Lecture 10 Bruckner & Mahler

8/13/2019 Lecture 10 Bruckner & Mahler

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Lecture 10

Anton Bruckner [1824-1896]

Symphonic Style and Musical Fingerprints

It must be remembered that Bruckner was a virtuoso organist and a brilliant improviser soit is often said that his orchestration is like an organist engaging ranks of pipes orregistering stops on the instrument. In fact, this is in a sense an unfortunate criticism of ahighly accomplished composer who had a unique style of orchestration. He uses the mainfamilies of instruments in blocks: strings, brass, woodwinds, strings and does notintegrate the sections of the orchestra in the same way as Wagner or Brahms. It has beendescribed as monochrome by comparison.

Bruckner

BackgroundA country man of rustic appearance and manners out of place in fashionable Vienna

Very devout God-fearing RC his music is also reverential and mystical

Trained as an organist at the Monastery St. Florian in Upper Austria

Organist at Linz Cathedral a brilliant virtuoso and improvisor

9 Symphonies [No9 is unfinished] all are 4 movement plan

Vast, epic proportions = to a Gothic Cathedral

He uses the cyclic principal of themes returning in the finale

Has three subject groups in the exposition

Idolised Wagner The Master

Much academic study until he was in his 40s

Embarked on a composing career and eventually Professor of Composition at ViennaUniversity

He followed in the Schubertian tradition of lyrical symphonic texture

His music abounds in late romantic harmony and chromaticisms


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The Bruckner orchestra is huge by any standard The last three symphonies employtriple woodwind and brass + 4 Wagner tubas

His orchestration is built in blocks of woodwind, brass and strings rather like an organistregistering stops. He uses string tremolandos frequently.

His style is quite unique and NOT Wagner writing symphonies as often has beensuggested!

His somewhat nave personality and deeply felt religion figures in the emotional qualityof his music

Bruckner s music requires time and space for it to be appreciated

His first triumph was the Seventh Symphony in Leipzig

There are a number of easily identifiable musical fingerprints in his music;

He uses scalic motifs, particularly in a descending format.An insistence on phrase and sequential repetition creating an incessant hammeringhome of his themes and motivesUse of the orchestra in huge unison passages at ff His phrases are built up through crescendos and then a sudden pp and the wholesequence starts again moving up in pitch.Counterpoint plays a vital role in the texture as Bruckner was an accomplishedstudent of all these essential techniques labouring long and hard to achieve

excellence in this area.String tremolos are used extensively for effect whilst lower instruments quote atheme.His harmonic language is highly adventurous exploring distant keys andmodulation with great skill and speed giving almost instability to the tonality ofthe central key. It can be quite difficult to keep track of the journey through manykey centres but it is a way of taking the listener on an extensive tour.The use of bars rest is a way of letting the air in after an extended passage andgiving the listener time to take stock of what has been experienced beforecommencing on the next section of the work.Scherzos are often lengthy featuring two Trio sections. The rustic nature of the

Austrian dance style known as the Lndler often appears. It said that thatBruckner enjoyed dancing so this genre is not surprising as it was so much a partof Austrian folk culture contrasting with the elegant Viennese Waltz.The use of cyclic structure can be found where earlier themes from the openingreturn later in the closing stages of the finale. The Fifth Symphony displays thistechnique. It is, in fact, a structural miracle built from a single pizzicato phrasewhich grows to a colossal tour-de-force.


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The Bruckner slow movement in the final three symphonies last around 25minutes and the climax is reached in mathematic terms to fit the Golden Sectionformula [0.6180]The sonata form movements often have three subject groups rather than theconventional two. This may be Bruckner the mystic being deeply religious and

could symbolise the Holy Trinity in the Christian religion.Bruckner makes extensive use of the brass section and particularly featured arethe horns in chorale-like passages. This requires considerable skill from the

players as the exposed passages reveal any discrepancies in tuning and split notes.It should be noted that Bruckner possessed a supreme contrapuntal skill in whichthemes are treated to canon, imitation, augmentation, diminution and inversion.The Third Symphony was dedicated to Bruckner s idol, Richard Wagner andcontained quotations from Wagner s works. Bruckner also in the later symphoniesused self quotation from some of his religious music. It was whilst writing theAdagio of the Seventh Symphony that he learned of the death of Wagner. Thismovement is considered to be an elegy for the dead composer.

He was influenced by Wagner s advanced harmonic idiom and his music displaysa wandering tonality constantly changing key and modulating through repeatedsequences in the texture.

Best known symphonies: No 4 has acquired the title Romantic but has nothing todo with programmatic ideas. Nos 7, 8 & 9 are the real pinnacle of his work. Alluse Wagner tubas, triple woodwind and brass. No 7 begins with a wonderfularpeggio theme in E major under a string tremolando. This theme came toBruckner in a dream. No 8 is a magnificent work on a vast scale. No 9 wasincomplete at Bruckner s death as finale was not finished and sketches apparentlyhave been lost. The work has only three movements ending with a heavenlyAdagio and is a tribute to Bruckner s deeply felt faith. It is dedicated to Our Dear

God in Heaven.

Gustav Mahler [1860-1911]

9 symphonies + 10 th unfinished, completed by Deryck Cooke and first performed in1964.Das Lied von der Erde [The Song of the Earth] written rather than compose a 9 thsymphony as he felt it could be unlucky. This is a song cycle symphony.Ambivalent towards programmes - some symphonies were provided with programmenotes and then later withdrawn! Many of them have literary titles to each movement.

Symphony 1 : Titan used songs from Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen cycle [Songs of theWayfarer]. Many external sounds bird song, bugle calls. Mahler originally thought ofthis work being a Symphonic Poem. However, it is the most original and unusual Firstsymphony ever produced by a composer at this time!

At one time, m y friends persuaded me to provide a kind of programme for the D-major symphony in order to make it easier to understand. Therefore, I hadthought up this title [Titan] and explanatory material after the composition.


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Symphony 2 : Resurrection includes voices. The first movement started life as a symphonic poem called Totenfeier (Funeral Rites). Then Mahler added two more

movements. The finale eventually was conceived after he had read Klopstock s poem.Mahler wrote a detailed programme for each of the five movements but later withdrew itand stopped the publication. [Please see attached original programme by Mahler whichappear to be his own unique thoughts on the Resurrection and the Day of Judgement ].Mahler used the first two verses of Klopstock's hymn, then added verses of his own that dealtmore explicitly with redemption and resurrection .[3] He finished the finale and revised theorchestration of the first movement in 1894, then inserted the song Urlicht (Primal Light) as thepenultimate movement. [Wikipedia]

Symphony 3 : A Programmatic work the longest of his symphonies. 1. "Pan Awakes, Summer Marches In" [Orchestral]2. "What the Flowers in the Meadow Tell Me" [Orchestral]

3. "What the Animals in the Forest Tell Me" [Orchestral]4. "What Man Tells Me" [Alto Solo]5. "What the Angels Tell Me" [Boys Chorus]6. "What Love [God] Tells Me" [Orchestral]The finale is a sublime Adagio culminating in a triumphant conclusion.

Symphony 4 : No programme public puzzled.The opening movement is clear sonata form with the addition of sleigh bells. The secondmovement introduces a solo fiddle tuned up a tone played by friend death . The thirdmovement is an Adagio in variation form on two themes.The finale introduces a soprano soloist singing D a s h i m m l i s c h e L e b e n [The Heavenly Life]from Des Knaben Wunderhorn.This movement was originally intended as the finale for Symphony No 3 but that wouldhave made the work incredibly long! The work ends in a different key which isunusual!

Symphonies 5, 6 & 7 - No programmes produced. Purely orchestral music.

Symphony 8 : Symphony of a Thousand uses two vast choirs and soloists plus children schoir.Part 1 is based on the Christian Latin hymn for Pentecost Veni creator spiritus [Come,Creator Spirit]. Part 2 is a setting of the closing scene in Goethe s Faust. The idea ofredemption through the power of love unites both parts.

Symphony 9 : No programme, four movements
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._2_(Mahler)#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._2_(Mahler)#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._2_(Mahler)#cite_note-2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._2_(Mahler)#cite_note-2


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Mahler Points of Style

He stems from the great Austrian tradition of Schubert in terms of song writingand symphonies

He was a friend of Anton Bruckner whose grandeur of symphonic style was aninfluence on his epic works

He admired Beethoven and Wagner

Unlike Bruckner, his style was mingled with poetry, song and philosophy

The first 3 symphonies are clearly programmatic but he tried to shed this label inthe fourth. Symphonies 5, 6 & 7 return to the more absolute plan. No 8 is knownas Symphony for a 1000! No 9 returns to the abstract plan.

The symphonies overflow with song elements. He was fascinated by romantic poets

He wrote a song-cycle symphony Das Lied von der Erde to avoid writing a ninthsymphony!

Austrian dances such as the Lndler are a feature of his style

He was a great conductor with an intimate knowledge of the orchestralinstruments

He uses a huge orchestral line up but in an almost chamber style of orchestrationexposing wonderful clarity of instrumental sounds

His harmonic style is very advanced chromatically and his use of counterpointvery evident in the texture. His key systems are also adventurous ending indifferent keys to the tonic.

He brings the late romantic symphony to a climax at the beginning of the 20 th century

Mahler felt the symphony should embrace the world and this is reflected in hisfirst symphony which is highly unique in its content.

His vast output was written in the summer months each year when the ViennaCourt Opera was on vacation

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Lecture 10 Bruckner & Mahler