7th Symphony (Bruckner)

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The 7th Symphony in E major ( WAB 107) was written by Anton Bruckner between 1881 and 1883.

The work dedicated to Ludwig II of Bavaria was premiered on December 30, 1884 in the Leipzig City Theater by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Arthur Nikisch . The fact that the work was a success in Leipzig in spite of slow and arduous rehearsals (partly through correspondence between Bruckner and Nikisch), Bruckner's lack of recognition as a composer and inconsistencies in the schedule is a great merit of the conductor Nikisch, who introduced the symphony to the Leipzig audience through introductions . Bruckner had so much confidence in him that he even gave him the option to change the score. The composer Bruckner had to be 60 years old to achieve his first resounding success - later a global success - with this new composition. Soon after the premiere of this symphony, the triumphant advance of the work was announced, with performances in other musical centers in Europe. A little later the symphony even found its way overseas.

Large parts of this symphony, which is still very popular with the public in later times, were composed in St. Florian , where Bruckner is buried in the monastery .

occupation

2 large flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets (in A), 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 4 (Wagner) tubas (in the 2nd and 4th movements), 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, double bass tuba, timpani, cymbals, triangle, I. violin , II. Violin, viola , violoncello , double bass

Since no Wagner tubas were available for the premiere in Leipzig, Nikisch cast a second horn quartet, which Bruckner decidedly did not want. Like Richard Wagner, he preferred military instruments as an alternative to the rare Wagner tubes and expressly asked for them. But his request was not granted. (At a later performance of the 7th Symphony in Leipzig on June 6, 1893 under Emil Paur, military musicians played its part; however, they came to the concert too late, so that the middle movements had to be swapped.)

The triangle and cymbals are used exclusively in a single measure in the second movement. They play at the same time, so that for a performance of the symphony two percussionists actually have to be assigned “only for a single note”.

Order of sentences

Bruckner composed the Scherzo as the second movement under the impression of the devastating Ringtheater fire . His apartment at the time was in the immediate vicinity of the scene of the fire, and he hurried through the city to rescue his manuscripts. The accompanying figure of the strings shows the restlessness of the flickering flames and the wandering of the crowd, and the trumpet theme of the scherzo is reminiscent of horn signals with which the fire brigades communicated with each other up until the 1930s. The Adagio was initially created as a kind of funeral march for the victims of the fire, which Bruckner had eerily moved - but also strangely fascinated. The grief over Richard Wagner came later as an idea.

Only a few conductors have changed the middle movements (including Sir Colin Davis). Musically it would make perfect sense, because after the first movement, which is often played much too slowly (original tempo: Allegro moderato ), there is a very slow second movement. From this point of view, the tension would be easier to hold if a quick movement followed the quiet first - as then in the 8th symphony . In the manuscript, however, the scherzo is clearly in third place.

To the music

1st movement: Allegro moderato

It begins with a long introductory topic about which Bruckner writes:

“ This topic is not mine at all. One night Dorn appeared to me ( Bruckner knew the violinist Ignaz Dorn from Linz) and dictated the theme to me. Watch out, he said, you'll make your fortune with him. "

The chromatic theme is reminiscent of Richard Wagner's music . This longest of all Bruckner's main themes is divided into three sections. After 2 preparatory bars, a shimmering E major third in the violins, the theme rises, rising to radiant heights, in the cellos and horn, later accompanied by the clarinet. Repetition in the same key by the entire orchestra. The 2nd theme with the characteristic double beat at the beginning or the section, which in Bruckner's symphonies is often referred to as the “singing period”, also takes up a large space in the exposition and turns into a long progression, an organ point in F sharp. Immediately afterwards, the third topic group, designed as a dance, begins quietly. An ending in B major ends the exposition.

In the broad-based implementation can be the counterpoint from Wagner's opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg recognize. The 1st theme of the exposition appears full of fervor in the inversion and spreads a devotional mood before, after a shorter processing of the 3rd theme, the reversal of the main theme breaks in with dramatic force in C minor. After repeating the opening theme in C minor and then in D minor, the intensity of this section is brought back to E major by skillful modulations, where the main theme and the theme reversal now mark the beginning of the recapitulation. By repeating the 2nd theme in the variant sound of the basic key (i.e. E minor) and the third group of themes (widely varied), Bruckner arrives at the extraordinarily effective coda of this movement. A part of the main theme appears at first in a moving way above a swelling drum roll, which then ebbs again before the great final climax begins in pianissimo using the first main theme part.

The clusters of sound in the brass and woodwinds towards the end of the movement resound under the accompanying figures of the high strings that are typical for Bruckner - a kind of ornamentation that seems like a grip on the giant movement.

2nd movement: Adagio. Very solemn and very slowly

Bruckner began the second movement a few weeks before Wagner's death, which he probably foresaw. He wrote to Felix Mottl :

“ Once I came home and was very sad; I thought to myself, Master cannot live long. The C sharp minor Adagio came to mind. "

Although initially not planned for the beginning of the composition of the 7th symphony, Bruckner uses the Wagner tubas constructed by Richard Wagner for the Ring of the Nibelung in this adagio movement and the fourth movement of the work , for which Bruckner changed the score considerably. From now on, however, these instruments can also be heard in symphonies 8 and 9. They give the orchestral sound an enormous additional depth effect . There are also other references to the revered master Wagner. For example, the sextole accompaniment on the main theme is strongly reminiscent of Tannhäuser .

The two motifs of the Adagio (Bruckner's Adagio has the scheme AB-A'-B'-A '' - conclusion) are 1. the Wagner tuba motif (A) - predominantly descending - that sounds at the beginning, and 2. that Te Deum theme (B), which quotes the section non confundar in aeternum from Bruckner's work . Three weeks after the draft of the 2nd movement, on February 13, 1883, Wagner died. Bruckner had just composed the climax in the movement of this adagio and the following coda (a funeral melody played by the Wagner tubas first alone, then with accompaniment in the horns) forms the actual funeral music for the revered master.

The 2nd sentence is, next to z. B. the funeral march from Beethoven's 3rd Symphony (Eroica) and the funeral march for the dead Siegfried from Wagner's Götterdämmerung , one of the most stirring funeral music of the 19th century .

3rd movement: Scherzo. Very fast

The rhythmically concise Scherzo in A minor (3/4 time) has a demonic character. A trumpet signal, ascending and descending again, begins immediately after four dark-colored preparatory bars of the string section. The first bar already forms the basic rhythmic motif of this movement. In the manner of ostinato, it pulses through the two scherzo parts that frame the trio, in which the presented motifs are repeatedly transformed and processed in a contrapuntal way. The trio in F major (a little slower) draws a lyrically contemplative mood. The rhythm of the da-capo-scherzo-part that rushes out again is announced in the last four bars of the trio pianissimo by the kettledrum.

4th movement: Finale. Moved, but not fast

The short finale of the symphony again presents three thematic groups. The opening theme in dotted rhythm ties in with the shape of the main theme in the first movement. The chorale-like second theme soon sets in and a brief transition leads to the bitter unison theme of the third group, in which the dotted rhythm of the opening theme reappears.

From the time it is carried out, the movement becomes “retrograde” and moves from the unison theme back via the chorale theme to the first theme, which is then made increasingly dramatic and led to a climax. The last section - to give the symphony a grand finale - begins softly as an intensification with the somewhat widened final main theme, which is then followed towards the end by the powerful main theme from the first movement, now in fortissimo of the whole orchestra.

Frames

Bruckner's Seventh is only available in one version by the composer. It was not reduced or expanded in any way by the composer or by someone else. Retouching of the instrumentation by later editors is of no consequence, it is of little importance.

To this day, however, it has not been clarified whether Bruckner wanted to give the climax of the Adagio a stroke or not. It is assumed that one of his pupils or friends ( Joseph Schalk ?) Encouraged the composer to highlight this passage with additional percussion. Although it is now increasingly assumed that the cymbal strike contradicts Bruckner's actual intention, the deletions, repeal of the deletion and pasting over at the corresponding point in the score do not allow a really clear conclusion. The seventh is usually performed with the pelvic stroke.

However, there is an arrangement for chamber orchestra by Hanns Eisler , Erwin Stein and Karl Rankl . In 1918 Arnold Schönberg , Alban Berg and Anton Webern founded the " Association for Private Musical Performances ". This version was created for this association as a commission from Arnold Schönberg to his students Hanns Eisler, Erwin Stein and Karl Rankl in 1921, in which each voice is played by only one instrument. It allows transparent listening and a rediscovery of the original. However, the adaptation was never performed in the association at the time. The sheet music became the property of Arnold Schönberg and is now in the Arnold Schönberg Center, Vienna. The first full performance of the chamber orchestral version took place in 1994 at a symposium on Anton Bruckner at Connecticut College, New London. It was recorded in 2005 with the Thomas Christian Ensemble for Dabringhaus and Grimm.

Hitler and Bruckner's Seventh

Frederic Spotts writes in his book Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics that Adolf Hitler repeatedly compared this symphony with Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. By order of Hitler, the Adagio from the Seventh Symphony was heard on Reichsrundfunk on May 1, 1945, after Admiral Karl Dönitz had announced the news of Hitler's death. Presumably it was the recording made by the conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler on April 7, 1942.

Discography

Content details

Oskar Fried made his first commercial recording with the orchestra of the Berlin State Opera in 1924 ( Polydor ). With the 4th symphony, Bruckner's “Seventh” is the composer's most popular work, both in the concert hall and on the record and CD market.

Herbert von Karajan's last recording with the Vienna Philharmonic , recorded on April 23, 1989 three months before his death for Deutsche Grammophon in the Haas edition of the score from 1885, was listed by Norman Lebrecht at number 80 on his list of the 100 best recordings , characterized as “more human and vulnerable” compared to his earlier Berlin recording. When assessing the recording by Kurt Sanderling (1999), David Hurwitz compared earlier recordings by Eugen Jochum (1952), Bernard Haitink (1978), Karajan (1989) and Günter Wand (1999) as a reference . Stephen Johnson prefers Karl Böhm's recording with the Vienna Philharmonic, where he writes: "Böhm combines a formal, clear rendering of the structure with a subtle interpretation of the phrasing."

The overwhelming majority of current recordings of the symphony use vibrato for the strings, with the exception of Roger Norrington's recording with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra of the SWR .

An arrangement for chamber orchestra was recorded by the Thomas Christian Ensemble, among others, with one critic commenting: “Without a doubt, you need more than 10 musicians (regardless of how good they are) if you want to record a Bruckner symphony”.

selection

The respective running times of the individual rates in brackets:

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Norman Lebrecht: The life and death of classical music: featuring the 100 best and 20 worst recordings ever made. New York: Anchor Books (2007): 252-253
  2. ↑ Stephen Chakwin: Anton Bruckner. In: Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. ed.Alexander J. Morin (San Francisco: Backbeat Books, 2002), 196
  3. ↑ David Hurwitz, ANTON BRUCKNER, Symphony No. 7 ClassicsToday.com, launched March 4, 2001
  4. ↑ Stephen Johnson, Anton Bruckner Symphony no.7 (1883), 1001 Classical Recordings You Must Hear Before You Die. ed. Matthew Rye. "Universe" (New York), 424.
  5. ↑ Shirley (2010) Hugo. Bruckner: Symphony No. 7 . MusicalCriticism.com
  6. ^ Stevenson (2010) Joseph. Review classicstoday.com
  7. ↑ Published by Accentus Music, No. ACC202177