Happy 199th Birthday, Anton Bruckner - born on 4th September, 1824
Anton Bruckner was one of the most extraordinary composers of the 19th century, born in Ansfelden, near Linz in Austria on 4th September 1824. This means, of course, that 2024 will be the bi-centenary of this towering yet simple man, and I thought I would get in a year early with an appreciation, as part of my series of ‘A Singer’s Guide to the Great Composers.’
If you cast your mind back to the middle of the pandemic, you may recall that I wrote a series of articles for the EMR, in which I attempted to look at various composers from the point of view of a professional singer. I didn’t include Bruckner, as he didn’t write any operas or Lieder (as far as I am aware), and most of his vocal writing was for choral forces, only occasionally with soloists, notably the great Te Deum.
My many reviews since then of orchestral music have allowed me perhaps to write more lucidly than before about non vocal music, and since Bruckner is one of my passions, maybe now is the time, on his 199thbirthday, to salute him.
His father and grandfather were both schoolmasters in Ansfelden, poorly paid but respected in the community. Anton was the eldest of eleven children, and he received his first music lessons from his father, taking up the organ at a young age. At the age of 9 he was sent to a school in Hörsching a few miles away but returned at the end of his schooling to help his father. When Anton Sr died in 1837, the young Bruckner was sent as a choirboy to the nearby Augustinian Abbey of Sankt Florian, an enormous establishment which became his spiritual home for the rest of his life.
I have visited Sankt Florian several times over the course of my life, and it always inspires me to see it and imagine Bruckner at the gigantic Baroque organ there. Anyone coming from a Church of Scotland upbringing must find these great Austrian catholic abbeys and cathedrals overwhelming, and I was no exception, but my outrage at the elaborate and heavily gilded interiors, so typical of Counter-Reformation excess and wealth, has abated over the years, and I can now enjoy these crazy buildings for what they are. Sankt Florian and, further down the Danube, Melk are truly magnificent and one can see how Bruckner, a relatively humble individual, albeit blessed with unimaginable gifts as a composer, must have been in awe of the church that created them.
All his symphonies were conceived with the acoustic of St Florian in mind, which is why they mostly end with a bang, as if to let the reverberations continue for 10 seconds or more.
His mother wanted him to be a teacher, like his father and grandfather before him, and for several years he was employed as that, eventually working in or near St Florian. In 1848, he was appointed as organist at that very monastery, a post that was confirmed as permanent in 1851. He never composed music for the organ but was renowned as an improviser on this huge baroque instrument, which was to become known as the ‘Bruckner Organ’. It is still there, and magnificent. In 1855, he started having composition lessons with the famous teacher, Simon Sechter, in Vienna, often going to the city for sessions.
His compositions were still very minimal (he didn’t become famous until his 60s), but he became acquainted with the music of Richard Wagner, and by 1861, he had met and impressed Franz Liszt. After Sechter died in 1867, Bruckner was appointed to his post as Professor of Music Theory at the Vienna Conservatoire the following year, and in 1875, he accepted a post at Vienna University. By this time, he was beginning to write symphonic music, although his music was described as ‘wild’ and ‘nonsensical’. This period saw the start of Bruckner’s coming of age, but also, due to his utter lack of self-belief or confidence in his ability, this was when the problems arose that bugged him for the rest of his life, and indeed lasted well into the future. He was totally unable to stand up to criticism and deferred to many friends and colleagues who persuaded him to keep changing his scores. It is only now, since the latter half of the 20th century, that we are able to hear much of his music as he wanted it. Various ‘friends’ rewrote or re-orchestrated vast chunks, and well-meaning editors have, over the years, tried to produce their versions of his music, completely misunderstanding his genius. It is quite like what happened to Modest Mussorgsky, when none of his contemporaries could understand his music, and rewrote it as they thought fit, resulting in vast amounts of music sounding nothing like what Mussorgsky intended.
This happened with Bruckner, although, unlike the crazy Russian, he did live to see some success, even with symphonies chopped up and revised. It does seem extraordinary that a composer who was manifestly, as we now understand it, one of the greatest symphonists of all time, could allow clearly inferior and oddly motivated contemporaries to alter vast quantities of his music, simply because he was so shy and lacking in confidence.
I have always found this anomaly bizarre. If Bruckner had composed small scale and pretty music, one could understand him bowing to other stronger voices to change things, but the fact that he wrote enormous, complicated and earth-shattering symphonies at great length seems to me to demonstrate that he wasn’t just a simple provincial organist. His genius was all-encompassing and deeply profound, and it is hard to understand such a composer being so meek and mild.
In addition, he was not even just a provincial organist, but one of the greatest virtuosos of his day. He toured to France in 1869 and to Britain in 1871, playing six monumental recitals on the new Father Willis organ at the Albert Hall in London, and five at the Crystal Palace. This was no bumpkin, however humble he may have been.
There is no doubt that Bruckner was a great composer, particularly of symphonies, although his willingness to change what he had written has led to a huge amount of speculation as to what his exact wishes were, in terms of final versions of his work. During his life, he was amending all the time, and being advised by various friends and colleagues. After his death in 1896, over the decades since, there have been numerous attempts to solve the so-called Bruckner Problem: what are the definitive versions of his symphonies? Added in the mix is the fact that Hitler loved his music, seeing it as some sort of vision of a perfect Aryan society, a musical summation of the Thousand Year Reich. This is manifestly rubbish, and Bruckner would have been horrified that his music should have been used as a template for the most vicious and cruel philosophy ever invented. He was definitely weird though, with a fascination for teenage girls, in his old age particularly, and a morbid obsession with death. He kept a photograph of his mother’s corpse, rather than photos of her in life!
In my reading for this article, I have seen how this very odd man fascinated writers has for years, but I suggest you find out for yourselves more about the various editions and versions, and his odd private life. My purpose here is to direct you to a symphonist who I adore and whose music has thrilled and moved me for over 50 years. I will have a look at my five favourites.
The first symphony I became aware of was his 3rd, written in 1873 and dedicated to Richard Wagner. This was the most revised of all his symphonies, with six extant versions, three of which are performed regularly now. He finished the original work in December 1873, after visiting Wagner and asking his opinion. The master was pleased, and so Bruckner dedicated the work to him. No one would play it at first, and when Bruckner revised it for a performance in Vienna in 1877, with him as conductor (not a good idea, as he had no control over a large orchestra), the audience began to walk out, as did some of the orchestra by the end. Only Gustav Mahler, a supporter through all the criticism, although not above revising it himself later, stayed, along with a few other faithful disciples.
The symphony has four movements and represents the first real statement of Bruckner’s genius as a composer. A great trumpet theme rings out of an ostinato opening, and this theme will permeate the whole score. The Adagio second movement is the first great slow movement to come from Bruckner’s pen, and features a quotation from Wagner’s ‘Die Walküre’ at the end. The Scherzo swells quickly from a quiet start, with a gentle Trio providing contrast. The finale brings back the trumpet theme from the first movement and sweeps to its grand conclusion in a powerful declaration of Bruckner’s arrival as a major composer. Despite all the controversy and the different versions, it is clear that someone quite unique was now a player in late 19th century music. The shy, middle-aged provincial was on his way, even though most of Vienna, and the musical world, was totally unconvinced!
His great breakthrough came with the Fourth Symphony, premiered in 1881 by Hans Richter in Vienna. Despite the existence of multiple versions again, with variants from 1874, 1881, 1888 and editions from 1935 and 1951, and later, in 1996, there emerges a symphony of great power and beauty. Bruckner called it his ‘Romantic’ Symphony and suggested a storyline of a mediaeval town waking to church bells, and scenes of knights out hunting, with birdsong, leading to a joyous ending. There is certainly no doubt in my mind that the great finale of the fourth movement is one of my all-time favourite symphonic endings, with a slow build up leading to a wonderful heart-warming climax, which takes my breath away every time.
Symphonies Five and Six are very fine, but No 7 is probably my all-time favourite, although on certain days, I would go for No 8, and actually no 9, although unfinished, is fabulous. What a choice, and what music! How did this eccentric man produce such compositions? It remains a mystery, like the whole question of multiple versions.
The 7th begins with a majestic melody on the cellos and a solo horn, and, over the course of 70 minutes or so, Bruckner paints a vast canvas in music, covering all sorts of emotions and feelings, and transporting his listeners to a realm far from the mundane reality around us. It is amusing that one of the biggest controversies about this, and indeed any of the symphonies, is whether the cymbal clash at the climax of the slow movement was intended or not. The question can never be answered, but, on balance, and having heard both with and without, I favour inclusion myself, as it’s such a wonderful moment. The reception for the 7th after its premiere in Leipzig in December 1884 was the greatest Bruckner had ever experienced and gave him some hope that his music would be better appreciated.
The Eighth is even longer, and more elaborate, than the Seventh, and can perhaps be seen as the apotheosis of Bruckner’s life and work. Again there are many versions and changes to contend with, along with different editions, and again, there is a minefield to walk through to get anywhere near what the composer truly intended. I must say that I hadn’t really appreciated, until I started to research this article, how complicated the ‘Bruckner Problem’ was, and it is not remotely within the scope of these few pages to make any sense of it. All I can do is to point you in the direction of some vague understanding of the genius that was Anton Bruckner, and to give some feeling of the response I have to this extraordinary music. The version of the 8th that gives me the best sense of what Bruckner was attempting, is probably that used by Günter Wand and Herbert von Karajan in their great late 20th century recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, known as the Haas ‘Mixed Version’, dating from 1939. It is the one that seems to me to reflect the mature symphonic style of the composer towards the end of his life, and the one which takes me, as a listener, to the furthest level of majesty and glory in the concert hall. Beethoven and Mahler can do this too, but Bruckner somehow seems to transport me to an almost heavenly spot, where sheer sound takes over and the outside world seems to stand still. I know this sounds terribly hippie and perhaps even silly, but his music does have that effect on me, and I would love to direct others to this lofty height.
I still regret that Bruckner never finished his 9th Symphony, but there is enough written to have almost convinced me that it is best left in its unfinished state. He finished the slow third movement in November 1894, and the accepted view seems to be that his deteriorating health prevented him from making more than vague notes and sketches of the Finale. Many have tried to complete the symphony from those notes, and Bruckner himself was reported to have requested that his Te Deum, which he had written in 1884, be used as the Finale. However, the consensus seems to be that the best solution is to play the first three movements and leave the audience to ponder what might have followed, or perhaps just luxuriate in the magical sounds Bruckner conjured up in that last great Adagio.
I have sung the bass solos in the ‘Te Deum’ a few times in my career, and I must say that it is a most satisfying work to be a part of, although the tenor gets the best bits! As usual!
This short look at the amazing work of Anton Bruckner can only give a tiny glimpse of the awe -inspiring music that this modest and devout man produced in the second half of the 19th century, but if I can tempt just a few of our readers to investigate his compositions, especially his symphonies, I will feel that I have achieved something.
