This Intermezzo in C major is the shortest of the Piano Pieces (4) comprising Brahms' Op. 119 set, lasting only about a minute-and-a-half. It is also the happiest, but for some the relatively brief emotional high expressed here will only reinforce their view that the composer could not write a substantial work of joyous character in the latter stages of his career. Brahms' sister Elise and his close friend Elizabeth von Herzogenberg had died shortly before he wrote this set, leaving him bereft and perhaps serving as the springboard that made his last piano compositions generally reflective and darker. Marked Grazioso e giocoso, this piece is quite lively, an usual feature for Brahms since his intermezzos are usually slow or moderately paced. The main theme is chipper in its jaunty chords and tricky rhythmic features, seeming to bounce along in a carefree manner. Just when the music seems detoured toward a more serious character, it turns playful and almost childlike. After further elaboration on the theme, variants of it are heard and the piece ends in a mostly subdued manner.

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If the opening work of the Pieces (4) comprising Brahms' Op. 119 set can be described as having a mixture of fantasy and loneliness, this one can be said to blend grace and anxiety. The composer seemed to balance conflicting elements with utter mastery in his last piano compositions, of which his Op. 119 set was his keyboard swan song. He tended to compose slow intermezzos, but this E minor effort, with its Andantino un poco agitato marking, lives up to its agitato character with a main theme whose hesitant, nervous manner conveys a desperate sense worlds removed from the more sedate intermezzos of Opp. 76 and 116. The main theme here, rhythmic and agitated in its mostly descending contour, expresses urgency and desperation with a typically Brahmsian restraint, never letting emotions go to an extreme, never losing a sense of dignity. The lovely theme in the middle section restores a feeling of stability, of warmth. The main theme returns in its original, agitated guise and the work quietly ends, struggling to recall the calm of the alternate melody. This Intermezzo for piano has a duration of about five minutes.

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Until 1865, a significant percentage of Brahms' published work was for piano solo. After this time, he concentrated on vocal music, not publishing a major work for piano until the Eight Piano Pieces, Op. 76, of 1878, followed immediately by the Two Rhapsodies, Op. 79, of 1879. Brahms would take another break from the piano until the early 1890s, when he released Opp. 116 through 119. Thus, works for piano open and close his compositional career. Unity seems not to have been an issue with Brahms in the late sets of piano pieces, except in the case of the Fantasias, Op. 116. Although the late piano works are brief, they are among the most complex, dense, and reflective works ever composed for the instrument. Most likely composed in the summer of 1893, the Klavierstücke (Piano Pieces), Op. 119, were published in Berlin by Simrock in 1893. They were first performed in London in January 1894.

Brahms was uncomfortable with descriptive titles for his pieces, and often resorted to the noncommittal "Klavierstücke." Occasionally unsure as to what title, if any, he should give an individual piece, Brahms came to use the term "intermezzo" as a rubric under which he could file anything that was not especially whimsical or fiery. Thus, the three Intermezzi of Op. 119 are not all constructed alike. The Op. 119 pieces do not require the technical facility necessary to play many of his earlier works, but an incisive musicality is paramount for a proper performance of these musical miniatures.

Brahms disguises the bar line in a masterful fashion at the beginning of the first piece, an Intermezzo in B minor. Described by Walter Frisch as a B minor triad that is "embedded in a chord that looks, but cannot be said to function, like a E minor ninth," the first three notes (a B minor triad) really function as an upbeat to what follows. Thus, the second half of each measure belongs, harmonically, with the first half of the next. Such an analysis reveals a circle of fifths progression into the fourth measure, at which point the real bar line becomes meaningful. After the central section, which is less linear than the opening material, the beginning of the piece returns, but with touches of the tonic major. The strongest cadence, on B minor, occurs at the end of what is the most harmonically rich, yet harmonically ambivalent, of Brahms's works.

Agitated repeated notes characterize the E minor Intermezzo, whose first section consists of varied presentations of the opening theme. The waltz-like central section, itself in two parts, uses the same melody as the opening measures, disguised by the different tempo, rhythm, and accompaniment. The reprise of the first section skips little material, and the piece ends with a reminiscence of the waltz.

The Intermezzo in C major is a frivolous, humorous romp with the melody in the thumb of right hand, accompanied both above and below. The piece has the feel, though not the form, of a scherzo; its middle segment is set off more by harmony than by new melodic material.

The fourth and final piece of the set, a Rhapsody in E flat major, is the longest of Brahms's late piano works. A passage built of triplets sets off the harsh opening from the more lyrical central episode, which features a stepwise melody over broken chords. A varied form of the main theme appears before the literal reprise. The Rhapsody's firm close on E flat minor is very unusual, and looks back to the second of Schubert's Four Impromptus, D. 899.

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The four piano pieces in Brahms' Op. 119 set were his last efforts for the piano. It would be difficult to contend they all have a valedictorian air about them, since the No. 3 is joyous and lively and the last is mostly grandiose and triumphant. But the first two are both introspective works that arguably convey a sense of loss or loneliness. These works were written shortly after the deaths of Brahms' sister Elise and the composer's close friend Elizabeth von Herzogenberg, losses that explain the somber nature of many of his final piano works. To many, this Intermezzo in B minor will seem the most desolate of Brahms' piano works. The writing is sparse, the dynamics mostly piano, and the mood lonely. Brahms stressed in a letter to Clara Schumann that the Adagio tempo must be scrupulously observed. The forlorn main theme gently descends from the upper register to the center of the keyboard. In the middle section, the music grows warmer and stronger, but cannot ultimately dispel the sense of sweet loneliness. The main theme returns to gently close out this lovely intermezzo.

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Most likely composed in the summer of 1893, the Klavierstücke (Piano Pieces), Op. 119, were published in Berlin by Simrock in 1893. They were first performed in London in January 1894.

Brahms was uncomfortable with descriptive titles for his collections of pieces, and often resorted to the non-committal, "Klavierstücke." The Piano Pieces, Op. 119, do not require the technical facility necessary to play many of his earlier works, but an incisive musicality is paramount for a proper performance of these musical miniatures. Of the four works, the final "Rhapsody" is perhaps the best known and most effective, and may date from earlier in Brahms' career. Occasionally unsure what title, if any, he should give an individual piece, he used the title rhapsody to get himself out of a bind. The Alto Rhapsody, Op. 53, was the first piece for which Brahms used the term, and which has a very different format than the Two Rhapsodies, Op. 79, of 1879.

The Op. 119 Rhapsody in E flat major, is the longest of Brahms' late piano works. In three-part song form, the first section is itself ternary. A passage built of triplets encloses the more lyrical central episode, which features a stepwise melody over broken chords in A flat major. Brahms' predilection for variation takes hold as the triplet passage reappears to round off the central section, bringing with it a return of E flat major. Variation continues as the entire opening section, in the "wrong" key, appears before the literal reprise. Here, Brahms inserts new material on E flat minor, a key far removed from the tonic. The Rhapsody's firm close on E flat minor is very unusual and looks back to the second of Schubert's Four Impromptus, D. 899, which reverses the typical Classical era procedure of moving from a minor key to close on a related major key.

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