F-A-E Sonata

The ‘F.A.E' Sonata, a four-movement work for violin and piano, is an interesting example of a collaborative effort by three composers. It was composed in Düsseldorf in October 1853 by Robert Schumann, the young Johannes Brahms (who had become known to Schumann on the 1st of that month) and Schumann’s pupil Albert Dietrich.

The Sonata was Schumann’s idea and was intended as a gift and tribute to the violinist Joseph Joachim, with whom all three composers had entered into friendship relatively recently. Joachim had taken the Romantic-sounding phrase Frei aber einsam as his personal motto (‘free but lonely’), and the idea was for all of the movements of the sonata to make prominent use of the musical notes F-A-E, echoing this motto, and for Joachim to have to guess the composer of each movement. To Dietrich was assigned the substantial sonata form first movement; Schumann followed with a short ‘Romanze’ taking the place of a slow movement; the scherzo was by Brahms, who had already proved himself a natural master of this form in his E flat minor Scherzo for piano and the scherzi of his first two piano sonatas; and Schumann provided the finale.

The work was presented to Joachim at the end of the month; on it Schumann had written the dedication:

F.A.E. In Erwartung der Ankunft des verehrten und geliebten Freundes JOSEPH JOACHIM schrieben diese Sonate R.S., J.B., A.D

('In expectation of the arrival of their revered and beloved friend, Joseph Joachim, this sonata was written by R.S., J.B., A.D.'). Joachim played the work in the Schumann household on 28 October with Clara Schumann at the piano, and identified the authors of the movements without difficulty. He had been presented with the music earlier in the evening at a soirée attended by Bettina von Arnim and her daughter Gisela. The work thereafter remained unpublished as an entirety during the composers' lifetimes. Schumann proceeded to incorporate his two movements into his own Violin Sonata No.3. Joachim retained the original manuscript, from which he allowed only the scherzo to be eventually published in 1906, nearly ten years after Brahms's death. The sonata was only published in full in 1935. Whether Dietrich made any further use of his sonata-allegro is not known. It is interesting to note that all three composers separately composed a violin concerto for Joachim; Schumann’s, indeed, was completed on 3 October 1853 just before the sonata was begun. Joachim, however, never played it, unlike the concertos of Brahms and Dietrich.

References

• Dietrich, Albert & Widmann, Karl Recollections of Johannes Brahms translated by Dora E. Hecht (London: Seeley & Co. Ltd, 1899)
• Geiringer, Karl Brahms. His Life and Work, 2nd edition (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1948)
• MacDonald, Malcolm Brahms (London: JM Dent, 1990), ISBN 0-460-03185-6
• May, Florence The Life of Johannes Brahms, 2nd edition (London: William Reeves, 1948)