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NYT: A Long Party of Concerts to Celebrate Anton Bruckner

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Frank Forman

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Feb 15, 2017, 8:43:54 PM2/15/17
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A Long Party of Concerts to Celebrate Anton Bruckner
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/13/arts/music/a-long-party-of-concerts-to-celebrate-anton-bruckner.html

By DAVID ALLEN

Cycles of a single composer's works are strange things. Particularly
[15]when [16]Beethoven's [17]symphonies are involved, cycles can
illustrate the classical music industry's profound conservatism. But
every so often, a cycle comes along that entices, that offers a
chance to grapple with music that is unpopular, under-heard or
misunderstood.

Celebrated by many for their majesty and spirituality, Anton
Bruckner's symphonies are seen by others as unduly long, arcane and
opaque. While musicologists [18]now [19]treat Bruckner (1824-96) as
a sophisticate, popular discussion of him has long centered on his
naГЇvetГ©, his social fumbling and on esoteric debates about [20]the
editing of his scores. As the scholar Julian Horton has [21]written,
more than any of his contemporaries', "Bruckner's music has come to
be defined by its attendant problems."

Bruckner problems, or Bruckner opportunities? Look for answers in
Daniel Barenboim's [22]coming cycle with the Staatskapelle Berlin at
Carnegie Hall, a landmark traversal of the nine numbered symphonies
over nine concerts between Jan. 19 and 29.

Bruckner cycles are extraordinarily rare events, partly because of
the scale involved (about nine hours of music in total); partly
because this work remains an acquired taste; and partly because of
the composer's late entry into the canon, an admission that depended
on special advocacy and the advent of stereo recording.

According to Benjamin Korstvedt, a professor of music at Clark
University and the president of the Bruckner Society of America, no
comparable Bruckner cycle has ever before been presented in the
United States. Even in Europe, these are blue-moon events: Ferdinand
Löwe, Bruckner's student, managed sequences in Vienna and Munich, in
1910-11 and 1913-14. Arthur Nikisch essayed one with the Leipzig
Gewandhaus in 1919. Volkmar Andreae led two, in 1928-29 and
[25]1953. And in 1999, Lorin Maazel produced [26]a survey in Munich.

But having recorded Bruckner's symphonies three times--[28]with
the Chicago Symphony in the 1970s and 1980s, [29]the Berlin
Philharmonic in the 1990s and [30]the Staatskapelle in the 2010s--
and with three recent live cycles under his belt, in Berlin, Vienna
and Tokyo, Mr. Barenboim has demonstrated particularly intense
commitment.

This conductor came to Bruckner early. Historic in itself, the
coming Carnegie series also signifies the 60th anniversary of Mr.
Barenboim's [31]debut at the hall in 1957, as a 14-year-old pianist.
At 15, he recalled in a telephone interview shortly before
Christmas: "I played with Rafael Kubelik in Australia, of all
places. He did the Ninth, and he said, 'You must come to the
rehearsal, because it is a unique world.' I became completely
fascinated by it. I conducted my first Bruckner symphony in 1969. It
was not very popular at that time. It still is not very popular, but
at that time, it was considered to be fit only for Austrian
consumption, even in Germany."

Even so, Bruckner's symphonic world exerted an unusual pull. "What
still amazes me," Mr. Barenboim added, is that "the musical
language, the harmonic language especially, is definitely
19th-century. The structure, however, is Classical, almost Baroque.
And there is something in the atmosphere of the music, which makes
me think of the Middle Ages."

Mr. Barenboim has made cycles the centerpiece of his mature art. In
New York alone this century, he has offered two Beethoven symphony
cycles at Carnegie (in [32]2000 and [33]2013) and a survey of that
composer's piano sonatas (in [34]2003, reprising a [35]1986 effort).
In [36]2004, there was a Schumann cycle. In [37]2009, he [38]shared
the conducting of a Mahler cycle with Pierre Boulez. Although his
obsession with grand, cyclical thinking bears noting, none of those
cycles were genuinely novel. The Bruckner is.

Presenting the symphonies like this raises the issue of overall
narrative, particularly as a vast majority of attendees will hear
only a small portion of the whole. "Not everybody comes to all the
nine concerts," Mr. Barenboim said. "I'm perfectly aware of that."
(A spokeswoman estimated that 200 of Carnegie Hall's 2,804 seats
will be taken each night by patrons attending the entire cycle.)

Nevertheless, the intellectual justification for such cycles lies in
giving the public a depth of focus. "In the cycles," he said,
"especially when you do them chronologically, you see the
development of the composer.

"You realize," he added, "that those who say that Bruckner always
repeated himself are completely wrong."

That said, Bruckner doesn't provide the intensely variegated
landscape of a Beethoven cycle. "There is not such a difference
between the symphonies like in the nine Beethoven symphonies," Mr.
Barenboim said, "where you feel that Beethoven looked for a special
idiom for each symphony. I don't think you can claim that in
Bruckner; maybe in Mahler, yes, but not in Bruckner."

Bruckner's development was more gradual. The First and Second
Symphonies are heard rarely. Mr. Korstvedt, the Bruckner Society
president, pointed to the Fifth as an important caesura, concluding
Bruckner's earlier period with its daring fugal finale. Throughout
the nine, there is a steady expansion of formal audacity and
harmonic complexity. In the hallowed final three symphonies,
Bruckner stares more deeply into the abyss.

"Bruckner starts as an architect in the way each symphony is built,"
Mr. Barenboim said. "From about the Fifth on, he changes profession.
He becomes an archaeologist. You have a feeling that he is going
down, deeper and deeper. Those pieces are like an excavation. And
sometimes some of the very powerful dynamic climaxes become a result
of this archaeological digging, rather than building on top."

Over the years, Mr. Barenboim said, his style in this music has
changed primarily as a result of conducting more operas by Richard
Wagner, who was a profound influence on Bruckner. "You cannot play
the symphonies as if they were by Wagner," he continued, "because
the structure does not allow you to do that." Still, bands that
double as concert and opera orchestras might have an advantage. "You
feel, with the orchestras that are familiar with Wagner--in my
case the Staatskapelle and the Vienna Philharmonic--how they swim
differently in this music, because they see the connection to the
Wagner operas that they play regularly. Whereas with the Chicago
Symphony and Berlin Philharmonic, these connections are not there
automatically."

Not Wagner but Mozart will accompany the Bruckner at Carnegie Hall,
in the form of six piano concertos and two sinfonias concertante.
Indeed, Mozart has become a common concert partner for Bruckner, and
with reason. Both composers, Mr. Korstvedt said, began musically in
the world of Catholic church music, and their approach to dissonance
was rooted in that tradition. Bruckner studied Mozart closely,
particularly his Requiem and "Jupiter" Symphony.

Still, the point in pairing the two in this cycle, Mr. Barenboim
said, is contrast. "To have a smaller orchestra before a huge
Bruckner monument," he said, "is better than to play something that
is stylistically closer to Bruckner. You could do it just as well
with Haydn, or Schubert."

Bruckner, though, must be the focus, and what absorbs Mr. Barenboim
about him is not any purported relevance to our own time, but his
timelessness.

"If you really concentrate on Bruckner," he said, "you have in front
of you the world of at least three or four centuries of human
history."

Want to Listen to Bruckner? Start Here.

[40]Listen to our Spotify playlist of Bruckner's symphonies

Bruckner's music provokes heated debate over which recordings are
ideal. Below is not a list of "bests," but of personal favorites.
Choosing a single version of each symphony inevitably omits many
jewels, and I wouldn't want to be without Bruckner by many others,
including Sergiu Celibidache, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Bernard
Haitink, Herbert von Karajan and, above all, Wilhelm Furtwängler.

https://embed.spotify.com/?uri=spotify%3Auser%3Anytarts%3Aplaylist%3A3CxlmkijZ7ReEYLqsvWcrc

NO. 1: EUGEN JOCHUM, BERLIN PHILHARMONIC ([42]Deutsche Grammophon)
Jochum recorded two cycles, and both are essential listening. The
earlier one, which the Berlin Philharmonic shared with the Bavarian
Radio Symphony, has a potent First.

NO. 2: CARLO MARIA GIULINI, VIENNA SYMPHONY ([44]Testament) It
suffers from cuts, but no matter: Giulini's Second glows from
within, saving a particular radiance for the slow movement, which
sounds sublime here.

NO. 3: MICHAEL GIELEN, SWR SYMPHONY, BADEN-BADEN AND FREIBURG
([45]SWR Music) Mr. Gielen is a superb Brucknerian, and his
structural expertise pays special dividends in symphonies others
leave incoherent. This Third is a model of clarity.

NO. 4: GГњNTER WAND, BERLIN PHILHARMONIC ([46]RCA) Revered among
Bruckner's devotees, the steadfast visionary GГјnter Wand recorded
these symphonies over and again. His Berlin Fourth is stunningly
dramatic.

NO. 5: DANIEL BARENBOIM, BERLIN PHILHARMONIC ([47]Warner) Any Fifth
stands or falls on the ability of its ending to bring together the
strands of what has come before. Daniel Barenboim's second recording
stands, and majestically so.

NO. 6: OTTO KLEMPERER, NEW PHILHARMONIA ([48]Warner) Klemperer's
Bruckner is hit and miss, wayward in symphonies where one might most
expect his stoicism to work well. His Sixth, though, is a classic.

NO. 7: KURT SANDERLING, STUTTGART RADIO SYMPHONY ([49]Hänssler
Classic) Dark and foreboding at times, heaven-storming at others,
this is a masterly, often overlooked Seventh, both unusual and
convincing.

NO. 8: PIERRE BOULEZ, VIENNA PHILHARMONIC ([50]Deutsche Grammophon)
Boulez advocated for several seemingly uncongenial composers toward
the end of his life, and Bruckner was a fortunate beneficiary. This
Eighth is committed, transparent and makes supremely clear the
intricacy and force of Bruckner's design.

NO. 9: CARLO MARIA GIULINI, VIENNA PHILHARMONIC ([51]Deutsche
Grammophon) Slow and lyrical, Giulini's deliberate Ninth builds an
unstoppable momentum as it flows on. There are grimmer accounts--
Jochum's with the Staatskapelle Dresden, notably--but none so
intense.

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