Take Me To Your Shiksalieder.

I keep an updated list of famous German composers who are also Jewish. It begins and ends with Felix Mendelssohn. Yet a recent concert listing in The New York Times tempted me to add Johannes Brahms to that list. According to them, he wrote something called the “Shicksalied” (“Song of Destiny.”) Either “The Newspaper of Record” got the attribution wrong or shicksa doesn’t mean what I thought it did.

The first possibility is beyond considering. The New York Times may occasionally publish corrections, but they are so small and hidden that they can’t be important. So, I looked the word up in my German dictionary, Gefindawordenzeebuch Mitoutabridgenzee (Krapfarht Verlag, 1972), and there were two definitions. The first was “A non-Jewish woman.” The second was “Destiny.” The New York Times clearly finds the second entry compelling. I do not.

Why would a Nineteenth Century German composer write a song about destiny and risk appearing Jewish? The danger to his life would be immense and if Richard Wagner found out, he could wind up with a spear in his Rienzi. It seems much more likely that Brahms was a Jewish composer writing a song about a non-Jewish woman and disguising it as one about destiny.

But wait. What if he didn’t fool anyone? Wouldn’t that make him Jewish pretending to be gentile, but still appearing Jewish? That’s what the music critic, Victor Victoria, claims in his massive study, Genius Disguised as Stupidity and Mistaken for Art. If so, that must be one hot shicksa.

Yet, there is no evidence of her existence. In fact, on the subject of romance, Brahms is completely silent. He had a very warm relationship with the composer Robert Schumann’s widow, Clara, whom he called, “Mein hag”, but that’s it. The standard reference work, Musicians I’ve Slept With by Venus Impelz, doesn’t mention him at all.

We are, thus, forced to conclude that, against our earlier impression, “Shicksalied” was not written by Brahms. It was probably some talented Jewish composer, who was dealt with summarily and remains unknown. Somehow it became attributed to Brahms and we can guess how he reacted. Instead of rightly claiming that he had nothing to do with “Shicksalied,” Johannes tooken zie gelt und mach schnell.