Brahms rhapsody in g minor tempo?

[musicluvr49]

Ok, so I'm asking here because my book (schirmer) suggests 133 per quarter note, which kinda sounds ridiculously fast in my opinion, for this music. Then my teacher suggested something really slow like 75. So I'm not sure how flexible the tempo is for a college audition or performance. Suggestion/advice ?

[lelle]

I think quarter note = 133 is perfectly fine for the main theme and the "march". I would broaden the lyrical section however. Remember that the slower you play the more difficult it will be to make a connected melodic line from the quarter notes in the main theme.

Quarter note = 75 will make everything unbearably slow I think. It's non troppo allegro after all. Hard to make it Molto appassionato when playing it like an andante

[birba]

I play it at about  120-4.

[scott13]

Personally, I feel whenever Brahms writes Allegro non troppo, he does not want an overly fast tempo. The times he does he normally marks it presto. For examples look at the 4th mvt from Op 1 and the 5th mvt from Op 5. Both increases in speed are clearly marked.

This direction is frequent in the 3 piano sonatas, and very few people play them on the fast side. If anything slightly slower with some rubato is how I prefer to play Brahms.

Try listening to some recordings of the piece by famous players and see how they treat the tempo. That should give you a fairly good idea of the speed you want to go.

Best of luck

[musicluvr49]

I play it at about  120-4.

Thanks, I tried that and it sounds good, and it doesn't feel like I'm rushing the piece, like when I was playing it faster.

@scott13 - Thanks For the good advice

@lelle - thanks for the advice, but I feel like I can make the melodic line sound connected at a slower tempo. I completely agree that the 75 tempo is Wayyy too slow.