Anton Bruckner (1824-1896)
Symphony No. 9 in D minor (1894 ed Nowak?)
Symphony in F minor ‘Study Symphony’ (1863 ed. Nowak)
Bruckner Orchestra Linz/Markus Poschner
rec. live, 9 & 10 November 2021 (No. 9) & 23 & 27 February, 2922 (Study), Rehearsal Hall, Musiktheater, Linz, Austria
Capriccio C8096 [2 CDs: 91]

This is the final instalment in Markus Poschner’s complete Bruckner symphony cycle on the Capriccio label. In my estimation, it has been a strangely patchy, inconsistent survey, frequently marred by rushed tempi. Something like half the performances range in quality between satisfactory and excellent and the rest are between mediocre and awful. Highlights have been the two versions of the Eighth, an excellent 1878-80 Fourth (but a poor original version), and a good Second and Fifth but none of those except for the original, 1887 Eighth supersedes previous classic recordings. Those are just my responses, of course, and others may embrace his general briskness more enthusiastically, but for me there are too many misses, such that I cannot recommend the series as a whole over sets like those by Blomstedt or Karajan.

As is evident from the table of some my favourite recordings below, this new Ninth is comparable in speeds and manner to François-Xavier Roth’s even faster recent recording (review). Given that Poschner is a “modern” interpreter of Bruckner, the listener habituated to more the more ponderous manner of conductors like Giulini might want to jettison any preconceptions and prejudices and simply try to assess whether, like Roth, Poschner’s approach succeeds on its own terms.

As you can see from the above, Poschner’s overall timings for the first two movements are by no means extreme, and the sonorous grandeur of the playing of the Bruckner Orchestra Linz goes a long way to dispelling any sense of undue haste. In the opening, there is both a sense of flowing majesty and a pleasing momentum to Poschner’s conducting and the balances among instruments are excellent, giving proper prominence to the woodwind. However, he then typically begins to apply some peculiar little spurts of acceleration, speeding up in an attempt to generate a sense of excitement, then decelerating markedly; I somehow find the stature of this symphony diminished by Poschner’s interventionist fussiness of phrasing. The end product is unstable and spasmodic and I miss the steady, inexorable pulse we hear in a more patient overview. The potentially climactic coda, building from around twenty minutes in, is faintly pedestrian – there is no mystery to the falling figure on the violins which is played too loud – and it thus emerges as anticlimactic.

The Scherzo is nicely sprung and propulsive; the attack on the obsessively repeated, pounding dissonant chords is very satisfying and the Trio skips gratifying – almost manically, in fact and it is here that a sense of tipsy instability is welcome. The whole movement is a complete success.

The Adagio with its beautiful, chromatically sculpted, soaring ascent, begins very promisingly with a real sense of exhilaration and release. Everything proceeds rapturously: tempi are measured, the Wagner tubas are magnificent in the “Farewell to Life” chorale, the “sunburst” at 14:23 is radiant – but Poschner rather hurries the cosmic, climactic trumpet fanfare, compromising its impact, and as with the conclusion to the first movement, I do not derive from the coda here the sense of transcendence and serenity the greatest recordings impart – although the soft horn tones on the final sustained B natural are meltingly lovely and steady.

As if to put the seal on a cycle often characterised by haste, Poschner’s speeds in the Study Symphony are strikingly fast compared with Gerd Schaller’s (review). While it is true that much of the difference may be accounted for by the fact that Schaller takes the exposition repeats – amounting to four minutes in the first movement and three in the finale – Poschner is still characteristically driven, perhaps in an attempt to “paper over the cracks”, as the symphony has its longueurs, despite being quite short:

None of the music is especially characteristic of Bruckner’s later work and surely nobody claims that the Study Symphony is a masterpiece but it is hardly the “piece of junk” a certain YouTube critic declares it to be. As I remarked in my review of Schaller’s recording, it is “essentially rustic in spirit”. Poschner jollies along the rather banal main subject of the Allegro molto vivace and it ends up sounding rather like the overture to a generic German operetta – by no means inapt or undiverting played this way; at times, it assumes an almost Mendelssohnian lightness. The Andante is not especially distinguished or memorable as music but is elegantly delivered, especially by the bank of woodwind. The Scherzo is neatly crafted and executed with neat, deft precision. The finale is similarly jocular and played in spritely fashion.

The sound throughout is exemplary in clarity and balance and the booklet features as usual Paul Hawkshaw’s scholarly yet wholly accessible notes.

A few eccentricities of tempo and a certain lack of exaltation in climaxes mean that I do not place this among my favourite versions of the Ninth but it is nonetheless an enjoyable and finely played version, coupled with cheerful account of the Study Symphony which will appeal to Bruckner completists.

Ralph Moore

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