Bruckner 5th

[Goon525]

You should hear Haitink’s B5, on BR Klassic. It’s the one I really go for.

Thank you for the recommendation. Got round to listening to it this morning. It’s everything you’d expect from Haitink - clear sense of the architecture throughout, a little more freedom of tempo than sometimes, allied to fine playing from BRSO, and a very good recording.

[Goon525]

Just as a PS - this is a helluva fine symphony. It’s not obvious to me why it should be a lot less popular than, say, 4 or 7. Can anyone explain?

[Bryn]

Just as a PS - this is a helluva fine symphony. It’s not obvious to me why it should be a lot less popular than, say, 4 or 7. Can anyone explain?

It's just not memorable. After all, Boulez was noted for his fine ear but when interviewed about his decision to conduct a version of Bruckner's 8th (the Haas), he said he could not tell Bruckner's 8th from his 5th.

[Goon525]

It's just not memorable. After all, Boulez was noted for his fine ear but when interviewed about his decision to conduct a version of Bruckner's 8th (the Haas), he said he could not tell Bruckner's 8th from his 5th.

Might that (if true) not be an equally valid criticism of the 8th?

[jayne lee wilson]

Just as a PS - this is a helluva fine symphony. It’s not obvious to me why it should be a lot less popular than, say, 4 or 7. Can anyone explain?

As I've often commented (e.g. #32)

"I've long regarded this as Bruckner's greatest, certainly his most formally daring (in the finale) and structurally perfect masterpiece."

Is this beauty all too much for us to take in?
"Human kind cannot bear very much reality" etc.....
It does perhaps evince a certain Apollonian detachment. The melodic warmth of elegy, pastoral and subjective appeal - a human yearning - are less evident than in the 4th and 7th.

Shame I wore it out, for myself, when young (Klemperer LP).... but I genuinely believe it to be Bruckner's magnum opus, should one choose to believe in the validity of such a concept....and never performed in his lifetime. (Then spatchcocked and betrayed by the Schalk cuts....shame Kna went along with those...)

All four movements are entirely characteristic, innovative and - pefectly consummated.

[Goon525]

Thanks, Jayne. I think in particular the finale - long as it is - doesn’t show the weaknesses of some other Bruckner finales.

[jayne lee wilson]

Thanks, Jayne. I think in particular the finale - long as it is - doesn’t show the weaknesses of some other Bruckner finales.

Weaknesses? Really.....?
"How long have you got?" Or, "Don't get me started".....

"My music isn't difficult; it is merely badly played" Schoenberg almost said....
With Bruckner its: "my finales are not weak; merely misunderstood. Oh don't worry, I can take it; God always understood and I'm immortal now".

If you care to elaborate on those weaknesses, I shall pay close attention and attempt to respond....
(Probably tomorrow now; gotta eat sometime....)

[BBMmk2]

I heard yesterday, see WCMAYLTNiii, Lorin Maazel’s recording of B5. Certainly most wonderful.

[Goon525]

Weaknesses? Really.....?
"How long have you got?" Or, "Don't get me started".....

"My music isn't difficult; it is merely badly played" Schoenberg almost said....
With Bruckner its: "my finales are not weak; merely misunderstood. Oh don't worry, I can take it; God always understood and I'm immortal now".

If you care to elaborate on those weaknesses, I shall pay close attention and attempt to respond....
(Probably tomorrow now; gotta eat sometime....)

Jayne, I don’t really want to get into a debate about whether a composer I love has weaknesses. But lastly from me on this subject, take the finale of the 4th: after three great movements, the fourth simply isn’t of the same class - and it goes on too long. I was at Haitink’s farewell performance of it at the Barbican last year, consider him the greatest living exponent of Bruckner - but even he couldn’t entirely hide the longueurs of the finale.

[mathias broucek]

Jayne, I don’t really want to get into a debate about whether a composer I love has weaknesses. But lastly from me on this subject, take the finale of the 4th: after three great movements, the fourth simply isn’t of the same class - and it goes on too long. I was at Haitink’s farewell performance of it at the Barbican last year, consider him the greatest living exponent of Bruckner - but even he couldn’t entirely hide the longueurs of the finale.

Have you heard one of Celi’s Munich recordings of the 4th? The tempo relationships make far more sense, and even Robert Simpson thought so..

[jayne lee wilson]

Jayne, I don’t really want to get into a debate about whether a composer I love has weaknesses. But lastly from me on this subject, take the finale of the 4th: after three great movements, the fourth simply isn’t of the same class - and it goes on too long. I was at Haitink’s farewell performance of it at the Barbican last year, consider him the greatest living exponent of Bruckner - but even he couldn’t entirely hide the longueurs of the finale.

In all honesty I simply don't know what that means....

You know the 1874 4th? Or the first-publication one of 1888 (cf Vanska). If not, you may find them very enlightening from the structural point of view....

Most of Bruckner's finales (as with his first movements) are against the background of sonata, based on three subjects, but very free in their structural and harmonic creativities....... so listeners should perhaps try to take it from there...).

The 5th excepted of course. He was a very innovative, very original, far-flung composer; always trying to improve his creations, pushing or even breaking the formal classical envelope, under intense pressure to "conform" from his well-meaning friends and not-so well-meaning contemporaries. (It seems their successors are still around...)

No wonder we are still trying to understand his otherworldly, extraordinary music....

[HighlandDougie]

- but even he couldn’t entirely hide the longueurs of the finale.

I have some sympathy with this view - I had often struggled with the finale to the extent that it was the Bruckner symphony I probably listened to the least often, apart from '0' & '00'. But then I heard the edition prepared by Benjamin Korstvedt in a concert in Tokyo a couple of years ago and it all fell into place musically. I'm not sure how often the Korstvedt edition is heard in concert?? I haven't heard the Osmo Vänskä recording so, prompted by this thread, I ought now to do so.

[jayne lee wilson]

I have some sympathy with this view - I had often struggled with the finale to the extent that it was the Bruckner symphony I probably listened to the least often, apart from '0' & '00'. But then I heard the edition prepared by Benjamin Korstvedt in a concert in Tokyo a couple of years ago and it all fell into place musically. I'm not sure how often the Korstvedt edition is heard in concert?? I haven't heard the Osmo Vänskä recording so, prompted by this thread, I ought now to do so.

Absolutely. Read all about it......

https://www.eclassical.com/shop/art96/BIS-1746-SA_booklet.pdf-de0873.pdf

"...the scherzo and finale contain significant formal modifications..."

The 1888 4th (Loewe/Gutmann edn) was the version performed, establishing the work's reputation, until the 1930s. But even after the Haas 1878-80 version largely came to replace it in performance, Knappertsbusch and Furtwangler remained devoted to 1888 (Furtwangler sometimes restored the cut in the scherzo reprise). Every Brucknerian should get to know it.