But what really fascinates me about Bruckner is that he started composing symphonies fairly late in his life. Pain is an incredible stimulant of creativity. I have a theory that the less happy the composer, the better, richer, and more emotional his music. Bruckner died a virgin and was buried under the organ at St Florian ( from Gramophone).īruckner must have had a rather unhappy life. Piety and pubescent girls are not an attractive combination. Her refusal to convert to Catholicism ended that. Later still he became infatuated with the 14-year-old daughter of his first love – that came to nothing and at 70 he proposed to a young chambermaid.
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Though the parents in this instance gave the relationship their blessing, the young girl tired of Bruckner, and his passionate letters went unanswered. He fell for another 17-year-old in his mid-fifties. He was 43 when he fell in love with a 17-year-old, whose parents put a stop to the relationship. (Bruckner followed to a “T” the Church’s proscription against sexual relations not sanctified by marriage.)īruckner searched for a bride all his life:
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He believed completely that everything he did should honor God.īruckner was a total country bumpkin: naïve, simple, overly trusting, deferential and pious to a fault. The Church was Bruckner’s refuge and solace for the entirety of his life he was as devout a man we will ever find outside a monastery or a foxhole. Bruckner was a very diligent student and became a very talented organ player. As I’ve been listening to Bruckner’s symphonies and reading about him, I have found that Bruckner the person is as interesting as his music.īruckner’s ancestors were farmers. This brings me to the latest victim of my explorations, Austrian composer Anton Bruckner (1824-1896). I still don’t understand all of Mahler’s work. Mahler, Sibelius, and Bach, on the other hand, took a long time for me to understand. Russian composers take the least number of tries – there must have been something in the water I drank as a child growing up in Russia. I “understand” some composers quicker than others. First, it implies that I am a judgment-worthy connoisseur (I am not!), and second, “I don’t like” has a finality to it, while “don’t understand” leaves the door for me to understand the music down the road. I try very hard not to use “I don’t like” when it comes to classical music, for two reasons. Sometimes, even after a dozen tries the music won’t click with me, and I put it into the “I don’t understand” pile. I remember listening to Puccini’s La Boheme a dozen times, and at first I was baffled at how this opera could possibly be one of the most-performed operas. I may have to listen to a new piece half a dozen times before it clicks with me.
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At first, I don’t understand that music and it brings me little pleasure – it’s just random, unconnected sounds. When I listen to music that is unfamiliar to me, at first it’s work. Over the last few years I’ve been actively trying to stretch the boundaries of my musical knowledge by going deeper into the music of the composers I am already familiar with and also by more widely exploring new (previously unfamiliar to me) composers. Neither Grieg’s nor Mahler’s music suddenly got better public attitudes towards it changed. Mahler’s music was not popular in the US until Leonard Bernstein popularized it in the 1960s.
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At the beginning of the 20 th century, the American public did not care for Edward Grieg’s Piano Concerto in A minor, but today it is one of the most-performed piano concertos. I have stopped trying to figure out why the music of one composer is popular and the works of scores of others are not performed but collect dust in the obscurity of music libraries.