Karajan artists: Dennis Brain – the superlative horn player

“He was a wonderful player.”
Karajan about Dennis Brain

 

Dennis Brain (1921 – 1957) was the Fritz Wunderlich of the horn. Benjamin Britten, Francis Poulenc and Paul Hindemith composed works for him. Brain was principal horn player of the newly founded Philharmonia Orchestra and hence figures in many Karajan recordings of the 1940s and 1950s. Their recording of the Mozart horn concertos in 1954 is still the most popular version of these works. Richard Osborne called it “a classic of the gramophone that has never been out of the catalogues. Brain was in dazzling form: everything from memory, of course. A music-stand had duly been provided, though when Karajan strolled over during one of the breaks to check some minor discrepancy in the parts all he found on it was a copy of Autocar.” Ivan March in Gramophone wrote about that recording: “Again and again Karajan matches the graceful line of the solo phrasing (the Romanza of No. 3 […] is just one ravishing example), while in the allegros the crisply articulated, often witty comments from the Philharmonia violins are a joy […] Brain left us this supreme Mozartian testament which may be approached by others […] but never quite equalled, for his was uniquely inspirational music-making, with a quality something like innocence to make it the more endearing.”
Dennis Brain died in a car crash aged only 36. For Gramophone in November 1957, Walter Legge wrote the obituary which was published again in Gramophone in 2021 on the occasion of Brain’s 100^th birthday.

“Their passion for cars forged an extramusical link between Dennis and Karajan. They both knew by heart the specifications, advertised and actual performances, structural details, advantages and disadvantages of every fast car, and never tired of discussing them. When Karajan told Dennis that he was giving up cars in favour of flying Dennis looked at him in hurt astonishment, then smiled and said, ‘Yes, but you’ll need a car to get to and from the aerodrome.’ One of his happiest hours was when Karajan let him drive his Mercedes 300SL in Lucerne.”

 

—  P.R. Jenkins