Bruckner 9; the four movement version

[amateur51]

Absolutely agree. It doesn't take a great stretch of the imagination to realise that a vast struggle is going on which alternates between moments of despair, violence, grandeur etc, but beyond that it is pure music. The biographical take, like the Liszt sonata's association with the Faust story, makes interesting reading, but does not help us to understand the music, nor should it.

i'm not certain that Alfred Brendel would agree with you about the Liszt piano sonata

[amateur51]

Part of the point here is, I think, that Bruckner did not actually set out deliberately to evoke this, that or the other extra-musical responses in listeners to his Ninth Symphony and there's no obvious evidence that he attached any kind of undeclared "programme" to it either, but that does not of itself mean that nothing beyond the disciplies of putting together its ideas and working it into a symphonic argument had any part in its composition; listeners will in any case have their own "encounters with the music" as well as recognising that others may have different ones to the same music. I don't therefore quite see Richard's and Jayne's sttements as necessarily incompatible or irreconcilable.

And this does not take into account matters of interpretation by performers of course.

[Sir Velo]

i'm not certain that Alfred Brendel would agree with you about the Liszt piano sonata

Do you mean that he would think it was relevant to an understanding of the music; or that there is a different hidden programme? Knowing Brendel, I would have thought he would have had little truck with extra musical associations.

[amateur51]

Do you mean that he would think it was relevant to an understanding of the music; or that there is a different hidden programme? Knowing Brendel, I would have thought he would have had little truck with extra musical associations.

I recall his saying that the story was significant in the structure of the Liszt sonata and thus that knowledge of the story was important in the playing of the sonata.

i think

[Roehre]

Part of the point here is, I think, that Bruckner did not actually set out deliberately to evoke this, that or the other extra-musical responses in listeners to his Ninth Symphony and there's no obvious evidence that he attached any kind of undeclared "programme" to it either, but that does not of itself mean that nothing beyond the disciplies of putting together its ideas and working it into a symphonic argument had any part in its composition; listeners will in any case have their own "encounters with the music" as well as recognising that others may have different ones to the same music. I don't therefore quite see Richard's and Jayne's sttements as necessarily incompatible or irreconcilable.

I agree fully with the general tenor of this, but we have to keep in mind that the 9th (as is certainly the case with the 3rd, 4th and partly the 7th) likely has got a kind of undeclared "programme".
It is not by chance that this work is dedicated to the dear Lord (dem lieben Gott gewidmet) and that Bruckner -jokingly, but nevertheless- mentioned the Te Deum to close an unfinished symphony, to -in his own words- stand before his Creator's throne with confidence that this work would earn him a place in Heaven.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Bruckner 9; BBCSSO/Dausgaard

Declining the invitation to join the river boat today has meant that I've been able to catch up with a broadcast of which I heard only the last half-hour or so when I was travelling at the beginning of this month. I'd quickly identified the Music I was hearing as from the Third Movement of Bruckner's Ninth - and would have switched off (not wanting just to hear the last quarter-hour or so) if it hadn't been for the brisker-than-I'm-used-to tempo. Taken att this "lick", I found it fascinating, and found myself thinking that this would be the sort of tempo needed if a Finale was "added" - and, sure enough, there was no applause at the end of the movement; instead the Finale began.

ahinton has regularly spoken for the need of the completed edition of the Finale (600 bars of pure Bruckner together with a "likely" Coda) to be included in performances of the Bruckner #9 - I had never been convinced, despite revelling in the Music of the Finale; I could always "hear the join", if you will. This performance, by the BBC Scottish SO conducted by Thomas Dausgaard, swept away my doubts and finale convinced me. I've been meaning to listen to the whole performance, but today has been the first opportunity that I've remembered to do so:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07xhlrx

It's not a "flawless" performance (although the quality for a genuinely Live performance is astonishingly good) and the speeds may seem "too fast" compared with those adopted for the traditional "Slow Movement Finale" - even so, Dausgaard realizes the sense of accumulation and inexorability in the Third Movement whilst also creating a sense of momentum that propels the Music into the Fourth Movement. An astonishing achievement from everybody (performers and editors) concerned, and one I urge enthusiasts of this work to hear - with my very sincere apologies for having left this until there's only three days availability left.

I hope Dausgaard and the orchestra record their performance: with the miniscule errors ironed out in the studio, this should be a world-beater.

EDIT: Starts just after the 15min mark (ignore the "markers" on the site!) and ends about seventy-one minutes later. Introduced by Penny Gore, who doesn't tell us which "team of scholars and composers" edited the Finale, the little tease!

[richardfinegold]

Nice review. I like the Conductor but for some reason would have trouble imaging a good B-9 from him

[ahinton]

ahinton has regularly spoken for the need of the completed edition of the Finale (600 bars of pure Bruckner together with a "likely" Coda) to be included in performances of the Bruckner #9 - I had never been convinced, despite revelling in the Music of the Finale; I could always "hear the join", if you will. This performance, by the BBC Scottish SO conducted by Thomas Dausgaard, swept away my doubts and finale convinced me. I've been meaning to listen to the whole performance, but today has been the first opportunity that I've remembered to do so:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07xhlrx

Well, I've done so because Bruckner obviously always intended the work to be a four movement symphony and every time that I've listened to it in its three movement form I've always felt gravely short-changed, despite so many people having convinced themselves that it's somehow complete in itself like that, ending in a sublime E major after all the trials and tribulations through which that third movement has gone before arriving there. The most recent SPCM completion isn't perfect - what other than the entire finale completed by Bruckner himself could be - but it's been compiled on the basis of far more music in Bruckner's own hand than was once thought to exist. Yes, Bruckner's own Coda is most frustratingly missing and, despite discovery of more and more pages of the composer's own work on the movement over the years, that vital section was almost certainly not even begun by him, still less composed other than in his own head - but this version is probably about as good as it's likely to get until and unless a page or two more from the composer himself is discovered (if ever it is), so better this than no finale at all!

OK, I'll now dismount from my hobby-horse!...

[Flay]

Thanks for the prompt, ferney. I probably heard much the same as you and had meant to listen again properly. I was astonished by the speed, and pleasantly surprised by the finale.

However another event 2 weeks ago - my daughter's wedding - seemed just a little more important

[Richard Barrett]

I hope Dausgaard and the orchestra record their performance: with the miniscule errors ironed out in the studio, this should be a world-beater.

High praise indeed, I look forward to hearing that if it comes out. I was briefly convinced by Rattle's recording of the "complete" work but went off it again. I think the finale just doesn't measure up to the rest of the work for me (not unlike that of another 9th symphony I could name) so maybe the problem I have is with Bruckner rather than with his completers.

[antongould]

Thanks for the prompt, ferney. I probably heard much the same as you and had meant to listen again properly. I was astonished by the speed, and pleasantly surprised by the finale.

However another event 2 weeks ago - my daughter's wedding - seemed just a little more important

Many congratulations Flay I am sure your speech was better than any AB Finale complete or incomplete .....

[ahinton]

High praise indeed, I look forward to hearing that if it comes out. I was briefly convinced by Rattle's recording of the "complete" work but went off it again. I think the finale just doesn't measure up to the rest of the work for me (not unlike that of another 9th symphony I could name) so maybe the problem I have is with Bruckner rather than with his completers.

Impossible to say for sure, really - although I'm with you on that other Ninth finale if I'm guessing you correctly (and for sure it's not Mahler's!)...

[Flay]

Many congratulations Flay I am sure your speech was better than any AB Finale complete or incomplete .....

Oh I couldn't say, but many seemed to appreciate it

Isn't it strange that in the same month we get perhaps the fastest performance of the 9th that I have ever heard, and the most sluggish from Haitink and the Lucern Festival Orchestra?

I felt that the latter was a great disappointment, especially when compared to Abbado's performance with the same orchestra.

[Petrushka]

Oh I couldn't say, but many seemed to appreciate it

Isn't it strange that in the same month we get perhaps the fastest performance of the 9th that I have ever heard, and the most sluggish from Haitink and the Lucern Festival Orchestra?

I felt that the latter was a great disappointment, especially when compared to Abbado's performance with the same orchestra.

The Haitink performance was the 8th not the 9th.

[Bryn]

The Haitink performance was the 8th not the 9th.

Ah, they're all pretty much the same, innit? Boulez could not tell the 5th from the 8th, or so he once claimed.