This needs a bit of explanation as it’s a bit off my usual beat. I was watching a TV programme about two grumpy old men fishing and an arrangement of this turned up as background music. It was turgidly slow and showed no signs of actually being a waltz. Only a snail could have danced to it.

This grumpy old man thought he would have a crack at it and swiftly ran into problems. These 16 waltzes are after Schubert. Schubert wrote reams of waltzes and intended them to be danced to. The majority are pretty banal but there are some absolute gems, often pulled about by “romantic” pianists sufficiently to make them undanceable. The Brahms Op. 39 waltzes are in a similar vein but more ambitious in structure. They are not intended to be danced to; more salon pieces.

Brahms does not use metronome marks (“I don’t want to hear my music played the same way every time”). Most of the waltzes, including this one, have no tempo indication at all which leads this engineer to think they should be played at waltz tempo. Some of them, including this one, really don’t work at anything approaching waltz tempo. Three of them, not including this one, have marking such as “poco sostenuto” suggesting they should be played slower.

At face value, this piece should be played at waltz tempo. It is horrible at that speed. It is usually played far too slowly. I have chosen a tempo that is as fast as I could make it without it becoming problematic, so that it retains the waltz character. Don’t judge it on one hearing. Give it a few goes to get used to it.

I also could not in all conscience orchestrate it a la Strauss. Best guess at mid-romantic period orchestration