Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg
Ivor Bolton, Dirigent
Seeing Ivor Bolton as a Bruckner conductor had been
a rather unusual picture just a few years ago, yet after
having completed three Bruckner recordings with the
Mozarteum Orchestra, he has strongly shown how
he gives Bruckner’s music a timbre of his own plus
a very special expression. Now the fourth sequence
of the Salzburg Bruckner Cycle is released; we hear
Symphony No. 3 in the version presented by Leopold
Nowak in 1889.
Behind the Wagnerian
façade
Highlights of the reception of Anton
Bruckner’s 3rd Symphony
Germany in 1937. Fanfares blast out of the
radio, a sublime setting for the “Tag der
Deutschen Kunst” (German Arts Day). Everything
which sounds “German” in the National
Socialist sense is lauded to the skies; everything
“non-Aryan”, “Bolshevist” or experimental is
denounced as “degenerate”. The fanfares for
German Arts Day symbolize the ultimate in
“German essence” as the Nazis understand it;
this is why they were chosen: they are settings
of the main theme from Anton Bruckner’s 3rd
Symphony transposed into major keys.
The orchestra of Reichssender München
(Munich Reich Radio) recorded the fanfares
on June 30, 1937 under Karl List; Albrecht
Dümling has documented them on CD for
his valuable sound archive Entartete Musik
(Degenerate Music). This abuse by the Nazis
was to date the absolute nadir in the history of
the reception of Bruckner’s 3rd Symphony – a
history which is as convoluted as the question
concerning the various versions of the work.
Flashback to 1872: Bruckner starts work on
the Third. This original version is dominated
by the influence of Richard Wagner, who was
much admired by Bruckner. In 1934, Robert
Haas made special reference to quotations
from Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, Valkyries
and Mastersingers of Nuremberg in his book
on Bruckner. Bruckner himself dedicated
his 3rd Symphony to Wagner after visiting
him in Bayreuth in 1873, the year the work
was completed. Bruckner wanted to dedicate
either the 2nd or the 3rd Symphony to Wagner;
the “Master of all Masters” (as Bruckner
described Wagner) chose the Third.
Wagner’s friend G.A. Kietz gave the following
description of what happened in Bayreuth:
“Good old Bruckner drank and drank,
despite the laments and opposition which repeatedly
interrupted his musical discussions in droll
fashion.” Next morning, Bruckner approached
Kietz at breakfast in the hotel: “Oh, Sir Privy
Councillor,” said Bruckner. “How glad I am
to see you – I am the most unfortunate person!
Yesterday you heard how I offered the Master a
choice of several symphonies for dedication, and
now I am in the appalling situation of not being
able to remember which one the Master chose.
Oh that beer, that terrible beer!”
Kietz replied that a trumpet had been
talked of – i.e. the mentioned fanfare, the
main theme of the Third. This sealed the
Wagnerian fate of the 3rd Symphony; however,
there is a problem: the Wagnerian references
are only present in the original version;
Bruckner cut them out almost completely
in the second (1876/77) and third (1888/89)
versions, the latter of which we hear on this
CD. The second version was performed at
the premiere of the Third on December 12,
1877; the first was not performed during
Bruckner’s lifetime.
Thus it becomes clear that the emphasis
on Wagner in Bruckner’s 3rd Symphony
was at the very least relativised by Bruckner
himself. This may also be one reason
why the National Socialists were strongly in
favour of the “original” versions of Bruckner’s
symphonies, as Bruckner’s “Wagnerian
symphonism” was a central leitmotif of
Bruckner’s reception under the Swastika,
and this had to be preserved at all costs. The
Nazi devotion to the “original version” of the
Third may also be why this was not recorded
until 1982, under Eliahu Inbal.
In any case – the emphasis on Wagner
is a distraction from other central lines of
reception which were likewise practically
ignored during Bruckner’s life. One such
central moment can be heard in the Finale:
here there is a clash between two
semantically opposing thematic groups, i.e. a chorale
in the winds and a polka in the strings.
“That’s life,” commented Bruckner. “The
polka describes the humour and cheerfulness in
the world – the chorale the sadness and pain.”
This quotation is indicative, because Bruckner
himself refers to a more or less subtle
tragicomedy which influenced Romanticism
from Franz Schubert and Robert Schumann
via Hector Berlioz to Gustav Mahler – and
which is completely alien to Wagner in this
form. Bruckner was to go one step further in
the slow movement of his 4th Symphony: here
a funeral march gives way to lively activity.
Mahler followed these tendencies in the slow
movement of his 1st Symphony of 1884/88,
and surpassed them immeasurably; here a
funeral march, a canon based on “Frère
Jacques” in a minor key, is combined with
sounds from Jewish and Slavic folklore.
Thus it becomes clear that proximity
to Wagner was only one side of Bruckner’s
music. As yet, there has been no comprehensive,
systematic study of the central influence
which Bruckner’s symphonism has exerted
on the music of the 20th and 21st centuries.
Here too, the 3rd Symphony, the first to give
full expression to Bruckner’s original tonal
cosmos, plays an important role. Even in the
first few bars, a unique tonal colour develops
with the characteristic Bruckner rhythm
(consecutive duplets and triplets).
Moreover, the many general pauses and
breaks are unsettling – these give the movement
a feeling of static development. Dmitri
Shostakovich was to pick up on this in the
first movement of his 6th Symphony of 1939,
transforming it to a scenario paralysed with
fear, which could be interpreted as a grim
commentary on Stalin’s Great Terror of
1936/38: Shostakovich’s Sixth promptly fell
into disfavour with the Stalinists. At the
same time, the internal emigrant and Nazi
critic Karl Amadeus Hartmann also latched
onto Bruckner – thus countering the official
image of Bruckner as it blasted out of the
radio in 1937 in the form of the fanfares from
the Third.
Marco Frei
translation: ar-pege translations