PROGRAM ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FOURTH SEASON Chicago Symphony Orchestra Riccardo Muti Zell Music Director Pierre Boulez Helen Regenstein Conductor Emeritus Yo-Yo Ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO Thursday, April 23, 2015, at 6:30 (Afterwork Masterworks) Friday, April 24, 2015, at 1:30 Saturday, April 25, 2015, at 8:00 Sunday, April 26, 2015, at 3:00 Semyon Bychkov Conductor Bruckner Symphony No. 8 in C Minor Allegro moderato Scherzo: Allegro moderato Adagio: Solemn and slow, but not dragging Finale: Solemn, not fast There will be no intermission. Friday’s performance honors the memory of Elizabeth Hoffman and her generous endowment gift. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is grateful to WBBM Newsradio 780 and 105.9FM for its generous support as a media sponsor of the Afterwork Masterworks series. This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. COMMENTS by Phillip Huscher Anton Bruckner Born September 4, 1824, Ansfelden, Upper Austria. Died October 11, 1896, Vienna, Austria. Symphony No. 8 in C Minor When Bruckner’s Seventh But Levi did not know what to make of a work Symphony received a so vast and daring, and he sent word through tremendous ovation at its Bruckner’s student Josef Schalk that it needed to Leipzig premiere in 1884, be rewritten. Bruckner was devastated—Levi’s it looked as if the tide had rejection threw him completely off balance. turned at last. Bruckner, The joys and successes of the previous three now sixty, was enjoying years were quickly forgotten, and the composer his first taste of success plunged into a serious depression. Bruckner had after years of neglect, known crippling insecurity throughout his life, rejection—the Vienna but he was now consumed by a new wave of Philharmonic refused outright to play his first doubt: unable to continue work on the projected three symphonies—and repeated failure. With symphony that would posthumously become this work, Bruckner found an important new his ninth, he began to rip apart the C minor champion in conductor Hermann Levi, who led symphony instead, and he also revamped several the Munich premiere a few months later to great earlier works, including his first three sympho- acclaim. Even Vienna, Bruckner’s normally nies. It can be argued that much of Bruckner’s unsympathetic hometown, was won over by the revision of his Eighth Symphony made for a new symphony: the composer was called to the better piece of music, but there is no telling how stage four or five times after each movement. deeply he suffered in the process. Furthermore, Success followed success as the symphony was if he had left the Eighth alone, he might have performed in major music centers over the next finished the Ninth. several months. (The U.S. premiere was given in Serious renovation of the Eighth Symphony Chicago by Theodore Thomas and his orchestra began in March 1889, starting with the Adagio, on July 29, 1886.) and continued for the rest of the year. The In October 1887—after more than three years comments Bruckner added to the last page of the of work—Bruckner sent a brand new C minor score tell the tale: “First movement finally revised symphony off to Hermann Levi, certain that he from November 1889 to January 1890. Last note would agree that this was even more impressive written on January 29th.” And then, “Vienna, than the Seventh Symphony and that he would February 10th, 1890, entirely finished.” And still be honored to conduct the first performance. again, “March 10th, entirely finished.” And even COMPOSED MOST RECENT APPROXIMATE 1884–1887; revised in 1889 and 1890 CSO PERFORMANCES PERFORMANCE TIME April 16, 17, 18 & 21, 2009, Orchestra 81 minutes The 1890 version is performed at Hall. Bernard Haitink conducting these concerts. CSO RECORDINGS May 2, 2009, Carnegie Hall. Bernard 1980. Daniel Barenboim conducting. FIRST PERFORMANCE Haitink conducting Deutsche Grammophon December 18, 1892; Vienna, Austria INSTRUMENTATION 1990. Sir Georg Solti conducting. FIRST CSO PERFORMANCES three flutes, three oboes, three London March 17 & 18, 1949, Orchestra Hall. clarinets, three bassoons and George Szell conducting contrabassoon, eight horns, four Wagner tubas, three trumpets, three August 7, 2005, Ravinia Festival. trombones, tuba, timpani, triangle, Christoph Eschenbach conducting cymbals, harp, strings 2 though the work actually was “entirely finished” When Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony was played at that point, Bruckner probably still didn’t really in Vienna, the same people who had often snick- believe it. ered behind his back now listened as he spoke to The first performance was to take place them with an almost inhuman eloquence, and in Mannheim, under the baton of Felix this time they did not laugh. Weingartner, who began rehearsals in March 1891. Bruckner was apprehensive. “How does ruckner’s Eighth is the largest of his it sound?” he wrote from Vienna. “I do recom- completed symphonies. It begins qui- mend to you to shorten the finale severely as is etly, in the same rhythm that opens indicated. It would be much too long and is valid BBeethoven’s Ninth Symphony, although only for later times and for a circle of friends and Beethoven would never have dreamed of starting connoisseurs . .” Weingartner got cold feet, so far from the symphony’s announced key of and the premiere C minor, nor would he have made the jour- was canceled. The ney last so long. Getting used to the pace of a Eighth Symphony Bruckner symphony was hard even in leisurely was finally performed nineteenth-century Vienna, where stopping for the first time in for afternoon coffee sometimes actually took Vienna in December all afternoon. There are first movements by 1892, under Hans Beethoven as long as this one, but they are so Richter. The critic full of energy and so tightly packed with events Eduard Hanslick, that they pass like lightning. Bruckner writes who seldom had a music that takes its time and demands that we good thing to say submit ours to it. He would not understand the about Bruckner, person who, finding himself in a great Gothic wrote a predictable Hans Richter cathedral, buys a postcard rather than take the review, full of phrases thirty-minute tour. (He never tired of stand- like “unrelieved ing in the great transept at Saint Florian, the gloom,” but he also reported “tumultuous accla- towering masterpiece of baroque architecture mations, waving handkerchiefs, innumerous calls, just down the road from his birthplace.) laurel wreaths, and so forth. No doubt whatever, The first movement of Bruckner’s Eighth for Bruckner the concert was a triumph.” Even Symphony suggests the architecture of sonata Vienna had become a “circle of friends and con- form—three big themes are exhibited, developed noisseurs,” much to Bruckner’s surprise. in a masterful way, and returned later somehow The Viennese had never known what to make fresher for the experience. At the beginning, of Anton Bruckner, with his country manners, Bruckner approaches C minor from the odd severe Prussian haircut, and perilously baggy perspective of B-flat minor and then settles suits. (Bruckner favored wide pant legs because into a series of holding patterns from which they made it easier to reach the organ pedals.) C minor is visible but not yet accessible. There is Beethoven, once mistakenly arrested as a vagrant, a powerful stillness at the center of Bruckner’s had already proved how little appearance has to music, something for which Beethoven and even do with musical greatness. But Bruckner was Wagner have not prepared us. The development a more serious misfit in Viennese society. He section, for example, begins from a point of lacked the necessary skill for chitchat, and when almost total silence and inertia, and Bruckner he spoke he often said the wrong thing. (When generates momentum slowly. A number of big, his idol, Wagner, died in 1883, he could barely brassy climaxes merely collapse, as if from a loss string together two perfunctory sentences to send of nerve. After the last flare of chords, the music off to the composer’s widow Cosima.) Music was stops, leaving a few desolate reminders of previ- his real language. When, at sixty-seven, he was ous themes and the repeated beat of the timpani. named a doctor of philosophy at the University Bruckner called this the Totenuhr, the clock in a of Vienna, he told the rector magnificus: “I cannot room where someone is dying—a deathwatch. find the words to thank you as I would wish, but Bruckner did not explain why he placed the if there were an organ here, I could tell you.” powerful, driven scherzo next, contrary to 3 custom, and one cannot guess his plan until he Bruckner shakes us firmly by the shoulders at lays out the extraordinary expanse of an adagio the start of the finale and then launches a fierce just before the finale. The scherzo, in the mean- and powerful theme for the brass. From there, time, is brilliant dance music of the most serious the finale moves steadily, but not without diffi- kind, achieved by ingenious repetition and a culty, toward the moment when C major slowly bold use of color. The trio, in contrast, is lyrical, emerges. A number of episodes and themes tender, reflective, and delicately scored (Bruckner intervene, including a warmly lyrical melody in uses the harp here and in the following Adagio the strings and an eloquent chorale tune. The for the only time in his career). music frequently comes to a total stop, not from The Viennese who sat spellbound by this great, inertia, but to gather strength.