Chailly cancels Proms

[EdgeleyRob]

It's easy to see why Mahler is so frequently featured - seriously great composer (I mean, one of the very best); popular with audiences; popular with performers. Win, win, win.
Why Bruckner (seriously great composer; I mean one of the very best) doesn't attract the same enthusiasm "out there" is beyond me. And why Rodge didn't invite his mate Danny to do a Bruckner cycle at the Proms (to finish off what would have been a trilogy of such cycles) - well: the missed opportunity of the season.

Yeh,but apart form that....

[teamsaint]

i was at an LSO Bruckner 8 recently at the Barbican, which was far from a sell out.

Bruckner gets less than half the performances that Mahler does at the RFH. If tickets sold as quickly as Mahler tickets do, you can bet that he would be programmed a lot more frequently.

[amateur51]

It's easy to see why Mahler is so frequently featured - seriously great composer (I mean, one of the very best); popular with audiences; popular with performers. Win, win, win.

Why Bruckner (seriously great composer; I mean one of the very best) doesn't attract the same enthusiasm "out there" is beyond me. And why Rodge didn't invite his mate Danny to do a Bruckner cycle at the Proms (to finish off what would have been a trilogy of such cycles) - well: the missed opportunity of the season.

I'd prefer a Bruckner cycle with a different conductor for each symphony, me

[richardfinegold]

Is the situation the same in Germany & Austria? Bruckner may rival, if not surpass GM in that part of world.

[Petrushka]

For years Mahler and Bruckner were bracketed together as if they were twins (both wrote long-winded symphonies that no-one performed etc) so it's amusing to see the comments on here.

Every orchestra and his dog play Mahler these days and, in truth, Bruckner hasn't done too badly at the Proms either over the years and the vast spaces of the Royal Albert Hall seem ideally suited to both.

However, Bruckner isn't Mahler and part of the problem these days is that all of the old Bruckner maestros are no longer with us (Haitink and Barenboim excepted) and it's difficult to see who is to replace them. I don't sense the pacing and majesty of a Karajan or Jochum in modern Bruckner performances and that has to be a problem.

[Orphical]

I'd prefer a Bruckner cycle with a different conductor for each symphony, me

Which is what Brian McMaster did during his last year as EIF Director! And highly enjoyable it was!!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I don't sense the pacing and majesty of a Karajan or Jochum in modern Bruckner performances and that has to be a problem.

Does it?

[Krystal]

I saw Alan Gilbert in 2011 with the NYPO at the Musikverein and I agree he's a 'safe pair of hands'. Although, the orchestra sounded wonderful and it was good to hear English being spoken on the platform (I was sitting next to the 1st violins) after nearly a year of living in Vienna.

[richardfinegold]

For years Mahler and Bruckner were bracketed together as if they were twins (both wrote long-winded symphonies that no-one performed etc) so it's amusing to see the comments on here.

Every orchestra and his dog play Mahler these days and, in truth, Bruckner hasn't done too badly at the Proms either over the years and the vast spaces of the Royal Albert Hall seem ideally suited to both.

However, Bruckner isn't Mahler and part of the problem these days is that all of the old Bruckner maestros are no longer with us (Haitink and Barenboim excepted) and it's difficult to see who is to replace them. I don't sense the pacing and majesty of a Karajan or Jochum in modern Bruckner performances and that has to be a problem.

Agreed.

[P. G. Tipps]

I agree that Bruckner and Mahler are two quite different composers and the latter's music does enjoy a 'popular public profile' that the former's lacks, at least in the UK.

Still, I cannot remember a Bruckner concert I've been to at the RAH over the last few decades that wasn't extremely well-attended and, with the best, orchestras, completely sold-out. Bruckner is still referred to in some-quarters as a bit of a challenge for an audience which, to me, is a grossly out-dated sentiment. Of course there always be those who can't stand the music (there are those who feel much the same about Mahler's) but I suspect there are a lot more who adore it or are, at least, just as comfortable with it as a Mahler or Shostakovich symphony.

Bruckner certainly does not need 'special-pleading' these days, there are many other composers who are in greater need of that, but does not his latest omission (on the 190th anniversary of his birth) strike one as a bit neglectful (even decidedly odd) especially when we are presented with such a huge surfeit of Mahler for no apparent celebratory reason?

Just a thought!

[cloughie]

I agree that Bruckner and Mahler are two quite different composers and the latter's music does enjoy a 'popular public profile' that the former's lacks, at least in the UK.

Still, I cannot remember a Bruckner concert I've been to at the RAH over the last few decades that wasn't extremely well-attended and, with the best, orchestras, completely sold-out. Bruckner is still referred to in some-quarters as a bit of a challenge for an audience which, to me, is a grossly out-dated sentiment. Of course there always be those who can't stand the music (there are those who feel much the same about Mahler's) but I suspect there are a lot more who adore it or are, at least, just as comfortable with it as a Mahler or Shostakovich symphony.

Bruckner certainly does not need 'special-pleading' these days, there are many other composers who are in greater need of that, but does not his latest omission (on the 190th anniversary of his birth) strike one as a bit neglectful (even decidedly odd) especially when we are presented with such a huge surfeit of Mahler for no apparent celebratory reason?

Just a thought!

Guess there'll be more in '24! I don't recall many 190th celebrations for composers.

[jayne lee wilson]

For years Mahler and Bruckner were bracketed together as if they were twins (both wrote long-winded symphonies that no-one performed etc) so it's amusing to see the comments on here.

Every orchestra and his dog play Mahler these days and, in truth, Bruckner hasn't done too badly at the Proms either over the years and the vast spaces of the Royal Albert Hall seem ideally suited to both.

However, Bruckner isn't Mahler and part of the problem these days is that all of the old Bruckner maestros are no longer with us (Haitink and Barenboim excepted) and it's difficult to see who is to replace them. I don't sense the pacing and majesty of a Karajan or Jochum in modern Bruckner performances and that has to be a problem.

AS long ago as 1953 Volkmar Andreae (with the VSO) showed there is another approach - leaner, swifter, perhaps cooler but not inexpressive - the emphasis upon rhythmic directness and the musical argument, architecture revealed naturally without any grandiosity, no excess fat on the tone. It's a more "localised" tradition, worlds away from what can be an internationalised, generalised concept of "majestic" - an idea of what the VPO or BPO are supposed to sound like in Bruckner, with a very few ageing conductors who have some secret gift of performance. This is not to deny the very real beauties of Karajan, the one-basic-tempo ideals of Wand, the cello-led nobility of Giulini, and so on - just to warn of the danger of that view becoming calcified as the one true way, or commodified as Bruckner's USP.

Haitink is a fascinating case: I've always preferred his Amsterdam cycle - lean, swift, direct, a successor to Andreae - to any of his grander Vienna or Berlin performances (Haitink, self-effacing as ever, respecting THEIR traditions). I think it tells us more about Bruckner's actual music, in its freshness and clarity, free of any conductorly posturing or monumentality. We often hear about Bruckner being like "a cathedral in sound", and shouldn't forget that such "monumental" sounds should arise as much from Alpine, pastoral evocations as from Great Churches.

Again I would direct attention to Blomstedt's recent cycle (the early symphonies especially, the 1873 No.2 is key to understanding Bruckner)), and perhaps Mario Venzago above all - shame he uses the most truncated editions (the finale of the 1889 3rd is for me almost unlistenable) but he brings out the Schubertian side to Bruckner's tradition very clearly in the first 4 symphonies, and should make anyone creatively reconsider the whole concept of "pace" and "majesty" in Bruckner. If this music (or any classical music) is to stay alive, as a living tradition, we have to be open to new, even shocking, interpretations. (Why do you think Venzago gets so insulted by some reviewers?).
This is after all what gave rise to HIPPs performances of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven - they don't destroy earlier traditions, but it's impossible to conceive of that music without them now.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

AS long ago as 1953 Volkmar Andreae (with the VSO) showed there is another approach - leaner, swifter, perhaps cooler but not inexpressive - the emphasis upon rhythmic directness and the musical argument, architecture revealed naturally without any grandiosity, no excess fat on the tone. It's a more "localised" tradition, worlds away from what can be an internationalised, generalised concept of "majestic" - an idea of what the VPO or BPO are supposed to sound like in Bruckner, with a very few ageing conductors who have some secret gift of performance. This is not to deny the very real beauties of Karajan, the one-basic-tempo ideals of Wand, the cello-led nobility of Giulini, and so on - just to warn of the danger of that view becoming calcified as the one true way, or commodified as Bruckner's USP.

Exactly so - hence my querying Pet's "this has to be a problem". It wasn't only Andreae - Böhm's 1943 Live recording of the Seventh is fleeter of foot and fierier than his 1977 studio recording, and even Furtwangler doesn't hang about in his 1944 Live Fifth. (Klemperer, too, is swifter in his Bruckner recordings from the 1950s with the VSO than he was fifteen years later.) Karajan is my preferred choice for many of these works, but to suggest that Bruckner's multi-faceted Music responds well only to this approach (there being a "problem" otherwise) misses a lot from the Symphonies, I think.

If this music (or any classical music) is to stay alive, as a living tradition, we have to be open to new, even shocking, interpretations ... This is after all what gave rise to HIPPs performances of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven - they don't destroy earlier traditions, but it's impossible to conceive of that music without them now.

Almost took the very words out of my keyboard, Jayne, except that I prefer "readings" to the more loaded (for me) "interpretations". Did you hear the excerpt from Fischer's new recording of the Seventh on CDReview? I was struck instantly by the beauty of the Music, the way instantly it grabbed my imagination by the lapels and took me away from the housework for a moment (in the TS Eliot sense) - only to have me dumped on the ground when Andrew MacG faded it out to talk about its obviously (for him) too-fast Tempo! Venzago deserves all insults if he follows the cuts in the early editions, but he (and many other younger conductors) are right to question "orthodox" dismissals of the Tempo indications that the composer added in his own handwriting to these editions (the cuts aren't, IIRC) - they share characteristics with first-hand descriptions of Bruckner's own Organ playing, and deserve to be given the HIPP "let's hear what happens if we actually perform what he wrote" treatment.

Riccardo who? Oh ... sorry ...

[jayne lee wilson]

I wish I could do "housework in the TS Eliot sense"... it's all too literal here!

...To the excellent examples you mention one might add Kna's 4 & 7 from 8/9/44 and 30/8/49 respectively... taking an hour over the 7th was once more "traditional", v. Haitink in Amsterdam, live and studio.
Andreae seems so significant because he's at the heart of an earlier Viennese tradition, but one which didn't quite make it through to the Stereo era of The Great Conductors etc... it says a lot that I'm prepared to spend time with Venzago despite his choice of editions. Rob Cowan understands his aims very well, but Philip Clark ?
The Venzago 8th is due out in a few days, I see Hurwitz has already used the phrase "nutcase conductors" in his review... I don't think I'll pay the $49 to read it in full...

CD pre-ordered... I'm hoping to be, like, totally outraged...

[Zucchini]

This was about Chailly and/or Gilbert but has got trashed somewhere. By all means start a new thread if you want to chat about Anita Bruckner