Non confundar in aeternum
The Berliner Philharmoniker perform Bruckner/Beethoven in Baden/Baden (*****) [live]
Each Bruckner symphony is like a cosmic interplay between ebb and flow, seasoned with overwhelming orchestral climaxes that only come into their own with a good orchestra and in a concert hall. Climactic waves are the hallmark of the monumental Bruckner symphony. As a dynamic form principle, it was previously unknown in symphonic music. “What today arouses the enthusiasm of many people all over the world when they hear Bruckner is the intensity and breath of expression, the fervid ecstasy, his fondness for the solemn, consecrational and visionary, the jubilant conclusions and the loftiness and sublimity of his symphonies”, Constantin Floros writes in “Anton Bruckner. The man and the work”.
Anton Bruckner becomes a Wagner fan early on. Wagner's broadened harmonic spectrum immediately appeals to him. In 1865, he travels to Munich twice in connection with the first-ever performance of Tristan und Isolde. On Sept. 13 and 14, 1873, he visits Bayreuth to present his third symphony, which he plans to dedicate to Wagner. Wagner accepts but has served Bruckner so much Weihenstephan in the evening that the next day he cannot remember for which of his three symphonies Wagner accepted his dedication. After that, Bruckner visits the Festival in 1876. After his last visit to Wagner on the occasion of the premiere of Parsifal (1882), he works "in an elevated mood" on the first three movements of the Seventh Symphony. Indeed, he lives in the happy conviction that the "Master of all Masters" will fulfill his promise to perform all his symphonies in Bayreuth. According to Curt von Westerhagen, during the Parsifal summer of 1882, Wagner is reported to have said, "I know only one who comes up to Beethoven, and that is Bruckner." Brucknerians also like to refer to the following Wagner quote: "We two are now the first; I in the dramatic arts, you in the symphony." Are these apocryphal quotes? I do not find them anywhere in Wagner's collected works but we know from Wagner's correspondence with Emil Heckel that Wagner rated Bruckner very highly as a symphonist and Wagner's promise is also confirmed by Heckel. So why Bruckner is not on the Bayreuther Festival poster every year is a complete mystery to me. I would be curious to hear how Bruckner's semi-religious monumentality would sound like in the Festivalhaus conceived for Parsifal.
When news of Wagner's death in Venice reaches him on Feb. 14, 1883, the lofty funeral music of the Adagio is completed, and the Wagnertubas, which he greatly loved, are to be given a prominent voice. Bruckner wanted it to be understood that the section for tubas and horns, which was written under the immediate impact of the news, was intended as a funeral music in memory of the masters’ demise. Thematic links to the Te Deum reveal that the Christian hope “non confundar in aeternum” is at the back also of the Adagio. There is a certain analogy between Siegfried's Tod and the funeral music of the Adagio. Both compositions obtain their unique coloration from the tubas. The Adagio and the Finale of the Seventh are the first movements for which Bruckner prescribed four Wagner tubas and a bass tuba. Significantly he was unwilling to and unable to do without these Wagnerian instrumental colors in his subsequent symphonies, the Eight and the Ninth, as well.
During the Third Reich, Bruckner will be performed less than during the Weimar period. Neither Goebbels nor Hitler were real fans despite the fact that the cultural program of the Nürenberg Reichsparteitage invariably opened with a movement of a Bruckner symphony. The Führer's composer was Wagner, the party's composer was Beethoven. Yet in June 1937, in a pose of devotion, Adolf Hitler will have his picture taken in front of Bruckner's bust in Valhalla, the neoclassical temple of honor Ludwig I had built in Regensburg. It will be the Munich Philharmonic that will grace the occasion with the adagio from Bruckner's Seventh. And then, during 1940, Hitler suddenly develops a passion for Bruckner. He even begins to mention him in the same breath as Wagner. By 1942, he places him on the level of Beethoven. He funds a study center at the monastery of Sankt Florian, he has the organ restored, and he unfolds ambitious plans for a Bruckner orchestra and a Bruckner festival. He pays for the Haas edition of Bruckner's works out of his own pocket. After Hitler's suicide, it will once again be the Wagner-inspired adagio from the Seventh that will be heard on the radio.
Bruckner's Seventh and Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, these are worlds apart. The unifying factor is the Berliner Philharmoniker, this time under the baton of Tugan Sokhiev. What stands out the most is the quality of the strings, their silken sound, the perfect interplay, the appealing way they evolve dynamically together, synchronous as one man. They play Beethoven with a rather large line-up, almost three-quarters of the Bruckner line-up. Too large perhaps for ears that have also become accustomed to a different orchestral culture? Jan Lisiecki does not quite convince me with his toucher which makes his playing sound a bit opaque at times. The strongest musical moment of Beethoven Three is the transition from the exciting cadenza to the mysterious finale of the first movement. Here the strings start from an almost inaudible pianissimo. It is indicative of the orchestra's superb dynamic mastery.
This will assert itself even more in Bruckner. How the strings seem to be seamlessly taken over by the brass in the various orchestral crescendos of the long first movement (allegro moderato) is breathtaking. The complaint of orchestras performing Bruckner with period instruments claiming to be blown away by the brass in the major climaxes does not hold water. The balance of the voices in the orchestra is indeed optimal here. The funeral music of the Adagio ("very solemn and very slow") is resigned, only a few times the emotion breaks through unrestrained. The solo moment of the Wagnertubas is an obvious highlight, performed flawlessly in a quasi sacred, requiem-like mood. The scherzo that follows, with its unrelenting rhythm as a structuring factor, again highlights the outstanding brass. And the crushing finale just about sets the Festspielhaus ablaze.