Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 5 in B flat major, performed by the WDR Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Marek Janowski. Recorded live on 24.11.2023 in the Kölner Philharmonie.
Anton Bruckner - Symphony No. 5 in B flat major
00:00:10 I. Introduction. Adagio - Allegro
00:20:43 II. Adagio. Very slow
00:38:13 III. scherzo. Molto Vivace
00:51:03 IV. Finale. Adagio - Allegro Moderato
Marek Janowski, conductor
WDR Symphony Orchestra
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○ Introduction to the work
Anton Bruckner is the great ambivalent among important composers. While Beethoven and Brahms impress with the sovereignty of their music, Bruckner's symphonies always seem to be full of question marks. He often wrote unsolvable riddles into his works: Surprising, unruly, irritating. This is also the case in his Fifth.
The road to recognition was hard for Bruckner. Full of hope, the 43-year-old moved from Linz to Vienna in 1868. He took up a position as professor of music theory and organ playing at the conservatory there. He also became court organist. Bruckner therefore held prestigious positions, but the shy oddball was quickly regarded as an eternal provincial in cosmopolitan Vienna. But he had a healthy dose of ambition.
Throughout his life, he struggled to be recognized as a composer and symphonist. This was difficult for two main reasons. Firstly, Bruckner disqualified himself in Vienna through his open commitment to Richard Wagner. Vienna's leading music critic, Eduard Hanslick, saw the downfall of the West in Wagner's music of all things. When Bruckner then made the tactical mistake of dedicating his third symphony to Wagner, the tablecloth was cut in two. From then on, Hanslick wrote one scathing review after another about Bruckner's music.
The second reason why Bruckner received little goodwill as a composer lay in his compositional style itself. The audience of his time was used to symphonies in which two contrasting themes entered into a discourse and thus created arcs of tension. Bruckner overtaxed his contemporaries with his method of usually setting up not two but three thematic complexes. In addition, the three themes are not necessarily rich in contrast, but the symphonic conflicts only unfold in the course of their interaction. In a nutshell, one could say that whereas Beethoven and Brahms attempted to reconcile the contrasting musical material in their symphonies, Bruckner steered towards unexpected escalations in the course of a symphony and sometimes led the source material into irresolvable musical conflicts. This demands from the audience an unusual
The composer's approach to the symphony leads to unexpected climaxes in the course of a symphony and sometimes leads the source material into unsolvable musical conflicts. This demanded an unusual amount of
This demanded an unusual amount of patience from the audience at the time.
Bruckner's personal situation worsened in 1874. As his income was insufficient, he applied to the university to teach music theory there too. His bad luck: the committee that had to decide on this was chaired by Hanslick of all people, who was hostile to him. The request was harshly rejected. On top of that, Bruckner lost his job at a Viennese girls' school, where he had taught piano and organ for several years, for "improper behavior". As so often in difficult life situations, he threw himself into his work: his own compositional work as a safe haven. This personal crisis ultimately gave rise to the Fifth - one of his most complex symphonies. Bruckner himself called it his "contrapuntal masterpiece". It is obvious to see this as a reflection of his rejected university application, as the explanatory statement had been completely unobjective: "One can see that Mr. Bruckner is not entirely clear about the subject he wants to teach". With the Fifth he proves himself and the world wrong. He crowns the finale with a double fugue - a compositional challenge that can only be mastered if one is completely clear about the subject.
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(Text: Otto Hagedorn)