Eliahu Inbal


1 LP - 6.42921 AZ - (p) 1983
1 CD - 8.42921 ZK - (c) 1984

ANTON BRUCKNER (1824-1896)




Symphonie Nr. 4 Es-dur "Romantische" - Erstfassung 1874 68' 14"
- Allegro 18' 53"
- Andante quasi allegretto 18' 42"
- Sehr schnell · Trio: Im gleichen Tempo 13' 11"
- Allegro moderato
17' 18"



 
Radio-Sinfonie-Orchester Frankfurt
Elihau Inbal, Leitung
 






Luogo e data di registrazione
Frankfurt (Germania) - settembre 1982


Registrazione: live / studio
studio

Producer / Engineer
-

Prima Edizione LP
Teldec - 6.42921 AZ - (1 LP) - durata 68' 14" - (p) 1983 - Digitale

Prima Edizione CD
Teldec - 8.42921 ZK - (1 CD) - durata 68' 14" - (c) 1984 - DDD

Note
Coproduktion mit dem HR.












Bruckner’s Fourht Symphony, drafted in 1874 and rewritten a total of three times, is possibly his most popular work. Despite verbal comments made by Bruckner’s contemporaries, which point to the existence of various programmes for the symphony, we have no concrete evidence that a programmatic portrayal of nature was intended.
Notwithstanding, the work must have concerned itself with the subject of nature at least in parody fashion, since the epithet ”Romantic“, which Bruckner himself added to the manuscript, had associations with nature in contemporary linguistic usage. The hunting scherzo, which was substituted for the original scherzo in the second version of the symphony, likewise alludes to this topic. The musical proof, however, lies in the horn theme of the first movement, that grows out of a soft tonal shadow originating from nothingness, and possesses the traditional hunting-call character. Here Bruckner - comparable to Weber in the ”Freischütz“ Overture - builds up an atmosphere of nature without lapsing into a process of descriptive imitation.
The first version of the symphony characterised by the keywords periodicity, punctuation, dynamic impact contrasts, antipodean woodwind writing, an (inaudible) wealth of information and a logical structuring of the thematic material. If the first movement thereby presents the antithesis as a pattern of genesis and development, the second movement reacts to the association matrix of its predecessor. Aveiled funeral march with no less than ten different tempo markings and interspersed chorale passages aims at forcefulness, intensification and reinforcement. Where in the second version of the scherzo it is the harmonic traversing of chords that parodies the sound of the hunting horns, the motif of the first version is depicted as a jump-and-step model based on fifths with expanded movement into fourths and sixths. This tension of seconds, already formulated by Beethoven, appears in the oscillating suspension of violin trills in the meanings of the chromatic structures, whereby compact blocks are set in relief against the solo horn. It is certainly no mere coincidence that the trio melody works with the same material, analogically speaking, with tremolo strings and planes of a fifth, fourth and sixth in the oboes. Here, more clearly than elsewhere, Bruckner’s technique of inverting characteristic final intervals is shown in all but didactic form.
The final brings together the main structural elements of the preceding movements once more. Although there is not much to distinguish it from the second version in terms of basic thematic material, Bruckner achieves a construction principle, with the aid of differently sequenced stages of development, that is redolent of the third movement in its counter-rotating violin line coloured by thirds, of the main subject of the first movement in its soloistically accentuated bass ostinato. Just how important the rhythmic dovetailings were to Bruckner can be deduced from the extremely precise notation, which must have required considerable expenditure of time, so that one can assume that the composer devoted his complete concentration to it. A tonal check on the written material soon demonstrates the conceptual potential that Bruckner wanted to realise with the help of this complex notation: in part physically masked resonant and anticipatory sounds, suspensions, oscillations that provide evidence of Bruckner’s fanatical preoccupation with exactness: the intellectual aspects of his music can only be broughtout in performance by the realisation of these phenomena. The former gentle qualities of the movements are pressed together here in a restricted space, thrust up against each other, placed on top of one another, and stand in model form, as it were, for Bruckner’s tendency to develop a part into a whole, related to each other in the synoptic presentation of melodic and rhythmic substance and dinected towards the central goal of romantic, natural and landscape associations.
Manfred Wagner
Translation: Clive R. Williams