Anton Bruckner
(1824-1896)
Symphony No. 7
A mediaeval artisan might easily have kept a daily record of how many
different prayers he prayed and how often he repeated them. For a composer of
the nineteenth century, with its belief in unstoppable progress and human
supremacy, to behave in this fashion is certainly unique. But Anton Bruckner,
though accepting the harmonic and orchestral achievements of the Romantic
period, did just that; he did not really belong to his time. Even less did he
fit in with the Viennese environment into which he was transplanted for the
last 27 years of his life. The elegant and rather superficial society he
encountered there must have thought the naive, badly dressed fellow with the
'wrong' accent a rather pathetic oddity.
Bruckner had indeed come from a very different background. The little
village in Upper Austria, Ansfelden, where his father was a schoolmaster, was
not far away from the great and beautiful monastery of St Florian. The young
Bruckner followed in the footsteps of his father for a short time; but St
Florian possessed one of Europe's finest organs, and young Anton, whose talent
for music was discovered early, became an organist. The experience of hearing
and playing this magnificent instrument became central to his whole life. He
spent many hours there, practising and improvising, and eventually his playing
was so exceptional that he made successful tours of France and England as an
organ virtuoso. He had lessons in theory and composition, and started composing
fairly early in life, but he felt the need for more instruction in counterpoint
and became for several years a most diligent pupil of the famous Simon Sechter,
visiting him every fortnight in Vienna. Many years earlier and shortly before
his death, Schubert had also wanted to study counterpoint with Sechter, but of
course he was wrong; most of his life work was already done, and works such as
his early Mass in A flat showed him in no need of such lessons.
Sechter forbade Bruckner to compose a single note in order to
concentrate entirely on his innumerable exercises, and here Bruckner, who had
in the meantime advanced to the post of organist at Linz Cathedral, showed one
unfortunate trait of his character, perhaps acquired as an altar-boy: utter
submission to those he considered his superiors. He obeyed. But when he had
finished his instruction with Sechter and took lessons with the conductor of
the local opera, Otto Kitzler, who introduced him to the magic world of Wagner,
music poured out of him. Now forty, Bruckner composed his first masterpiece,
the wonderful Mass in D minor, followed by two other great
Masses, and Symphony No. 1. His reputation reached Vienna and he
was appointed to succeed Sechter as Professor of Music Theory.
Bruckner had ample reason to regret his move from Linz to Vienna. He,
the fanatical admirer of Wagner, was innocently dragged into the rather silly
conflict between the followers of Brahms and those of his beloved Wagner. So he
made many enemies, most cruel of whom was the critic Eduard Hanslick, whom
Wagner caricatured as Beckmesser in Die Meistersinger. But though
adversaries did him harm, his friends and admirers hurt his works much more.
All his young students were gifted Wagnerians and they thought Bruckner's music
needed to sound more like Wagner, and that it needed other 'ministrations' such
as large cuts as well. They considered their beloved Master to be a 'genius
without talent'.
Many of those misguided admirers, such as Artur Nikisch and Franz
Schalk, became famous conductors and they set about making these enormous
scores acceptable to the public – and it must be said that the master, who was
desperately anxious to be performed, often agreed and sometimes even became an
accomplice to their mutilations. But he also left his original scores to the
National Library with the comment 'for later times'. His own insecurity made
him constantly revise his works, especially Symphonies No. 1-4. As a
result, we are confronted in many cases by several versions of the same work.
Sometimes the later versions are a definite improvement, as with the Fourth
Symphony; and sometimes, in my opinion, the first version is superior, as
with the Second and Third Symphonies.
One who deals with eternal things is in no hurry, and therefore
performers and listeners must also allow plenty of time. Whereas Mahler, who
died three years before World War I began, was the prophet of insecurity,
‘Angst’ and the horrors we live in, the deeply religious Bruckner sings of
consolation and spiritual ecstasy (Verzückuug) – but not exclusively. In
some of the Eighth and most of the Ninth Symphonies, he expresses
agony, perhaps doubt.
Bruckner's music touches the innermost recesses of the human soul. In
this way he reminds me of Dostoyevsky. This quality is probably the only thing
the compulsive gambler and epileptic sinner has in common with the celibate
'country bumpkin'.
Symphony No.7
Bruckner was sixty years old when the first two performances of his Seventh
Symphony took place: under his pupil Nikisch in Leipzig, and shortly
afterwards under the celebrated first conductor of Parsifal, Hermann
Levi. The enthusiastic reception of those two performances laid the foundation
for the international fame of the composer. How precarious his position was in
Vienna, however, is shown in a letter he wrote to the Vienna Philharmonic
Orchestra, which planned to programme this new work. Bruckner implored them not
to perform it because he was afraid that the hostile music critics there would
condemn it and thereby endanger his prospects elsewhere.
Symphony No. 7 (actually his ninth symphony) is perhaps his most beautiful
work and with his Fourth Symphony certainly his most popular. After a
gentle tremolo in the violins the first horn and the cellos (the most
euphonious orchestral instruments) sing a rising very wide E major arpeggio; in
its continuation the violas quietly take over from the horn; this peaceful
melody (repeated by the full orchestra) gently leads to the dominant key, where
a very different second tune begins. It has a restless character, modulating
incessantly starting in steps with a Wagnerian turn (as in Bruckner's Second
Symphony and in Wagner's Rienzi). Also unexpectedly a third melody,
very different from either the first or the second, appears like an austere rhythmic
dance. With these three building-blocks, the composer gives us one of the
loveliest first movements in all music. I would like to mention that Robert
Haas is right in ignoring the many tempo modifications added (or at least
suggested) by lesser men. They disturb the flow of the music.
Bruckner's adoration of Wagner (who was eleven years his senior) is well
known. He had the premonition that his beloved "master of all
masters" might soon die. This fear inspired the main tune of the second
movement. The composer employed for the first time four "Wagner
tubas" which Wagner had specially invented for the Ring cycle.
Their sound is across between horns and trombones. They intone a funereal
melody answered by the strings. One great melody is followed by the next
without ever turning back to the main tune, until the low notes in the brass
lead to the slightly faster, much happier second tune (one of Bruckner's
greatest inspirations). Here may I point to the similarity in form between
this movement and the slow movement in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Also
there the slow 4/4 tune is twice followed by a slightly faster 3/4 after which
the substantial part of the movement does not mention the second melody again.
The first melody reappears with developmental episodes, then the lovely second
section is played atone higher with wonderful counterpoints. The main tune
appears (highly embroidered) a third time, leading to Bruckner's most
successful Steigerung (increase) to a shattering climax. It needs to be
mentioned that Nikisch persuaded our very insecure master to
