Jochum conducts Bruckner: Symphony no. 7

 

No. 380 of the ongoing ITYWLTMT series of audio montages is this week's Friday Blog and Podcast. It can be found in our archives at https://archive.org/details/pcast380

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Today’s podcast continues our crossover portion of our survey of Bruckner symphonis under Eugen Jochum with his 1967 recording of the seventh symphony with the Berlin Philharmonic

The Symphony No. 7 in E major, one of the composer's best-known symphonies, was written between 1881 and 1883. It is dedicated to Ludwig II of Bavaria. Along with Symphony No. 4, the Seventh is the most popular Bruckner symphony both in the concert hall and on record. The symphony is sometimes referred to as the "Lyric", though the appellation is not the composer's own, and is seldom used.

The Seventh Symphony premiered in Leipzig on December 30, 1884, conducted by Arthur Nikisch who insisted (after hearing a piano version); “from this moment, I regard it as my duty to work for Bruckner’s recognition.”  The Leipzig performance had been great, and the following premiere in Munich, March 10 1885, was fantastic. This acclaim constituted a major turning point in his career. 

Symphony Seven was destined for a Viennese premiere shortly thereafter, but the composer asked that this plan be withdrawn or at least deferred, “because of the influential critics who would be likely to damage my dawning success.” As it is often the case with Bruckner symphonies he undertook a revision in 1885. Vienna finally heard the work on March 21, 1886, where Bruckner’s premonitions proved correct. Hanslick wrote, “the music is antipathetic to me and appears to be exaggerated, sick, and perverted.” Gustav Dompke (another critic) added, “We recoil with horror before this rotting odor which rushes into our nostrils from the disharmonies of this decomposing counterpoint.”  Audiences around the world, including those in Vienna, did not agree with the spiteful opinions, and the symphony became a decided, unassailable triumph. Jonathan Kramer summarized: “Bruckner’s special world of slow moving intensity, overpowering climaxes, and intimate lyricism nowhere found a more coherent or beautiful statement than in the Seventh Symphony.”

Interesting fact: an arrangement of this symphony for chamber ensemble was prepared in 1921 by students and associates of Arnold Schoenberg, for the Viennese "Society for Private Musical Performances. The Society folded before the arrangement could be performed, and it was not premiered until more than 60 years later.

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