of "neo-German" composer such as Franz Liszt(1811 – 1886), Johannes Brahms’s (1833-1897) music was bold with its exploration of harmony and rhythm. Brahms was an important composer with great personal characteristics at this time. He had more fusion of his deep personal emotional touch in his works and held a firm ground against the overflow of the romantic period with his techniques which inherited the skills and counterpoint of the Classical and Baroque periods.

Brahms is extremely skilled in piano playing, his piano works play a very important part of his life which demonstrate advanced skills, complex rhythms, heavy chords and restrained colors. Each of his piano periods also has a different style. Brahms’s late works demonstrate the plain and simple late autumn atmosphere, but the melody is closer to his inner world. His unique composing techniques reached high perfection, therefore his works were free of the mainstream influences. His late piano works are evaluated as "pearl-like piano works."

This research examines Brahms’s use of harmonic progression, melodic techniques and rhythmic characteristics in Brahms op. 119, then disscusses articulation, dynamics and pedalling. Finally, this research proposes ways of understanding Op. 119.