{"id":57042,"date":"2012-05-17T00:01:49","date_gmt":"2012-05-17T04:01:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=57042"},"modified":"2012-05-19T03:35:19","modified_gmt":"2012-05-19T07:35:19","slug":"from-the-venus-rx-in-gemini-files-johannes-brahms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/astro-daily\/from-the-venus-rx-in-gemini-files-johannes-brahms\/","title":{"rendered":"From the Venus Rx in Gemini Files: Johannes Brahms"},"content":{"rendered":"

One thing that might be fun, as we all navigate this Venus retrograde in Gemini that leads up to some big events, is to look at the charts for some famous people who have Venus retrograde in Gemini. The software I use has given me a bunch of names. So far, I don\u2019t see a clear connection between them all, but I\u2019m working on them one at a time. Here\u2019s the first one \u2013 and I\u2019m sure you\u2019ve heard of him: Johannes Brahms<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Photo
Photo of Johannes Brahms; Wikipedia.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Brahms was born May 7, 1833 (Sun close to the midspring cross-quarter) in Hamburg, Germany, but spent most of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. (You can see his natal chart here<\/a>.) A master composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, he was both a traditionalist and an innovator — a master of counterpoint and development who used highly structured forms to move forward new approaches to harmony and melody that have been characterized as \u2018bold\u2019. He began playing as a boy in taverns, dance halls and brothels.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, Brahms\u2019 retrograde Venus in Gemini makes one major aspect — a strange, out-of-sign trine to Neptune in late Capricorn. This is an image of his extremely complex melodies and use of harmonics, as if he is trying to work out the tension of the out-of-sign trine through his compositions. It’s as if they must pass through a filter in order to be in harmony — but they get there sure enough.<\/p>\n

It may also indicate why he was not married, though through history there have always been people who have opted out of householding and marital bonds. Other aspects indicate that his energy was being focused in other ways. For example, his Mars — the other planetary half to sexual\/romantic relations \u2013 is conjunct his North Node in mid-Cancer. His drive and libido are already married \u2013 to his mission of artistic expression, in the emotionally moving realm of the Romantic orchestral movement. However, it’s important to remember how little we really know about the private life of anyone, much less someone born nearly two centuries ago.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, his Moon is just past a conjunction to Pholus in late Sagittarius: his inner, emotional landscape is tuned more to the Galactic Center than anything else (which seems to support his Mars-North Node conjunction in Cancer). Brahms is expressing the music of something much larger than himself.<\/p>\n

Over in his Aries ascendant, Mercury conjoining Jupiter ensures that this creative expression of his soul will be big, clearly broadcast, and expand far beyond himself. Pluto on the ascendant in the 12th house adds some evolutionary push, although it seemed to come from a corner of his psyche he may not have been fully conscious of.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Speaking of the 12th: there we find a triple conjunction of Uranus in between Eris and Black Moon Lilith in Aquarius. It would seem that his more shadowy feminine side was a bit fractured, detached, tucked in beyond the normal reach of consciousness, and rather unpredictable thanks to that Uranus. He could tap into the cosmic chaos. And his early life reflected some of that as well:<\/p>\n

Owing to the family’s poverty, as a boy Brahms played in dance halls and brothels \u2013 some of the seediest places in Hamburg \u2013 surrounded by drunken sailors and prostitutes that often fondled the boy as he played. Early biographers found this shocking and played down this portion of his life. Modern writers have pointed to this as a reason for Brahms’s later inability to have a successful relationship for marriage, etc., his view of women being warped by his experiences. Recently, Brahms scholars Styra Avins and Kurt Hoffman have suggested that this legend is false. Since Brahms himself clearly originated the story, however, some have questioned Hoffman’s theory.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Which theory would you say is better supported by the astrology?<\/p>\n

In any case, Brahms\u2019 Taurus Sun takes care of aesthetic refinement, as well as contributing to his appreciation of past musical forms — even as his Pluto pushed him to evolve them. It may even contribute to what has been described as his preference for writing \u201cabsolute music that does not refer to an explicit scene or narrative.\u201d He wanted a certain purity of sensory experience. That is one expression of Venus in his chart.<\/p>\n

The other, of course, is his retrograde Venus in Gemini. That Venus indicates a tendency toward the short, the folksy, even the supposedly \u2018shallow\u2019. And sure enough, despite the reputation Brahms built on large, complex works, he was best known for (and most commercially successful with) his shorter works of more \u2018popular\u2019 music. Among the most well known are his Hungarian Dances<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

That said, I think Venus retrograde in Gemini also gives us his inner dialogue expressed as music in his use of counterpoint, harmony and melody. It\u2019s his innate balance between old and new modes of communicating through beauty. That Taurus Sun just made sure he built his art to last.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One thing that might be fun, as we all navigate this Venus retrograde in Gemini that leads up to some big events, is to look at the charts for some famous people who have Venus retrograde in Gemini. The software I use has given me a bunch of names. So far, I don\u2019t see a … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":191,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1734],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57042"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/191"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57042"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57042\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}