Jakub Hrůša on the cover of his new Deutsche Grammophon album (courtesy of Crossover Media)
A little less than two months ago, Deutsche Grammophon released an album, whose content was organized around the first symphony composed by Hans Rott. That organization seems to have been conceived by the album’s conductor, Jakub Hrůša, leading the Bamberg Symphony, where he has been Chief Conductor since 2016 and is currently contracted to serve until 2026. Where Rott’s music is concerned, Hrůša appears to be an unabashed enthusiast. The advance material for this album quotes him as saying, “At a time when his younger schoolmate Mahler hadn’t yet written his first symphonic score, and his mentor Bruckner was struggling through his middle period, Rott was able to produce incredibly groundbreaking musical ideas, and to see how a symphony could expand in a manner unlike almost anyone before him.”
Rott began work on this symphony in 1878. Attentive listeners will have no trouble identifying themes from the symphonies of Gustav Mahler in the third and fourth movements. However, to mix metaphors somewhat awkwardly, those admirers of Mahler’s music would be looking through the wrong end of the telescope. Mahler did not begin work on his first symphony until 1888, drawing upon thematic material from his Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (songs of a wayfarer) song cycle, which he completed in 1885. “Theme detectives” listening to Rott’s symphony will detect material associated with Mahler’s second and fifth symphony, making it clear that Mahler was the one appropriating from Rott.
To be fair, however, Hrůša was far from the first to discover this instance of “appropriation in the wrong direction.” According to search results on Amazon.com, recordings of Rott’s symphony have been available at least as early as November of 1989, when Hyperion released an album of Gerhard Samuel conducting the Cincinnati Philharmonia Orchestra. Perhaps it takes a “prestige label” like Deutsche Grammophon to get music lovers to pay attention!
Beyond prestige, though, the new release also includes two “bonus tracks” following the four track’s of Rott’s symphony. The first of these is Mahler’s “Blumine” movement. Those consulting the Wikipedia page for Mahler’s first symphony will discover that the composer had an on-again-off-again relationship in deciding whether this movement belonged in the symphony. When the final version of the score was published in 1899, the “Blumine” movement was decidedly “off.” However, during my student days in the Sixties, there was a revived interest among record producers that were Mahler enthusiasts; and that decade was when I first purchased a recording of the symphony, which included that movement.
Over half a century has passed; and, unless I am mistaken, I have only encountered this movement in a concert performance in January of 2017, when the San Francisco Symphony performed it under the baton of then Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas. Hrůša seems content to present it without including the context of the other movements of the first symphony. MTT did the same, and I am inclined to sympathize with both of them. Mahler packed so much content into the four movements that were published that most listeners are probably perfectly happy with the plan of the movements and the overall duration. I have listened to the four-movement version in a generous number of concert programs (several led by MTT); and I have never felt that I missed the presence of the “Blumine” movement, whatever its charms may be.
The final track is a brief (a little less than six and one-half minutes) performance of WAB 297, a single orchestral movement that Anton Bruckner entitled “Symphonic Prelude.” This is based on music discovered shortly after World War II, about half a century after Bruckner’s death. This score has probably received as much attention as the “Blumine” movement. Indeed, in the context of Hrůša’s interest in Rott, the original orchestration of the music was performed for the first time in March of 1997. Once again the conductor was Samuel, this time leading the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.
This composition was not included in the Profil anthology of Bruckner’s music. The thematic material for WAB 297 draws upon passages from both the first and second symphonies (WAB 101 and WAB 102), both composed in C minor. Given that I have more than enough to occupy me with the different editions of the symphonies, I cannot say that I miss the absence of WAB 297 from that anthology; but I cannot object to having an account of it on Hrůša’s new Deutsche Grammophon album.
No comments:
Post a Comment