I remember when I bought my first Bruckner record in the mid-1970s. My parents didn't have any Bruckner in their collection. I was at the record store and saw the Karajan Berlin Bruckner 4, the one on DG with a stylised bird wing on the cover, and asked mom to buy it. She said "whatever". On the way home from the record store, I read the notes on the back of the record jacket. "Karajan uses a combination of versions ... revised ... replaced scherzo ... "Folksfest" finale ... retouching..." Before I even turned on the record player, my twelve-year-old mind was spinning with questions - what on earth was I listening to? Should I have bought some other recording? Why would Karajan mix and match versions? Why is the author of the notes on an LP album second-guessing the choices made on a record I just spent mom's money to buy? It turns out that dad and I liked the piece, and mom went to her grave still saying "whatever" about Bruckner. Decades later, I heard the "Folksfest" finale somewhere or other. And after hearing it, I said "whatever".
...LOVE your final point about Bruckner knowing who his God was. I hope you can do a video about Eduard van Beinum's Bruckner. His 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th & 9th truly reach Bruckner's core without the usual, insufferable navel-gazing. (Sadly, he and the Concergebouworkest never got to the 6th.) For a book, Robert Simpson's THE ESSENCE OF BRUCKNER is really the way to go. It offers insights that only another composer could give. Specifically, he points out how DIFFERENT Bruckner's take on post-Beethovenian sonata form is, from that of Brahms - and how that plays out in each symphony. And since Robert Simpson was agnostic, the usual kitschy, Bucknerian mysticism is bypassed ENTIRELY.
I liked the last 10 pages. The lettering starts to get bigger and bigger, and by the last couple of pages, single front is half the size of each page. It's Bruckner after all. My revered copy sits proudly next to my other table leg leveler, Karajan's Christmas Recipes in just 3/4 ingredients
Oh dear, you saved my day! I actually burst out into laughter. But I must add some things. 1) As Austrian, I know very well the cult with titles (I wrote about in my book). There are two kinds of Hofrat. One is honoris causa, but the other one has to do with the career as civil servant and the salary bracket. Both titels are grotesquely outdated. But I remember that my first chief editor, who was Dr. and ordinary Professor of the university wanted to be adressed Hofrat, which had nothing to do with what he made of himself but was just a title, because of his long career as civil servant. Yes, this is Austria (even today). 2) I wonder, if the Bruckner-cult would be the same if Bruckner wouldn't have been catholic. It has something of God and the pope and the cardinals who hope to become themselves the next pope. Even if one hates the other, one shares the higher faith. Cohrs writes a foreword for Carragan, althogh Carragan must have done all wrong in the finale of the 9th, because we all know that only Cohrs did it right. For if Carragan would have been right, why should Cohrs have done another version? 3) The disputations about the versions are insane. They root all in an outdated image of Bruckner as holy fool, who had ideas but didn't know how to realise them. It would be so simple: Every composer gains experiences with every performance (even of the works of other composers). Bruckner used this growing experiences to polish his works. None of the symphonies and the masses is really re-written (in the sense of f.e. Hindemiths "Cardillac"). But musicologists have their field, because they can argue, without the pain of listening, just with the printed score. 4) I close with a personal remembrance: I wanted to discuss with a Bruckner-guy the 8th with Karajan, I just got to know. He wasn't interested at all in the musical excitement (or in a discussion, if it's an excitement at all), he just asked: "Which version does he use?" I looked at the sleeve. I said: "Haas." He said: "Oh, it cannot be good, he does the wrong version."
Interesting inputs! Ad 2) see my commentaty about the enterprise of the BS being actually more protestant than catholic. And at the end of the day, it might all have to do more with the world of academia than with Bruckner ("publish or perish", the endless counting of citations and other wonderful quantitative measures of academic activities that say nothing about the quality of the activity, etc. etc.)!
Bruckner does make some pretty good cult material, I have to say. I mean he came from humble means, was hated by the press, his music was somewhat misunderstood at times by his followers, he himself did some questionable things perfect for cult members to completely ignore... They've got everything. He was ripe for cultification.
Very funny talk. Another illustrious and cultish Red Book has appeared recently, originally written by Carl Jung. As we all really do love Bruckner, deity or otherwise, could you give us your survey of the Book of Revelations in Bruckner terms, the 4-movement-versions and recordings of Bruckner 9 and what you consider the best?
You're right. In Czechoslovakia/Czechia, we were ridiculously obsessed by getting rid of everything reminding the Austria empire, but the biggest legacy - the bureaucracy - remained till nowadays.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Bureaucracies die only when they strangle the organization that they originally supported . They keep growing and they bleed their entities even more every year. Want a world without a bureaucracy? Join the Old Order Amish. Whoops -- with education limited to eighth grade and age 16, one is unlikely to learn about classical music, among other things. The only bureaucracy that works in the private sector indefinitely is an insurance company, and then because insurance companies operate on a cost-plus model. I'm guessing the Czechs simply replaced Austrian bureaucrats with Czech bureaucrats or had the Austrian bureaucrats decide to become Czechs.
I really shouldn't be spending nearly half an hour of my time listening to you talk about a composer who is not one of my Top 20. But it's such a brilliant and apropos rant that I had to stay with it all the way through, and when you broaden it to encompass the whole world of classical music cults (they're just as prevalent in other musical genres) I find myself giving it the old "Right on, baby!" The saddest thing , for me anyway, is that cult worship tends to jaundice our opinions of composers and performing musicians we otherwise like. Speaking of which, sooner or later, I know you'll be giving us Havergal Brian.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Walker and the Russians have been doing a good job for Naxos on Brian. The symphony that badly needs a better recording/performance is #4. With the current recording I can't decide whether it's a great work on an over-scored mess. In an ugly mug contest, Brian would give Bruckner a run for his money.
Dave - you may have forgotten the most appropriate red book to compare it to - Carl Jung’s Red Book, which NPR aptly titles ‘A Window Into Jung’s Dreams.’
@@EnriqueHernandez-zk7qc I think this particular phenomenon goes way beyond mere scholarship but as a means of validating its existence. That's, at least, my peception of David Hurwitz's humorous rant, with which I fully concur.
Hey, I am a proud member of the Bruckner 'cult' and have been for over forty years! Some years ago due to work commitments I found myself stranded and all alone in a small flat on Christmas Day and Boxing Day. I decided to spend the time by treating myself to all the Bruckner symphonies (including No 00 and No 0) on my DVD player over the two days. I can honestly say that my mind liberally lubricated with sufficient amounts of alcohol it was one of the most mind-blowing Christmases I have ever experienced. David, as the old saying goes don't knock such cultish behaviour it until you have tried it! 👍😁
@@DavesClassicalGuide Didn't say I was drunk! It was Christmas after all ... In all seriousness I find listening to all the versions fascinating and it was only after I heard the first version of No 4 that I understood why the composer labelled it 'The Romantic'. The 1878 and 1889 versions have never sounded very 'romantic' to me and one does have to wonder what the later symphonies would have sounded like if the composer hadn't felt the need to make his works more 'acceptable'.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Whatever ... Nevertheless I, and I'm sure many others, are just mighty glad he saved his originals for 'later ages'. Whilst the revision of the 8th is widely accepted (myself included) as an improvement I am not so sure about the revisions of the 3rd and 4th and the Linz version of the 1st I prefer to that of the Vienna. What is 'better' is purely a subjective matter according to listener taste, imv.
As you said, this is really crazy talk. I mean, Bruckner is one of my favourite composers, but it has no sense to listen to every single version of each symphony to understand the "musical process", because at the end of the whole thing, the final versions are what the composer wanted to do 😂 It's different when you want to listen the other versions because you feel curious about them, but seriously...
An ironic note on the Bruckner Problem: at Mahler's rehearsals for his 8th Symphony in Munich (5-11 September 1910, perfomance 12th Sept), Otto Klemperer noted that Mahler turned round to him and other devotees, and said: If, after my death, something doesn't sound right, then change it. You have not only the right but the duty to do so. (From the Jens Malte Fischer biography.)
Alright, I'm getting paranoid here. If I go to another Bruckner concert someday, and if they use Red Booklets for the programs, and if there's a BIG vat of orange Kool-aid in the foyer, I'm gonna run like hell.
honestly until I became acquainted with this channel I had no idea that Bruckner had inspired such fanaticism - it gets me thinking about whether I should join a composer cult group - hehe - well if I were so inclined I might be tempted to join a Delius cult group - I could listen to the Florida Suite 3 or 4 times in one night
Thanks very much for this - I've been laughing out loud for minutes. I'm sure Bill Carragan has done a terrific job, but I wonder what it is about Bruckner's music that encourages cultish behaviour? What, in short, is the psychological profile of the hardcore Bruckner Cultist - the card-carrying, apostles. I love rather a lot of Bruckner's music, but I've never understood the particular kind of deification he (alone) seems to attract. Fascinating - and a very entertaining video.
Actually, that excerpt you read did seem rather like Joyce. Finnegan's Wake though, not Dubliners or Portrait of the Artist! Just found the channel this week and really enjoying. Thanks!
As a confessing Bruckner disciple, studied christian theologian and German - I know I'm lost - I listened to your rewiew with lots of fun. Gosh, its as blasphemic as true! And I can reassure you that we don't hurt Bruckner's religious feeling when woreshipping him as we have at least three deities in the Christian religion - God the father, Christ the son and the Holy Spirit. So let's don't see our beloved master as the Godfather but maybe as a brother of Christ or, even better, as the final musical expression of the Holy Spirit. HOWEVER... I have to stop now and enlighten a candel on the master's altar before listening to all versions of the third to get my daily elevation above earths miseries. What you by the way missed to mention as an essential part of cults is the internal mystical language that only the initiated understand and therefore let me wish you a sincere: "Non confundar in aeternum!"
However, I would say that I find it interesting to listen to earlier versions by various composers, to see how they rethought the music and refined it for the final version. Some outstanding examples are the scherzo of Bruckner's 4th symphony, which is really different and actually kind of weird, compared to the musically much more conventional final "hunting horn" version; also, on BIS, the original version of Sibelius' Violin Concerto, and how he refined it to the final version, which is far more satisfying. But I would never get stuck on the preliminary versions----it is just interesting to see how composers conceived and revised their thought.
Yes, it's interesting--once. But that's very different from claiming that these first thoughts have equal merit as compared to the final versions approved by the composer. They belong on recordings, not in the concert hall.
Hilarious! But don't tell me you have never put a Bruckner symphony on Repeat for an afternoon. I have many times. Also, maybe the perfect comeuppance for the cultists would be to listen to those Eliahu Inbal recordings of the the original un-cut versions, especially with the same figure in 8th symphony repeating a million times.!
@@DavesClassicalGuide Well you are probably wiser than I am in such things. I grew up in Miami, where Morris Lapidus' famous dictum reigns: "Too much is never enough."
@@DavesClassicalGuide When you're only half paying attention, it isn't draining to listen to the sixth symphony on repeat while driving or surfing the internet.
Wow! An excellent listen! Thank you David. I guess it's a bit like a musical equivalent of the ubiquitous trainspotters on London Bridge station, come rain, hail, snow, ice with their flasks of hot tea, writing down every train number, type, time, etc...... Personally, I've never bothered to care about this version, or that version - if I come across a Bruckner symphony that I enjoy - that's it for me - job done!
the kind of reading they suggest would require something other than the text they provide. If they'd created a /website/ that would be something different; one which plays the different versions and shows the changes, with the scores, but that wouldn't be profitable, nor would it be commodifiable, really (and good luck licensing those recording snippets and scores!) But what a site that'd be...
I am fully satisfied with Gunter Wand's set of the nine legitimate symphonies of Bruckner on RCA (now Sony/BNG) with the Cologne Radio Symphony. It is inexpensive and complete, so it is a convenient collection. All that I could want added would be the Te Deum and the interesting string quintet. Perfect? Maybe one could get a better collection with individual recordings, but that would be a difficult proposition. Bohm's fourth, Chailly's seventh, and Maazel's eighth may be better, but one would need to listen to plenty of mediocre or worse performances to find a beloved set. Due to the length of Bruckner's symphonies, their performances had better be good -- really good. Anything less will be vexing. See also Mahler, a very different composer.
I would love you to do an interview with one of the disciples of the Bruckner society. Surely, they deserve an opportunity to reply to some of your concerns.
LOL And to think some of my fellow Englanders sometimes complain about David's humour. It could be worse chaps, we could be Austrian or a Brucknerite. Keep up the good work sir.
This inspired speech ranks very high among David’s best and bears comparison with the GB Shaw’s destructive critical piece that he shared with us some weeks ago ! The only caveat I would add is that the Red Book may be of some use to those who enjoy more than one version of a given symphony. It can prove useful as a sober philological tool (provided that one avoids to be dragged into the Cult !) . I found the parallels with the Talmud highly instructive. Thanks again for this much inspired diatribe!
Thank you, and I agree with your point. I gave full credit to the book as a straightforward and useful list of each work's major (and minor) variants. It is the presentation that I question.
It appears that some people need a hobby to divert themselves from their everyday problems or psychological neuroses. I guess chasing variants in Bruckner symphonies fits the bill, on the level with pole-sitting or fishing for hours for crappie on the bayou. It will be interesting to see if the beautiful red book lures prey into the clutches of the obsessed Brucknerites, who will force them to listen to nine different versions of the 4th symphony continuously without a bathroom break until they swear their undying allegiance to Brucknermania.
I'm afraid that Ernest Newman's eminently sane, thoroughly thought-out WAGNER NIGHTS (aka THE WAGNER OPERAS) has long since pre-empted any Redbook attempt.
Thank you for this. A clearly tabulated compendium of all the variants, enhanced digitally, would be a useful thing to someone who wants to bring themselves up to date on The Versions, but I agree that it goes far beyond what a listener should be told to do once in a while. That being said, there has been a comparable debate going on about one of Reger's late organ compositions, Fantasia and Fugue op. 135 b. It is a wonderful, if somewhat startling piece of late Reger. Unfortunately, someone kept a proof copy which contains large swaths that were cut, apparently over various stages of the composition process. By attributing these corrections to the influence of Karl Straube, a cult-like part of Reger's following victimized the composer and declared all cuts (which Reger undoubtedly did himself) woefully wrong, introducing them back into the score and, by doing that, adding some ten tedious minutes to the music, everything with hair-rising rationalisations which flatly ignore the composer's judgement. Now that's a cult.
As a teen I was very bored with Bruckner's symphonies and have never made it through a movement of any. I remember thinking "how the hell could anyone say Mahler is longwinded? I mean sheesh!" Pushing 40 now I plan to actually listen to one however forced it might be. However, when I was younger his choral works were striking and even more so, the older I grow. Really an underperformed and underappreciated macrocosm of contribution to music. I also say that not being religious by any means. And I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate the cult. Listening outweighs pretention.
Shades of Monty Python's "Every Sperm Is Sacred" song. It's an NFL play book! If you're among the chosen who make it into professional football, you get handed a play book with five hundred million plays and you have to memorize it. Same thing! What's really crazy at the Bruckner FB page, is that they'll correct you and tell you what obscure version/edition you ought to be listening to, and then refer you to some incredibly obscure recording, made with a second tier orchestra in the excessively reverberate acoustics of St. Florian - the Mecca for the Bruckner cult. I don't think even top tier orchestras sound particularly good in St. Florian. That's just me. It's all overload for anyone who just wants to enjoy the music.
Wonderful! Just wonderful! I have to retract my former statement, that you are at your best, when talking about things that you love and like! This video is certainly a runner up for the Best Bad Online Review of the Year Award! 😁 Seriously: you argue your case very strongly and admirably present your position on textual issues creeping up ever so often in many reviews of the individual symphonies 'in these pages'. Funnily, and somewhat a contradiction in terms: the Bruckner Society's entreprise seems to be a rather protestant take on their beloved Master. The scourge of the protestant churches has always been the text-fundamentalists, whereas the catholic's has been the tradition-fundamentalists. Talking text versus (performance) tradition, I wonder, whether the BS people in fact (contrary to their proclaimed 'objectivity') ascribes any kind of value to the different editions/revisions, that implicitely might rub off on the evaluation of a given performance? (Like when some orthodox member of the baroque revolutionary guard dismisses a performance of a piece, no matter how musically performed, with reference to it being based on a corrupt version) As HE rested on the 7th day, you now only have to sit back and await with eager anticipation the outcries of holy and righteous indignation from the Bruckner Friends! 😷
In any case, to lock oneself into any kind of "cult" is to renounce sharing one's taste and knowledge of music, or of any other field whatsoever. Rest assured, this type of cult exists elsewhere, and I can speak of it particularly with regard to the study of literature. It's very much the same thing, and it's based on the same approach to the mind, which consists in "objectifying" an admiration and turning it into a science. And once you've decided to do that, a whole host of "techniques" are available to you in your quest for objectification. Therein lies the danger of being locked into an admiration that becomes a logomachic discourse. Quite the opposite of sharing, transmitting and enjoying contact with art - again, whatever the field concerned.
hehe!! love this deflation...maybe this volume last chapter should have been unfinished then everyone could then have a go at completion....with better results i suspect..haha!
The cultification of Bruckner is a thing. Your characterization of Carragan's book as implicitly giving equal Scriptural authority to all of Bruckner's symphonyversions shows that. Considering it rationally, they can't all be equal, else Bruckner would not have revised them. Either he considered that his earlier versions contained error, or Was so weak in hi self-esteem that he was prevailed upon to think so either for crass reasons (sich as securing a performance). Neither is the hallmark of a musical deity. Only Bruckner gets the kid of treatment. Does Prokofiev get this kid of treatment with his two Fourth Symphonies, the Cello concerto/Sinfonia Concertante? Does Copland for Grogh/Dance Symphony? Does Shostakovich for Katerina Ismailovea/Lady Macbeth of Mzensk? Does Sibelius with his three different Fifth Symphonies or the two Violin Concerto versions? What about Stravinsky's three versions of the Firebird and his second publication of The Rite of Spring? I have a tape of the BBC's broadcast of Britten's Midummer Night's Drean with audble differences from the published score, including comoletely different music for Snug's "Lion Song." And let's not get started on Gluck's Orfeo/Orphée or Verdi's Don Carlo/Don Carlos. The real issue should be whether any extant version is worth hearing. As for the Firebirds, One is the sumptuous original version, another is the reduced and terse 1919 Suite, and the 1945 Suite has more music than the other. But there is no reason to go for the original Rite. Sibelius;s earlier versions are interesting but don't achieve the polish of the final one. Shostakovich's revision was made under pressure and the first is preferable. (I heard "Katerina" in San Francisco in the 1960s.) The final versions of the Prokofiev and Copland scores are preferable, but the others are good. Finally I would say that Carragan invalidates his own premise by having done an abominable "completion" of B's 9th Symphony.
There are several reasons to go for the original Rite. One is that it is available for purchase from Kalmus instead of rental from Boosey, and you can edit it as you please. Another is that the rewriting of the metre changes at the end makes it easier to conduct but messes up the placement of the accents. It is not a question of a "version" of the piece. Stravinsky made the new edition mainly to keep the piece under copyright. He was a shrewed business man. The changes he made to the score were practical, not structural.
So: Holy Text? Check. Deity? Check. All that's missing is the incense and human sacrifice, though I suppose anyone subjected to Symphony no. 0 would qualify for the latter.
I'm asking myself how you would compare this to the de la Grange bio of Mahler, because it seems the tone is similar (if I am a member of a cult, then it's a Mahler cult because I am a Mahler fanboy, and I like de la Grange). In case people think I'm anti-Bruckner, I haven't heard much, but the first movement of the 9th symphony is just great. In addition, as a fellow Jew, I felt that Talmud comparison! There's so much irrelevant stuff there
I think it's very different. De la Grange was a biographer trying to hunt down every detail of the man's life to be as thorough as possible. He was not interested in creating a "Mahler cult."
These people aren't serious. If they were they would realize that to really appreciate the differences between edits one must play the different versions simultaneously.
David, you will remember that in 1989 the US military blasted General Noriega, who was holed up in an embassy in Panama, for several days with heavy rock at ear-splitting levels. The general withstood the onslaught for nine days before surrendering. If you had been in charge, I'm sure you would have had the foresight to blast the general with Bruckner symphonies 0 and 00, in all their versions simultaneously and at rock-concert volumes, and driven the poor wretch out in twenty minutes. But then you chose to become a music critic, rather than a military man!
Awesome! Now we need a "bible" about the works of each of the following: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, Mahler!!! 😉 Seriously though, you're correct- this book has nothing to do with sharing the love of listening to Bruckner, this is just a dry academic exercise. It is an "egghead" manual of musical analysis and theories about the development of the Bruckner symphonies. As kids in school we all suffered through this in English class when the enjoyment of a perfectly good American novel was destroyed through over-analysis and literary nonsense. Critics start seeing stuff in the novel or in the symphonies that the author or composer himself never intended and that today is taught from the front of the classroom as if it were fact. Shakespeare and F. Scott Fitzgerald are the prime examples that come to mind but there are many others. I have the Norton Edition of the Shakespeare plays and also the Riverside and the amount of articles you have to wade through before you even get to the first plays is indeed phenomenal.Everything about the man, the time he lived in, the events of his life, and controversies and theories regarding the development of his plays are gone through with a fine tooth comb. That doesn't even begin to to cover the great annotations accompanying the text of the plays themselves!!It is truly quite incredible. But i'm not complaining, i knew what i signed up for when i bought those huge tomes. That having been said, stuff like this has its place.I needed a huge accompanying tome to help me get through Milton's Paradise Lost and I chose to get another scholarly guide to accompany my reading of Dante's Divine Comedy. One day i hope to tackle TS Eliot's epic poem The Wasteland.I've been told that poem needs the reader to wade through explanatory tome of its own. For those wondering why there are so many different versions of Bruckner symphonies and what are the differences a book like this may be just what they needed. As long as we understand that it is all just one scholar's point of view and shouldn't be taken as bible truth i think we're ok. This i think is where this Bruckner volume may be iffy. But you've already done us the service of letting us know it may be biased in its commentary, so in that case, if you purchase the book knowing that then you should be fine. Every now and then i like to read serious literary criticism--right now im wading through a very scholarly and annotated edition of Poe just because i was a big fan of his spooky stories and wanted to know more about him and the stories. However I agree that for most people the type of stuff that is presented in this type of scholarly work would come across as nothing more than academic esoterica and it is truly not necessary in order to enjoy the works of Poe or in our video example the music of Bruckner. It's sufficient just to read a story or listen to the music in order to have your life enriched.
A* David! A perfectly ireverent review of what appears to be a seductively appealing book (I bet the pages are slightly glossy and the whole book smells wonderfully new... Is it just the weirdness in me that likes the smell of new books!?!?) which I will make sure I steer well clear of! Thank you so much for saving me from a fate worse than.......(fill in the blank!).
Dave, you could have a second career as a comedian! This rant was worthy not only of Monty Python, as one commentator suggested, but even of Peter Schickele, and no praise could be higher. I would love to set your rapier wit loose on QAnon and other conspiratorial cults. Among my many debts of gratitude this Thanksgiving, is one I owe to you for bringing the joy of music, and of intelligent music criticism, into a troubled time.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Ditto. And if you have a yen to add some Bach to your Thanksgiving festivities, check out BWV 192. Bach's most light-hearted Cantata and appropriate for the season. Unfortunately, the Schlep won't get to it for many a year.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Well, if Bach's riff on "Nun danket alle Gott" isn't your choice for Thanksgiving day, then for an old-fashioned rip-roaring New England holiday it's got to be Charles Ives.
Made the mistake of buying the 1888 recording from Minnesota/Vanska, without realizing what they were playing. No thanks. The original 4th - I’m thinking of the Cincinnati recording/Lopez-Cobos recording - is also a nonstarter for me. Both remind me of the monster in the Franken-Stymied episode of Woody Woodpecker. Clunky, random movements, squeaky noises. Persistently annoying.
I know of Carragan's work. I have zero interest in it because I am simply not THAT into the subject. However, in his and his readers' defense, I have had friends who are simplify mystified by anyone who is deeply into classical music at all, and consider all of us nuts -- I have lived with a few of them. Full disclosure, Mr. Carragan is a fb acquaintance and member of our fb group The Classical Music Recordings Discussion Group. I still don't know squat about Bruckner, though, so I'll hush up before I dig myself any deeper LOL
He needs no defense. He did excellent work in putting the book together. He knows more about Bruckner editions than anyone. It's the context and manner of presentation that I find creepy and, ultimately anti-musical.
@@DavesClassicalGuide fair enough. Mr. Carragan once questioned the sincerity of my admiration of Bruckner because I defended some of Haas' editorial choices. I'm just being catty, but I really shouldn't do it here. Love your work! I don't always agree with your opinions but I always find them interesting and well worth listening to! :)
@@Don-md6wn Just ignore - and keep on listening! Savour and save, what can be saved, before the new puritanism of Identity politics (of the far left) or the politics of the generation identitaire (of the far right) invades the hallowed halls of music!
Are you suggesting that Herbert Blomstedt is torturing himself because he performed many times and recorded the original 1873 version of the third symphony? In an other of your video chat, you said that the 1877 version of this d minor symphony was "the" version when obviously Bruckner revised it for the last time in 1889. Following your logic, the last version ought to be the definitive one...
I think the point is more that one can derive enjoyment from Bruckner's Third by listening to any of the versions, and that one should not be burdened with guilt for knowing only this or that version or for, God forbid, simply being used to one or liking it innocently.
@@marknewkirk4322 I do not understand it as you do, because David Hurwitz claimed many times that the last version/revision by Bruckner is the relevant one. This is why I ask him, why to prefer the 1877 version of the third symphony and pretend it is "the good one" and not the 1889 revision? I am trying to find some logic...
And for what it's worth, I happen to like the 1873 and 1877 versions of the Third. But in general, I think the Third is deeply flawed, and none of the revisions really make its weaknesses better. I wish Bruckner had spent more time finishing the finale of IX and less time trying to undo the mess he made of I - III.
@@Tracotel I have not seen the complete works critical edition of Hurwitz commentary, so I cannot claim with authority to know which version of his stance you are referring to. :-) Personally, I agree with his 11/25/2020 stance that says it's nice to have available scholarly information about different versions, but that ultimately the importance of this research is marginal in the real world.
Sorry for the irreverence towards William Carragan, BUT . . . After not having watched this in a few years, I find myself laughing my head off now. I find this whole business about versions and editions to be a needless diversion. I think a great performance of non-sanctioned version trumps a so-so or poor performance of a politically correct version.
"The Bruckner Council has stated that you have been possessed by the unholy spirit of Hanslick, sir."
Egads! I've been unmasked!
I remember when I bought my first Bruckner record in the mid-1970s. My parents didn't have any Bruckner in their collection. I was at the record store and saw the Karajan Berlin Bruckner 4, the one on DG with a stylised bird wing on the cover, and asked mom to buy it. She said "whatever".
On the way home from the record store, I read the notes on the back of the record jacket. "Karajan uses a combination of versions ... revised ... replaced scherzo ... "Folksfest" finale ... retouching..."
Before I even turned on the record player, my twelve-year-old mind was spinning with questions - what on earth was I listening to? Should I have bought some other recording? Why would Karajan mix and match versions?
Why is the author of the notes on an LP album second-guessing the choices made on a record I just spent mom's money to buy?
It turns out that dad and I liked the piece, and mom went to her grave still saying "whatever" about Bruckner. Decades later, I heard the "Folksfest" finale somewhere or other. And after hearing it, I said "whatever".
This was my first CD ever. Still love it!!
Funny enough, that recording was also my gateway drug. But in CD in 2001
Whatever
Will all who stay at hotels now find the Bruckner red book sitting next to the Gideon bible?
Wouldn't surprise me.
...LOVE your final point about Bruckner knowing who his God was.
I hope you can do a video about Eduard van Beinum's Bruckner. His 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th & 9th truly reach Bruckner's core without the usual, insufferable navel-gazing. (Sadly, he and the Concergebouworkest never got to the 6th.)
For a book, Robert Simpson's THE ESSENCE OF BRUCKNER is really the way to go. It offers insights that only another composer could give. Specifically, he points out how DIFFERENT Bruckner's take on post-Beethovenian sonata form is, from that of Brahms - and how that plays out in each symphony. And since Robert Simpson was agnostic, the usual kitschy, Bucknerian mysticism is bypassed ENTIRELY.
Yes also he wrote the go-to book on Nielsen. Excellent insights.
It's too bad Vivaldi already has the title of the "Red Priest."
Outstanding thumbnail work.
I liked the last 10 pages.
The lettering starts to get bigger and bigger, and by the last couple of pages, single front is half the size of each page.
It's Bruckner after all.
My revered copy sits proudly next to my other table leg leveler, Karajan's Christmas Recipes in just 3/4 ingredients
Oh dear, you saved my day! I actually burst out into laughter. But I must add some things.
1) As Austrian, I know very well the cult with titles (I wrote about in my book). There are two kinds of Hofrat. One is honoris causa, but the other one has to do with the career as civil servant and the salary bracket. Both titels are grotesquely outdated. But I remember that my first chief editor, who was Dr. and ordinary Professor of the university wanted to be adressed Hofrat, which had nothing to do with what he made of himself but was just a title, because of his long career as civil servant. Yes, this is Austria (even today).
2) I wonder, if the Bruckner-cult would be the same if Bruckner wouldn't have been catholic. It has something of God and the pope and the cardinals who hope to become themselves the next pope. Even if one hates the other, one shares the higher faith. Cohrs writes a foreword for Carragan, althogh Carragan must have done all wrong in the finale of the 9th, because we all know that only Cohrs did it right. For if Carragan would have been right, why should Cohrs have done another version?
3) The disputations about the versions are insane. They root all in an outdated image of Bruckner as holy fool, who had ideas but didn't know how to realise them. It would be so simple: Every composer gains experiences with every performance (even of the works of other composers). Bruckner used this growing experiences to polish his works. None of the symphonies and the masses is really re-written (in the sense of f.e. Hindemiths "Cardillac"). But musicologists have their field, because they can argue, without the pain of listening, just with the printed score.
4) I close with a personal remembrance: I wanted to discuss with a Bruckner-guy the 8th with Karajan, I just got to know. He wasn't interested at all in the musical excitement (or in a discussion, if it's an excitement at all), he just asked: "Which version does he use?" I looked at the sleeve. I said: "Haas." He said: "Oh, it cannot be good, he does the wrong version."
Thanks for bringing your own experience to this discussion! You should be a "Hofrat" too! As for me, I'm just a Rugrat.
Interesting inputs!
Ad 2) see my commentaty about the enterprise of the BS being actually more protestant than catholic. And at the end of the day, it might all have to do more with the world of academia than with Bruckner ("publish or perish", the endless counting of citations and other wonderful quantitative measures of academic activities that say nothing about the quality of the activity, etc. etc.)!
Bruckner does make some pretty good cult material, I have to say. I mean he came from humble means, was hated by the press, his music was somewhat misunderstood at times by his followers, he himself did some questionable things perfect for cult members to completely ignore... They've got everything. He was ripe for cultification.
Exactly.
Very funny talk. Another illustrious and cultish Red Book has appeared recently, originally written by Carl Jung. As we all really do love Bruckner, deity or otherwise, could you give us your survey of the Book of Revelations in Bruckner terms, the 4-movement-versions and recordings of Bruckner 9 and what you consider the best?
I accept none of the four-movement versions. That finale is horrible.
You're right. In Czechoslovakia/Czechia, we were ridiculously obsessed by getting rid of everything reminding the Austria empire, but the biggest legacy - the bureaucracy - remained till nowadays.
Bureaucracies never die. Look at the Vatican. It's just the Roman Empire in drag.
By the way, Novák is the most frequent Czech surname, but there are no more Hofräte, the titles have changed since Austrian times. :))
@@DavesClassicalGuide Bureaucracies die only when they strangle the organization that they originally supported . They keep growing and they bleed their entities even more every year. Want a world without a bureaucracy? Join the Old Order Amish. Whoops -- with education limited to eighth grade and age 16, one is unlikely to learn about classical music, among other things.
The only bureaucracy that works in the private sector indefinitely is an insurance company, and then because insurance companies operate on a cost-plus model.
I'm guessing the Czechs simply replaced Austrian bureaucrats with Czech bureaucrats or had the Austrian bureaucrats decide to become Czechs.
Extraordinario!!! Casi me destornillo de la risa!!!! Danke schön Herr Hurwitz!!!
I really shouldn't be spending nearly half an hour of my time listening to you talk about a composer who is not one of my Top 20. But it's such a brilliant and apropos rant that I had to stay with it all the way through, and when you broaden it to encompass the whole world of classical music cults (they're just as prevalent in other musical genres) I find myself giving it the old "Right on, baby!" The saddest thing , for me anyway, is that cult worship tends to jaundice our opinions of composers and performing musicians we otherwise like. Speaking of which, sooner or later, I know you'll be giving us Havergal Brian.
Yes, I will, although I was hoping for some more recent recordings.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Walker and the Russians have been doing a good job for Naxos on Brian. The symphony that badly needs a better recording/performance is #4. With the current recording I can't decide whether it's a great work on an over-scored mess.
In an ugly mug contest, Brian would give Bruckner a run for his money.
Dave - you may have forgotten the most appropriate red book to compare it to - Carl Jung’s Red Book, which NPR aptly titles ‘A Window Into Jung’s Dreams.’
I believe these people forgot how to enjoy music. They dissect it and bask themselves in these analytical exercises.
@@EnriqueHernandez-zk7qc I think this particular phenomenon goes way beyond mere scholarship but as a means of validating its existence. That's, at least, my peception of David Hurwitz's humorous rant, with which I fully concur.
The ultimate Bruckner rant! Bravo! Now I can listen to any version of the symphonies and not feel guilty....
Hey, I am a proud member of the Bruckner 'cult' and have been for over forty years! Some years ago due to work commitments I found myself stranded and all alone in a small flat on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.
I decided to spend the time by treating myself to all the Bruckner symphonies (including No 00 and No 0) on my DVD player over the two days.
I can honestly say that my mind liberally lubricated with sufficient amounts of alcohol it was one of the most mind-blowing Christmases I have ever experienced.
David, as the old saying goes don't knock such cultish behaviour it until you have tried it! 👍😁
Sorry, but drunken Bruckner bouts only prove my point. It's just plain unhealthy.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Didn't say I was drunk! It was Christmas after all ...
In all seriousness I find listening to all the versions fascinating and it was only after I heard the first version of No 4 that I understood why the composer labelled it 'The Romantic'. The 1878 and 1889 versions have never sounded very 'romantic' to me and one does have to wonder what the later symphonies would have sounded like if the composer hadn't felt the need to make his works more 'acceptable'.
@@gezobel Making them "acceptable" was not why he revised them. Making them better was.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Whatever ...
Nevertheless I, and I'm sure many others, are just mighty glad he saved his originals for 'later ages'. Whilst the revision of the 8th is widely accepted (myself included) as an improvement I am not so sure about the revisions of the 3rd and 4th and the Linz version of the 1st I prefer to that of the Vienna.
What is 'better' is purely a subjective matter according to listener taste, imv.
@@gezobel what is better is what is Bruckner.
Red Book is also the name of the specification defining the audio CD format. We need new colors.
How come does Dave have all those red books? haha
I knew that would come up. Simple answer: homework.
As you said, this is really crazy talk. I mean, Bruckner is one of my favourite composers, but it has no sense to listen to every single version of each symphony to understand the "musical process", because at the end of the whole thing, the final versions are what the composer wanted to do 😂 It's different when you want to listen the other versions because you feel curious about them, but seriously...
Can't wait for the movie's soundtrack, conducted by ... Roger Norrington (!).
...Better to be tied to a post and forced to listen to Roger Norrington's Beethoven cycle.
I need that book! I adore Bruckner, also. Who doesnt?
An ironic note on the Bruckner Problem: at Mahler's rehearsals for his 8th Symphony in Munich (5-11 September 1910, perfomance 12th Sept), Otto Klemperer noted that Mahler turned round to him and other devotees, and said: If, after my death, something doesn't sound right, then change it. You have not only the right but the duty to do so. (From the Jens Malte Fischer biography.)
Yes, that's a very famous line. But of course, we have to be "right" in second-guessing Mahler, and not many have been qualified to do that.
Alright, I'm getting paranoid here. If I go to another Bruckner concert someday, and if they use Red Booklets for the programs, and if there's a BIG vat of orange Kool-aid in the foyer, I'm gonna run like hell.
honestly until I became acquainted with this channel I had no idea that Bruckner had inspired such fanaticism - it gets me thinking about whether I should join a composer cult group - hehe - well if I were so inclined I might be tempted to join a Delius cult group - I could listen to the Florida Suite 3 or 4 times in one night
I knew there is a level of fanaticism among some Bruckner fans, but not to this extent.
What a wonderfully perceptive and amusing presentation. I know exactly what you mean with regard to the cult-ish element. Thank you.
Thanks very much for this - I've been laughing out loud for minutes. I'm sure Bill Carragan has done a terrific job, but I wonder what it is about Bruckner's music that encourages cultish behaviour? What, in short, is the psychological profile of the hardcore Bruckner Cultist - the card-carrying, apostles. I love rather a lot of Bruckner's music, but I've never understood the particular kind of deification he (alone) seems to attract. Fascinating - and a very entertaining video.
Can you contact William Carragan and get him to ask Bruckner if he'll consider coming back to finish his 9th?
He's been channeling him for years. Haven't you figured that out?
Actually, that excerpt you read did seem rather like Joyce. Finnegan's Wake though, not Dubliners or Portrait of the Artist! Just found the channel this week and really enjoying. Thanks!
Thank you!
As a confessing Bruckner disciple, studied christian theologian and German - I know I'm lost - I listened to your rewiew with lots of fun. Gosh, its as blasphemic as true! And I can reassure you that we don't hurt Bruckner's religious feeling when woreshipping him as we have at least three deities in the Christian religion - God the father, Christ the son and the Holy Spirit. So let's don't see our beloved master as the Godfather but maybe as a brother of Christ or, even better, as the final musical expression of the Holy Spirit.
HOWEVER...
I have to stop now and enlighten a candel on the master's altar before listening to all versions of the third to get my daily elevation above earths miseries.
What you by the way missed to mention as an essential part of cults is the internal mystical language that only the initiated understand and therefore let me wish you a sincere:
"Non confundar in aeternum!"
The best yet 😀
However, I would say that I find it interesting to listen to earlier versions by various composers, to see how they rethought the music and refined it for the final version. Some outstanding examples are the scherzo of Bruckner's 4th symphony, which is really different and actually kind of weird, compared to the musically much more conventional final "hunting horn" version; also, on BIS, the original version of Sibelius' Violin Concerto, and how he refined it to the final version, which is far more satisfying. But I would never get stuck on the preliminary versions----it is just interesting to see how composers conceived and revised their thought.
Yes, it's interesting--once. But that's very different from claiming that these first thoughts have equal merit as compared to the final versions approved by the composer. They belong on recordings, not in the concert hall.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Agreed!
Hilarious! But don't tell me you have never put a Bruckner symphony on Repeat for an afternoon. I have many times. Also, maybe the perfect comeuppance for the cultists would be to listen to those Eliahu Inbal recordings of the the original un-cut versions, especially with the same figure in 8th symphony repeating a million times.!
No, I never have. I have listened to different symphonies on the same day, but never the same one all the way through. Once is enough.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Well you are probably wiser than I am in such things. I grew up in Miami, where Morris Lapidus' famous dictum reigns: "Too much is never enough."
@@DavesClassicalGuide When you're only half paying attention, it isn't draining to listen to the sixth symphony on repeat while driving or surfing the internet.
Wow! An excellent listen! Thank you David. I guess it's a bit like a musical equivalent of the ubiquitous trainspotters on London Bridge station, come rain, hail, snow, ice with their flasks of hot tea, writing down every train number, type, time, etc......
Personally, I've never bothered to care about this version, or that version - if I come across a Bruckner symphony that I enjoy - that's it for me - job done!
the kind of reading they suggest would require something other than the text they provide. If they'd created a /website/ that would be something different; one which plays the different versions and shows the changes, with the scores, but that wouldn't be profitable, nor would it be commodifiable, really (and good luck licensing those recording snippets and scores!) But what a site that'd be...
I am fully satisfied with Gunter Wand's set of the nine legitimate symphonies of Bruckner on RCA (now Sony/BNG) with the Cologne Radio Symphony. It is inexpensive and complete, so it is a convenient collection. All that I could want added would be the Te Deum and the interesting string quintet.
Perfect? Maybe one could get a better collection with individual recordings, but that would be a difficult proposition. Bohm's fourth, Chailly's seventh, and Maazel's eighth may be better, but one would need to listen to plenty of mediocre or worse performances to find a beloved set.
Due to the length of Bruckner's symphonies, their performances had better be good -- really good. Anything less will be vexing. See also Mahler, a very different composer.
I would love you to do an interview with one of the disciples of the Bruckner society. Surely, they deserve an opportunity to reply to some of your concerns.
No, actually, they don't. They can do their thing and I'll do mine. It's pointless to talk to fanatics, and it has nothing to do with music.
David, that is absolutely true!!!!
LOL And to think some of my fellow Englanders sometimes complain about David's humour. It could be worse chaps, we could be Austrian or a Brucknerite. Keep up the good work sir.
Tse-Tung is the sound of the optional cymbal crash in the 7th. Everybody knows that.
Thank you David, I think this is a very important message! Also, interesting mention of Tiziana Fabbricini... bad singing = more profound?
Great video
Thanks!
This inspired speech ranks very high among David’s best and bears comparison with the GB Shaw’s destructive critical piece that he shared with us some weeks ago ! The only caveat I would add is that the Red Book may be of some use to those who enjoy more than one version of a given symphony. It can prove useful as a sober philological tool (provided that one avoids to be dragged into the Cult !) . I found the parallels with the Talmud highly instructive. Thanks again for this much inspired diatribe!
Thank you, and I agree with your point. I gave full credit to the book as a straightforward and useful list of each work's major (and minor) variants. It is the presentation that I question.
It appears that some people need a hobby to divert themselves from their everyday problems or psychological neuroses. I guess chasing variants in Bruckner symphonies fits the bill, on the level with pole-sitting or fishing for hours for crappie on the bayou. It will be interesting to see if the beautiful red book lures prey into the clutches of the obsessed Brucknerites, who will force them to listen to nine different versions of the 4th symphony continuously without a bathroom break until they swear their undying allegiance to Brucknermania.
Jung also has a redbook for his cult
Wow, even Wagner’s operas don’t have a Red Book dedicated to them!
I'm afraid that Ernest Newman's eminently sane, thoroughly thought-out WAGNER NIGHTS (aka THE WAGNER OPERAS) has long since pre-empted any Redbook attempt.
Thank you for this. A clearly tabulated compendium of all the variants, enhanced digitally, would be a useful thing to someone who wants to bring themselves up to date on The Versions, but I agree that it goes far beyond what a listener should be told to do once in a while. That being said, there has been a comparable debate going on about one of Reger's late organ compositions, Fantasia and Fugue op. 135 b. It is a wonderful, if somewhat startling piece of late Reger. Unfortunately, someone kept a proof copy which contains large swaths that were cut, apparently over various stages of the composition process. By attributing these corrections to the influence of Karl Straube, a cult-like part of Reger's following victimized the composer and declared all cuts (which Reger undoubtedly did himself) woefully wrong, introducing them back into the score and, by doing that, adding some ten tedious minutes to the music, everything with hair-rising rationalisations which flatly ignore the composer's judgement. Now that's a cult.
As a teen I was very bored with Bruckner's symphonies and have never made it through a movement of any. I remember thinking "how the hell could anyone say Mahler is longwinded? I mean sheesh!" Pushing 40 now I plan to actually listen to one however forced it might be. However, when I was younger his choral works were striking and even more so, the older I grow. Really an underperformed and underappreciated macrocosm of contribution to music. I also say that not being religious by any means. And I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate the cult. Listening outweighs pretention.
Shades of Monty Python's "Every Sperm Is Sacred" song. It's an NFL play book! If you're among the chosen who make it into professional football, you get handed a play book with five hundred million plays and you have to memorize it. Same thing! What's really crazy at the Bruckner FB page, is that they'll correct you and tell you what obscure version/edition you ought to be listening to, and then refer you to some incredibly obscure recording, made with a second tier orchestra in the excessively reverberate acoustics of St. Florian - the Mecca for the Bruckner cult. I don't think even top tier orchestras sound particularly good in St. Florian. That's just me. It's all overload for anyone who just wants to enjoy the music.
"Doctor" would be "Medezinal-Rat", like Lulu's first victim in Berg's opera.
"nein...Nein...NEIN.......AAAGGGGHHHHHH !!!"
The ‘red’ books.. I love it!
Wonderful! Just wonderful! I have to retract my former statement, that you are at your best, when talking about things that you love and like! This video is certainly a runner up for the Best Bad Online Review of the Year Award! 😁
Seriously: you argue your case very strongly and admirably present your position on textual issues creeping up ever so often in many reviews of the individual symphonies 'in these pages'.
Funnily, and somewhat a contradiction in terms: the Bruckner Society's entreprise seems to be a rather protestant take on their beloved Master. The scourge of the protestant churches has always been the text-fundamentalists, whereas the catholic's has been the tradition-fundamentalists.
Talking text versus (performance) tradition, I wonder, whether the BS people in fact (contrary to their proclaimed 'objectivity') ascribes any kind of value to the different editions/revisions, that implicitely might rub off on the evaluation of a given performance? (Like when some orthodox member of the baroque revolutionary guard dismisses a performance of a piece, no matter how musically performed, with reference to it being based on a corrupt version)
As HE rested on the 7th day, you now only have to sit back and await with eager anticipation the outcries of holy and righteous indignation from the Bruckner Friends! 😷
In any case, to lock oneself into any kind of "cult" is to renounce sharing one's taste and knowledge of music, or of any other field whatsoever. Rest assured, this type of cult exists elsewhere, and I can speak of it particularly with regard to the study of literature. It's very much the same thing, and it's based on the same approach to the mind, which consists in "objectifying" an admiration and turning it into a science. And once you've decided to do that, a whole host of "techniques" are available to you in your quest for objectification. Therein lies the danger of being locked into an admiration that becomes a logomachic discourse. Quite the opposite of sharing, transmitting and enjoying contact with art - again, whatever the field concerned.
Thanks for using "logomachic" in a sentence.
hehe!! love this deflation...maybe this volume last chapter should have been unfinished then everyone could then have a go at completion....with better results i suspect..haha!
That's a great idea!
I have missed Christopher Hitchens so much. I think he would have been delighted with your wonderful discussion of religious absurdities.
The cultification of Bruckner is a thing. Your characterization of Carragan's book as implicitly giving equal Scriptural authority to all of Bruckner's symphonyversions shows that. Considering it rationally, they can't all be equal, else Bruckner would not have revised them. Either he considered that his earlier versions contained error, or Was so weak in hi self-esteem that he was prevailed upon to think so either for crass reasons (sich as securing a performance). Neither is the hallmark of a musical deity. Only Bruckner gets the kid of treatment.
Does Prokofiev get this kid of treatment with his two Fourth Symphonies, the Cello concerto/Sinfonia Concertante? Does Copland for Grogh/Dance Symphony? Does Shostakovich for Katerina Ismailovea/Lady Macbeth of Mzensk? Does Sibelius with his three different Fifth Symphonies or the two Violin Concerto versions? What about Stravinsky's three versions of the Firebird and his second publication of The Rite of Spring? I have a tape of the BBC's broadcast of Britten's Midummer Night's Drean with audble differences from the published score, including comoletely different music for Snug's "Lion Song." And let's not get started on Gluck's Orfeo/Orphée or Verdi's Don Carlo/Don Carlos.
The real issue should be whether any extant version is worth hearing. As for the Firebirds, One is the sumptuous original version, another is the reduced and terse 1919 Suite, and the 1945 Suite has more music than the other. But there is no reason to go for the original Rite. Sibelius;s earlier versions are interesting but don't achieve the polish of the final one. Shostakovich's revision was made under pressure and the first is preferable. (I heard "Katerina" in San Francisco in the 1960s.) The final versions of the Prokofiev and Copland scores are preferable, but the others are good.
Finally I would say that Carragan invalidates his own premise by having done an abominable "completion" of B's 9th Symphony.
There are several reasons to go for the original Rite. One is that it is available for purchase from Kalmus instead of rental from Boosey, and you can edit it as you please. Another is that the rewriting of the metre changes at the end makes it easier to conduct but messes up the placement of the accents. It is not a question of a "version" of the piece. Stravinsky made the new edition mainly to keep the piece under copyright. He was a shrewed business man. The changes he made to the score were practical, not structural.
So: Holy Text? Check. Deity? Check. All that's missing is the incense and human sacrifice, though I suppose anyone subjected to Symphony no. 0 would qualify for the latter.
I'm asking myself how you would compare this to the de la Grange bio of Mahler, because it seems the tone is similar (if I am a member of a cult, then it's a Mahler cult because I am a Mahler fanboy, and I like de la Grange). In case people think I'm anti-Bruckner, I haven't heard much, but the first movement of the 9th symphony is just great. In addition, as a fellow Jew, I felt that Talmud comparison! There's so much irrelevant stuff there
I think it's very different. De la Grange was a biographer trying to hunt down every detail of the man's life to be as thorough as possible. He was not interested in creating a "Mahler cult."
These people aren't serious. If they were they would realize that to really appreciate the differences between edits one must play the different versions simultaneously.
David, you will remember that in 1989 the US military blasted General Noriega, who was holed up in an embassy in Panama, for several days with heavy rock at ear-splitting levels. The general withstood the onslaught for nine days before surrendering. If you had been in charge, I'm sure you would have had the foresight to blast the general with Bruckner symphonies 0 and 00, in all their versions simultaneously and at rock-concert volumes, and driven the poor wretch out in twenty minutes. But then you chose to become a music critic, rather than a military man!
Music critics are military men!
Awesome! Now we need a "bible" about the works of each of the following: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, Mahler!!! 😉 Seriously though, you're correct- this book has nothing to do with sharing the love of listening to Bruckner, this is just a dry academic exercise. It is an "egghead" manual of musical analysis and theories about the development of the Bruckner symphonies. As kids in school we all suffered through this in English class when the enjoyment of a perfectly good American novel was destroyed through over-analysis and literary nonsense. Critics start seeing stuff in the novel or in the symphonies that the author or composer himself never intended and that today is taught from the front of the classroom as if it were fact. Shakespeare and F. Scott Fitzgerald are the prime examples that come to mind but there are many others. I have the Norton Edition of the Shakespeare plays and also the Riverside and the amount of articles you have to wade through before you even get to the first plays is indeed phenomenal.Everything about the man, the time he lived in, the events of his life, and controversies and theories regarding the development of his plays are gone through with a fine tooth comb. That doesn't even begin to to cover the great annotations accompanying the text of the plays themselves!!It is truly quite incredible. But i'm not complaining, i knew what i signed up for when i bought those huge tomes.
That having been said, stuff like this has its place.I needed a huge accompanying tome to help me get through Milton's Paradise Lost and I chose to get another scholarly guide to accompany my reading of Dante's Divine Comedy. One day i hope to tackle TS Eliot's epic poem The Wasteland.I've been told that poem needs the reader to wade through explanatory tome of its own. For those wondering why there are so many different versions of Bruckner symphonies and what are the differences a book like this may be just what they needed. As long as we understand that it is all just one scholar's point of view and shouldn't be taken as bible truth i think we're ok. This i think is where this Bruckner volume may be iffy. But you've already done us the service of letting us know it may be biased in its commentary, so in that case, if you purchase the book knowing that then you should be fine.
Every now and then i like to read serious literary criticism--right now im wading through a very scholarly and annotated edition of Poe just because i was a big fan of his spooky stories and wanted to know more about him and the stories. However I agree that for most people the type of stuff that is presented in this type of scholarly work would come across as nothing more than academic esoterica and it is truly not necessary in order to enjoy the works of Poe or in our video example the music of Bruckner. It's sufficient just to read a story or listen to the music in order to have your life enriched.
A* David! A perfectly ireverent review of what appears to be a seductively appealing book (I bet the pages are slightly glossy and the whole book smells wonderfully new... Is it just the weirdness in me that likes the smell of new books!?!?) which I will make sure I steer well clear of! Thank you so much for saving me from a fate worse than.......(fill in the blank!).
I like the smell of new books too. You're not alone.
@@DavesClassicalGuide "Like...it's the glue, man..."
HA! I think I'll pass on this eloquent text and just listen to Bruckner's music.
Dave, you could have a second career as a comedian! This rant was worthy not only of Monty Python, as one commentator suggested, but even of Peter Schickele, and no praise could be higher. I would love to set your rapier wit loose on QAnon and other conspiratorial cults. Among my many debts of gratitude this Thanksgiving, is one I owe to you for bringing the joy of music, and of intelligent music criticism, into a troubled time.
Thanks a lot. Have a Happy Socially Distanced Thanksgiving!
@@DavesClassicalGuide Ditto. And if you have a yen to add some Bach to your Thanksgiving festivities, check out BWV 192. Bach's most light-hearted Cantata and appropriate for the season. Unfortunately, the Schlep won't get to it for many a year.
@@davidaiken1061 Doubtless we'll find something to listen to between now and then.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Well, if Bach's riff on "Nun danket alle Gott" isn't your choice for Thanksgiving day, then for an old-fashioned rip-roaring New England holiday it's got to be Charles Ives.
Can you imagine going to one of their "cult" group parties...BORING!!!!😣
Made the mistake of buying the 1888 recording from Minnesota/Vanska, without realizing what they were playing. No thanks. The original 4th - I’m thinking of the Cincinnati recording/Lopez-Cobos recording - is also a nonstarter for me. Both remind me of the monster in the Franken-Stymied episode of Woody Woodpecker. Clunky, random movements, squeaky noises. Persistently annoying.
Wow. Great rant.
I know of Carragan's work. I have zero interest in it because I am simply not THAT into the subject. However, in his and his readers' defense, I have had friends who are simplify mystified by anyone who is deeply into classical music at all, and consider all of us nuts -- I have lived with a few of them.
Full disclosure, Mr. Carragan is a fb acquaintance and member of our fb group The Classical Music Recordings Discussion Group. I still don't know squat about Bruckner, though, so I'll hush up before I dig myself any deeper LOL
He needs no defense. He did excellent work in putting the book together. He knows more about Bruckner editions than anyone. It's the context and manner of presentation that I find creepy and, ultimately anti-musical.
@@olinwilliams Anyone who refers to a guy as "Hofrat" definitely needs an attitude adjustment.
@@DavesClassicalGuide what makes it even more pretentious is that he apparently doesn't even speak German.
@@marcoburak7584 We don't know that, and I don't think it matters. The Bruckner cult would be just as crazy if he did speak German.
@@DavesClassicalGuide fair enough. Mr. Carragan once questioned the sincerity of my admiration of Bruckner because I defended some of Haas' editorial choices. I'm just being catty, but I really shouldn't do it here. Love your work! I don't always agree with your opinions but I always find them interesting and well worth listening to! :)
Don’t forget the Red Book format for CDs. Jim Sveda once dubbed Bruckner the world’s ugliest composer.
Let us hope the Bruckner cultists do not emulate their master by proposing to 15 year olds
Or making out with skulls!
@@mogmason6920 I'm still trying to appreciate Bruckner's symphonies and you guys aren't helping!
@@Don-md6wn Just ignore - and keep on listening!
Savour and save, what can be saved, before the new puritanism of Identity politics (of the far left) or the politics of the generation identitaire (of the far right) invades the hallowed halls of music!
Are you suggesting that Herbert Blomstedt is torturing himself because he performed many times and recorded the original 1873 version of the third symphony?
In an other of your video chat, you said that the 1877 version of this d minor symphony was "the" version when obviously Bruckner revised it for the last time in 1889. Following your logic, the last version ought to be the definitive one...
I think the point is more that one can derive enjoyment from Bruckner's Third by listening to any of the versions, and that one should not be burdened with guilt for knowing only this or that version or for, God forbid, simply being used to one or liking it innocently.
@@marknewkirk4322 I do not understand it as you do, because David Hurwitz claimed many times that the last version/revision by Bruckner is the relevant one. This is why I ask him, why to prefer the 1877 version of the third symphony and pretend it is "the good one" and not the 1889 revision? I am trying to find some logic...
And for what it's worth, I happen to like the 1873 and 1877 versions of the Third. But in general, I think the Third is deeply flawed, and none of the revisions really make its weaknesses better. I wish Bruckner had spent more time finishing the finale of IX and less time trying to undo the mess he made of I - III.
@@Tracotel I have not seen the complete works critical edition of Hurwitz commentary, so I cannot claim with authority to know which version of his stance you are referring to. :-)
Personally, I agree with his 11/25/2020 stance that says it's nice to have available scholarly information about different versions, but that ultimately the importance of this research is marginal in the real world.
You do not understand it at all. Mr. Newkirk has it right.
Sorry for the irreverence towards William Carragan, BUT . . . After not having watched this in a few years, I find myself laughing my head off now. I find this whole business about versions and editions to be a needless diversion. I think a great performance of non-sanctioned version trumps a so-so or poor performance of a politically correct version.
Ouch! Very funny, however.
I prefer the Haydn cult. Haydn is God. Landon is the principle disciple.... Dave Hurwitz is the foremost disciple of the disciple :)
Uh, no thanks...
@@DavesClassicalGuide Only joking, but I guess now I gotta take down the Haydn bust from the shelf above my bed
Ha ha ha ha!
Bruckner's music always reminds me of Bruno Bettelheim's definition of autism: an empty fortress