Academic Festival Overture

Johannes Brahms

This work bears the designation Opus 80.

General Info

Year: 1880 / 1910 / 1969
Duration: c. 10:30
Difficulty: VI (see Ratings for explanation)
Original Medium: Orchestra
Publisher: Carl Fischer
Cost: Score and Parts - Out of Print

For availability information, see Discussion tab, above.

Instrumentation

Conductor
D-flat Piccolo
C Piccolo
Flute I-II
Oboe I-II
E-flat Soprano Clarinet I-II
B-flat Soprano Clarinet I-II-III-IV
E-flat Alto Clarinet I-II
B-flat Bass Clarinet I-II
Bassoon I-II
Contrabassoon
E-flat Alto Saxophone I-II
B-flat Tenor Saxophone I-II
E-flat Baritone Saxophone
B-flat Bass Saxophone
B-flat Cornet I-II-III
B-flat Flugelhorn I-II
B-flat Trumpet I-II
Horn or Alto in E-flat I-II-III-IV
Horn in F I-II-III-IV
Trombone I-II
Bass Trombone
Euphonium I-II
Tuba
Harp
Timpani
Percussion (3 players), including:

Bass Drum
Crash Cymbals
Snare Drum
Triangle

Errata

Flute I, reh. F, beat 2: F sharp and E quarter notes should read eighth notes
Oboe II, reh. B +7, beat 1: G-flat should read G natural
Bassoon I, reh. O +26 (13 meas. before Maestoso), beat 1: empty stem should read F below bass clef
Cornet III (2nd Cornet in Gilmore edition), reh. A +8: delete rehearsal "B"
Cornet III (2nd Cornet in Gilmore edition), reh. A +21: add rehearsal "B" (at the 4 measure rest)
Baritone I T.C., reh. P -12 (at the 3/4 meter change): add "Maestoso"
Basses, reh. H -20, beat 1&: fix broken note (A)

Program Notes

The University of Breslau awarded Brahms an honorary degree in 1880 and he reciprocated by writing an overture. Brahms conducted the piece at the University on January 4, 1881. The overture includes student drinking songs and retains the gay atmosphere of college life. Heard are: Wir hatten gebauet em stattliches Haus (We have built a stately house), played by the brass choir; Der Landesvater (The Land Father), given out by the violins in the orchestral version; Was kommt dort von der Hoh (What comes from afar) by the woodwinds and strings, and, finally the magnificent Gaudeamus igitur (Wherefore let us rejoice), by the whole ensemble.

- Program note by University of Houston Moores School of Music Wind Ensemble

Academic Festival Overture (Akademische Festouvertüre), Op. 80, by Johannes Brahms, was one of a pair of contrasting concert overtures -- the other being the Tragic Overture, Op. 81. Brahms composed the work during the summer of 1880 as a tribute to the University of Breslau, which had notified him that it would award him an honorary doctorate in philosophy.

Initially, Brahms had contented himself with sending a simple handwritten note of acknowledgment to the university, since he loathed the public fanfare of celebrity. However, the conductor Bernard Scholz, who had nominated him for the degree, convinced him that protocol required him to make a grander gesture of gratitude. The university expected nothing less than a musical offering from the composer. "Compose a fine symphony for us!" he wrote to Brahms. "But well orchestrated, old boy, not too uniformly thick!" Brahms, who was known to be an ironic joker, filled his quota by creating a "very boisterous potpourri of student drinking songs à la Suppé" in an intricately designed structure made to appear loose and episodic, thus drawing on the "academic" for both his sources and their treatment.

- Program Note from Wikipedia

Media

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State Ratings

Maryland: VI

Performances

To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project

Category 5 Wind Ensemble, Inc. (Dan Sitomer, conductor) – 28 April 2013
Mount Prospect (Ill.) Community Band (Ralph Wilder, conductor) – 28 March 2010

Works for Winds by This Composer

Adaptable Music

Allegro (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Watkin) (1876/2003)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Deterling) (1869/2020)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Stanton) (1869)
St. Anthony Chorale and Variation VI (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Brand) (1873/1991/2007)

All Wind Works

Academic Festival Overture (arr. Allen) (1880/2019)
Academic Festival Overture (arr. Safranek) (1880/1914)
Academic Festival Overture (tr. Hindsley) (1880/1914/197-?)
Academic Festival Overture (tr. Patterson) (1880/2012)
Allegro (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Watkin) (1876/2003)
Begräbnisgesang (ed. Whitwell) (1858/2014)
Blessed Are They (arr. Buehlman) (1868/1970)
Blessed Are They (arr. Kreines) (1868/xxx)
Blessed Are They Who Mourn (arr. Hanna) (1868)
A Child's Lullaby (arr. Swearingen) (1868/1996)
Clarinet Sonata No. 1 (1894)
Der Jäger (tr. Schuetter) (1859-60/2010)
Famous Melodies of Brahms (arr. Ployhar) (1970)
Finale from Brahms Symphony No. 1 (arr. Bobrowitz) (1862-76/2019)
Finale from "Symphony No. 1" (arr. Butts) (1862-76/)
Finale from "Symphony No. 1" (arr. Johnson) (1862-76/)
Finale from "Symphony No. 1" (arr. Nelson) (1862-76/1972)
Finale from "Symphony No. 1" (arr. Wilcox) (1862-76/)
Finale from "Symphony No. 1" (arr. Williams) (1862-76/2008)
Four Serious Songs (arr. Langslet) (1897/2017)
Funeral Hymn (arr. Westover) (1858/2018)
How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place (tr. Williams)
Hungarian Dance No 5 (arr. Laurendeau) (1869/1905)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Deterling) (1869/2020)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (arr. Longfield) (1869/1996)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (arr. Mahl) (1869/1911)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (arr. Stalter) (1869)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Stanton) (1869)
Hungarian Dance No. 5 (tr. Thompson) (1869/2018)
Hungarian Dance No. 6 (arr. Laurendeau) (1869/1905)
Hungarian Dance No. 6 (arr. Longfield) (1869/2005)
Hungarian Dance No. 6 (arr. Halle) (1869/1905)
Hungarian Dance No. 6 (arr. Price) (1869/1940)
Hungarian Dance No. 7 (arr. Hildreth) (1869/1919)
Hungarian Dances Nos 3, 5, 11 and 16 (arr. Sheen) (1869/1985)
Hungarian Dances No 7-8 (arr. Brockton) (1922)
Hymn of Freedom (tr. Gardner) (1876/1950/1995)
Nänie (tr. Smith) (1881/2020)
Oyama (arr. Laurendeau) (1905)
Piano Quintet in F minor (tr. Stroble) (/2020)
Prelude and Scherzo (arr. Hubbell) (c. 1857/1981)
Romanza (tr. Paxton) (c. 1865-1873/2020)
Serenade No. 2 in A major (ed. Smith) (1860/2012)
Sleep Gently, My Child (arr. Mahaffey) (1892/2001)
St. Anthony Chorale and Variation VI (Flex instrumentation) (arr. Brand) (1873/1991/2007)
Symphony No. 1 Theme (arr. Feldstein and Clark) (1876/2006)
Symphony No. 4 (arr. Wirgler)
Three Chorale Preludes (arr. Boyd; ed. Fennell) (1896/1996)
Three Hungarian Dances (arr. Singleton) (1858-1868/2009)
Tragic Overture (tr. Kreines) (1880/)
Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel (1862)
Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel (tr. Kreines; ed. Johnson) (1862)
Variations on a Theme by Haydn (tr. Duthoit) (1873/1938)
Variations on a Theme by Haydn (tr. Hindsley) (1873/197-?)
Variations on a Theme by Haydn (tr. Popkin) (1873/1996)

Resources

Academic Festival Overture, Wikipedia Accessed 17 May 2020
Brahms, J.; Safranek, V. (1943). Academic Festival Overture [score]. C. Fischer: New York.
Girsberger, Russ. Percussion Assignments for Band & Wind Ensemble. Volume I: A-K. Galesburg, MD: Meredith Music Publications, 2004, 48. Print.