Bruckner's Abbey

[Cato]

I just discovered that a German orchestra performed the Ninth with the latest revision of the Finale by Professor John Phillips:

[calyptorhynchus]

I just discovered that a German orchestra performed the Ninth with the latest revision of the Finale by Professor John Phillips:

Er, bit of a warning, the orchestra was getting a bit tired by the end of the concert (which began with a very good performance of Sibelius' Violin Concerto). There are several rather teeth-clenching moments in it which detract somewhat from the Phillips' revision of the finale. Also the tempi are a bit slow and dragging 

[Spotted Horses]

I did notice that her version choices were almost identical to Tintner with the earliest originals, which for me is a positive...

That was one of the distinguishing features of the Simone Young Cycle, the use of original editions of each symphony. I'm not too familiar with Tintner, but Imbal is another cycle which used the original editions.

At least in the 8th, I prefer the final edition, because one of my favorite passages in classical music (a cataclysmic passage in the coda of the first movement) was not in the initial edition (if I remember right).

[Cato]

Er, bit of a warning, the orchestra was getting a bit tired by the end of the concert (which began with a very good performance of Sibelius' Violin Concerto). There are several rather teeth-clenching moments in it which detract somewhat from the Phillips' revision of the finale. Also the tempi are a bit slow and dragging 

There was a hint of that in one of the comments, so I am forewarned!

I think two or three other performances are scheduled by more accomplished orchestras this year, so perhaps they will be better.

I wondered about having the Sibelius first, rather than something shorter and less demanding on the orchestra as a whole.

[DavidW]

If this hasn't already been discussed... brilliant classics has a new release box set of Janowski.  I've never heard his Bruckner, but I love his Wagner!



Opinions?

[Spotted Horses]

If this hasn't already been discussed... brilliant classics has a new release box set of Janowski.  I've never heard his Bruckner, but I love his Wagner!



Opinions?

I love his Brahms on Pentatone. Is this Brilliant set re-release, or new recordings?

[DavidW]

I love his Brahms on Pentatone. Is this Brilliant set re-release, or new recordings?

No idea, I saw it on Presto!

[Spotted Horses]

No idea, I saw it on Presto!

It appears to be a re-release on CD of the Bruckner cycle Janowski did for Pentatone, originally SACD surround sound. Based on the Brahms cycle and Pentagon's engineering quality I'd be optimistic about it.

[Roasted Swan]

I love his Brahms on Pentatone. Is this Brilliant set re-release, or new recordings?

Its the Pentatone cycle but it looks like its standard CD not the SACD of the original releases - generally well reviewed....

EDIT:  Oops!  Identical post to Spotted Horses - although I had no idea the Pentagon had moved away from Military operations to CD releases.........

[Cato]

Here is an example from Janowski's Pentatone cycle: Bruckner's Symphony #1.

[Spotted Horses]

Looking back. I purchased the recording of #8 when it was released but no longer have it. I guess. Didn't like it, although my taste has changed since then. I have grown to appreciate less histrionic Bruckner.

[ultralinear]

I saw Janowski conduct the OSR in #5 some years ago (quite a few years, in fact) and I'm sorry to say that I hated it.  This was a minority view among the Bruckner enthusiasts assembled on that occasion, who generally spoke positively in terms of "honesty" and "truthfulness".  Which are very good things, no doubt.  But not necessarily enough for an engaging performance.

It seemed to me Janowski did not even try to bring the symphony to life, but - quite the opposite - dissected it into its component parts, leaving it like a laboratory rat pinned to a board, all internal organs exposed and labelled.  And quite, quite dead.  What we got was the corpse of Bruckner's 5th Symphony.

I was not the only one to think this, but we were in the minority, so when it was released on disc I bought it nonetheless - and others in the cycle - in case there was something there that I had simply failed to grasp, which over time might seep through the concrete.  And I'm sorry to say that on the few occasions when I've delved into it since, nothing has ignited.  I still find it pretty lifeless.

There are so many great Bruckner cycles out there - and to be fair, this is not the worst I've heard - but I just can't muster any enthusiasm for it.  YMMV of course.

[Cato]

Wow!

Don't discuss completing the Finale of the Ninth Symphony with musicologists who have attempted to complete it!

"LIES!"  "DISTORTIONS!"  "INCOMPETENT ANALYSIS!"   "HE'S MAKING THINGS UP!"

From another website about Bruckner where this is happening: I dared to wonder about the latest revised completion by Professor John Phillips, who has stated that the Finale was complete in a short score, whose last few pages were lost/stolen at the time after Bruckner's death, and that some of those were recovered in the early 1990's.

By William Carragan, who did a completion in the 1980's:

William Carragan:

"Sébastien Letocart has disposed of Phillips's work in a recent Bruckner Journal article. I examined Letocart's paper before he published it, and much of what he pointed out I already knew. Phillips's work is in many ways not reliable, and I am sorry anyone has fallen for it."

In other words, Phillips is a charlatan and/or incompetent and/or a liar!   


It is hard to believe that so many people could look at the same pages and say "60% complete" (Letocart) while others say "essentially complete"  (Phillips).

[Cato]

On a more positive note: the recording of the year for 2023 (according to the Bruckner Society of America)  was the Bruckner Symphony #1 recorded by Remy Ballot with the Altomonte Orchestra of Saint Florian.






https://www.brucknersocietyamerica.org/news-pages/roty-award

[ultralinear]

Don't discuss completing the Finale of the Ninth Symphony with musicologists who have attempted to complete it!

This may amuse you.  Many years ago I wrote - under an obvious pseudonym - a review of a performance of a Bruckner symphony, which I somewhat deprecated for what I saw as wilful departures from the tempo and expression markings in the familiar Nowak edition.  The editor of the publication in which that review appeared then contacted me to say that he'd had an irate email from a well-known Bruckner musicologist, who apparently had prepared his own edition of the musical text for that very performance, and who had seen in my critical review the hand of his arch-rival amongst Bruckner musicologists, determined to undermine him.  Apparently he was demanding evidence of the real name behind the pseudonym, and when my editor - a congenial fellow who was perturbed and amused in about equal amounts - tried to assure him that even if he did reveal the name it would mean nothing to him, as the author was (correctly) a mere nobody - that only seemed to inflame him even more, indicating an even wider conspiracy.

Murky waters, this Bruckner scholarship.

[Daverz]

I've only heard the completion of the 9th once (Wildner), but the material itself is such obvious crap that I refuse to bother with it ever again.  Sad that scholars keep wasting their time with it.

[Cato]

This may amuse you.  Many years ago I wrote - under an obvious pseudonym - a review of a performance of a Bruckner symphony, which I somewhat deprecated for what I saw as wilful departures from the tempo and expression markings in the familiar Nowak edition.  The editor of the publication in which that review appeared then contacted me to say that he'd had an irate email from a well-known Bruckner musicologist, who apparently had prepared his own edition of the musical text for that very performance, and who had seen in my critical review the hand of his arch-rival amongst Bruckner musicologists, determined to undermine him.  Apparently he was demanding evidence of the real name behind the pseudonym, and when my editor - a congenial fellow who was perturbed and amused in about equal amounts - tried to assure him that even if he did reveal the name it would mean nothing to him, as the author was (correctly) a mere nobody - that only seemed to inflame him even more, indicating an even wider conspiracy.


Murky waters, this Bruckner scholarship.

Great story!  Many thanks for sharing it! 


Yes, musicologists - at least, or especially - the Bruckner specialists - are apparently a VERY "touchy" group!


And Bruckner specialists, who have attempted a completion of the Ninth's Finale, are the touchiest apparently! 

[calyptorhynchus]

Wow!

Don't discuss completing the Finale of the Ninth Symphony with musicologists who have attempted to complete it!

"LIES!"  "DISTORTIONS!"  "INCOMPETENT ANALYSIS!"   "HE'S MAKING THINGS UP!"

From another website about Bruckner where this is happening: I dared to wonder about the latest revised completion by Professor John Phillips, who has stated that the Finale was complete in a short score, whose last few pages were lost/stolen at the time after Bruckner's death, and that some of those were recovered in the early 1990's.

By William Carragan, who did a completion in the 1980's:


In other words, Phillips is a charlatan and/or incompetent and/or a liar!   


It is hard to believe that so many people could look at the same pages and say "60% complete" (Letocart) while others say "essentially complete"  (Phillips).

I wrote an article once arguing that the SPCM version of the finale of the Ninth works. I explained the fact that the music is so disconcerting as owing to the fact that Bruckner, to the very end of his life, continued to develop his compositional innovations.

But I didn't expect to convince anyone of the 'Unfinished Masterpiece' mindset: the sort of people who prefer an unfinished Contrapunctus XIV to a reliably completed one.

[brewski]

I wrote an article once arguing that the SPCM version of the finale of the Ninth works. I explained the fact that the music is so disconcerting as owing to the fact that Bruckner, to the very end of his life, continued to develop his compositional innovations.

But I didn't expect to convince anyone of the 'Unfinished Masterpiece' mindset: the sort of people who prefer an unfinished Contrapunctus XIV to a reliably completed one.

In 2012 at Carnegie, Rattle and the Berlin PO played this completion, and I was convinced by what I'd heard, though I haven't heard it since, either live or recorded. (Apologies if I missed points made in earlier discussion.)

Frankly, I can live with either. A well-considered completion, as this one seemed at the time, is fine, as is the existing torso.

-Bruce

[Cato]

The Ninth Symphony Finale Debate goes on!


Here is a recent comment from YouTube by Professor John Phillips, recently maligned by Sebastien Letocart: he begins by addressing the question of how much of the Finale is extant, as claims ranged from 60% to "essentially complete in short score."

For a start, the percentage calculation, which goes back to the work of my late colleague Ben Cohrs, is obviously based on how long one thinks the whole score is. So I don't know what - for Letocart - that figure might be based on. I'll do my best to give you a more complete picture of everything involved here – sorry for writing at such length.


Let me just say there's far more scholarship involved here than people like Letocart want to think; his idea is that you can do what you like with the material, not do the painstaking, real work required to reconstruct Bruckner's intentions from evidence. That's for a start unethical, perhaps rather egotistical, since it aggrandizes someone else's creative property, and most of all, insulting to the years of work spent by actual musicologists trying every way possible to get back to Bruckner's intentions, especially a team that has been involved with the score for as many decades as we have.


Like so often today, mis- and disinformation are paraded as the equal to real knowledge. When people don't know any better, they buy into it. The "SPCM Finale", since it was begun by my colleagues Nicola Samale and Giuseppe Mazzuca in 1985, has had over 80 performances world-wide by orchestras as prestigious as the RSO or LPO, and been recorded and even toured by the Berlin Philharmonic under Sir Simon Rattle.

My score of the Documentation of the Fragments was premiered by Nikolaus Harnoncourt in 1999 and recorded by him with the Vienna PO. My latest revision of 2022 has been enthusiastically greeted by conductors as distinguished as Robin Ticciati, Eliahu Inbal and Riccardo Chailly.


Letocart's score? A colleague once told me scathingly his score only sounds convincing when he's quoting other people's. So I wouldn't give him a lot of credence.


These are the facts: Bruckner began conceiving the Finale not in April 1895 when he started compositional work (the Adagio score was completed in April 1894). He began conceiving it back in 1887 along with the rest of the symphony. By April 1895 ideas like the tritone sequences of the opening, the principal and second theme and the idea of incorporating fugue and chorale, even the chorale melody itself all appear fully formed.


His late motet "Vexilla Regis" inhabits the same harmonic world as the Finale chorale; it was composed in 1892. In the 18 months Bruckner had left, he amassed what must have been well over 500 pages of drafts for the Finale, working incredibly thoroughly and methodically. With everything we know about his music-theoretical concepts, which underlay his compositional techniques, and the evidence of all his foregoing symphonic output, we can chronologically order this enormous amount of material, retrace his steps through the compositional process, and make credible informed hypotheses about the content of the missing bifolios based on the surviving materials.


Bruckner notated the score on numbered bifiolios pre-ruled by his secretary into 16 bars each. So from that 60/68 per cent – whatever – of the orchestral score you can re-establish with great credibility closer to 90 percent directly from Bruckner's sketches. Where Bruckner didn't have to use sketches to get his ideas right, it is most likely that the continuity was already clear to him already, and in such cases, we can probably retrace his thinking.


So the rest of the score requires no independent ideas, just understanding what he was doing, and I doubt that the structure of the completed movement is in doubt at no point. It isn't impossible that sketches, or even some of the missing bifiolios may yet turn up; last year a missing compositional sketch for the Scherzo was sold at auction. He reached the composition of the fugue by December 1895; By May 1896 he had sketched the coda, still six months before his death, and there are even newspaper reports from mid 1896 stating that he had drafted the entire movement, just no longer hoped to complete its instrumentation.


The exposition was originally completed in full score (a cover bifolio survives that enclosed the first 12 bifolios), the rest was probably left with the strings definitively scored in ink and significant wind entries in pencil. The coda sketches of May 1896 (which I discovered in the Austrian National Library in 1990), contain a reference to a "bifolio 36" (precisely the bifolio on which that sketch – now – begins).


My reconstruction of the autograph score as it appeared by the time of his death was published in the authoritative Bruckner Complete Edition in the 90s Musikwissenschaftlicher Verlag, Vienna, 1994, 1996). Up until that time no one understood the extent of the MSS and that the score bifolios represent a definitive autograph, not a draft. That led to the first ever performance of the Finale materials in Vienna, in 1999, by Harnoncourt.


If you want to know more, both my late colleague Ben Cohrs and I wrote doctoral dissertations on the Ninth and its Finale; mine (2001) is available on line: https://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/dspace/handle/2440/21827


Concerning the 2022 revision of the SPCM score, last published by us in 2012, see also my:

https://www.brucknerjournal.com/resources/phillips-b9-finale/index


Next performance of my revision is in June (Tokyo Metropolitan SO under Eliahu Inbal).