# Favorite Bruckner slow movement?



## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

Bruckner has a reputation for writing excellent slow movements and I'm just curious what you believe is his most beautiful or your favorite? It can be from any of his works. Personally I only know the 4th and 9th symphonies as well as his string quintet. The quintet does it for me by far. One of the most extraordinary things I could ever imagine hearing.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

I quite like the fifth's slow movement


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## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

I also read that Glenn Gould admired the quintet above all other Bruckner pieces as well and called the quintet adagio "the most wonderful thing he ever wrote". He plays it on piano on Youtube here:


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## Marsilius (Jun 13, 2015)

The seventh symphony I think - a requiem to Wagner - but the slow movement of the first is also a possibility thanks to its wonderful climax.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2015)

I recommend that you listen to the rest of Bruckner's symphonies. Only numbers four and nine? Well? What's holding you back? There are only nine more. Surely you've got a spare nine hours or so to listen to some more glorious music.

And then, at the very least you'll know what your own favorite Bruckner slow movement is. And, with any luck, you won't have any favorites at all. That is, you'll enjoy each slow movement, each symphony for that matter, for itself and not in any sort of competition with other slow movements, or other symphonies.

I can say one thing for sure, each Bruckner slow movement sounds better as part of an entire symphony rather than as a stand-alone piece.

Funny story--well mildly humorous (very mildly): when I was a kid, I had no money and access to very little. Poor white trash, you know. So for years the bulk of my listening was on radio. My sophomore year of college I found a recording of Bruckner's fourth (Haitink) and fell in love with it. I couldn't remember ever having heard any Bruckner before, but that scherzo sounded familiar. Each successive Bruckner symphony I got after that was new to me, except for the scherzo. Each scherzo for each symphony was something I'd heard before.

What that meant, given how the radio station I'd grown up listening to programmed only complete works, was that I heard all of Bruckner's symphonies before I ever found that recording of the fourth. This wasn't new stuff. This was all stuff I'd heard before without its making much of an effect on me except for those memorable scherzos. Well, it was certainly weird listening to each new Bruckner symphony I was sure I'd never heard before and getting to the scherzo and going, "Yep. I've heard that."


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## Skilmarilion (Apr 6, 2013)

Dustin said:


> Personally I only know the 4th and 9th symphonies as well as his string quintet.


You might want to change that. :tiphat:






But I think it needs to be said, you can't go wrong with any Bruckner adagio, and for me at least it's reached a stage where I couldn't possible single out one of them (although I guess I just did above, woops!).


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

some guy said:


> I can say one thing for sure, each Bruckner slow movement sounds better as part of an entire symphony rather than as a stand-alone piece.


I can say one thing for sure, doesn't work with my attention span!


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2015)

Ah. Well, put some work in on that there span, then.

When you're listening to music, you probably shouldn't be aware of time passing at all.

That is, listening to a Bruckner symphony should be a treat not a chore!!

[True story. Some friends of mine and I went to hear a performance of Mahler's sixth in San Rafael awhile back. It may even have been Conlon, I don't remember. But as we exited the hall, we were looking at each other incredulously. It seemed like only about 15 or 20 minutes had passed. No more. And yet....]


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## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

some guy said:


> I recommend that you listen to the rest of Bruckner's symphonies. Only numbers four and nine? Well? What's holding you back? There are only nine more. Surely you've got a spare nine hours or so to listen to some more glorious music.
> 
> And then, at the very least you'll know what your own favorite Bruckner slow movement is. And, with any luck, you won't have any favorites at all. That is, you'll enjoy each slow movement, each symphony for that matter, for itself and not in any sort of competition with other slow movements, or other symphonies.
> 
> ...


Yes, his scherzos are pretty memorable in my experience as well. But of course I plan on listening to the rest. The issue is not finding just those 9 hours, it's finding the tens of thousands of hours to hear the rest of Mahler, Wagner, Strauss, Liszt, and ALL the music I eventually want to get around to. And with regards to favorites and soliciting opinions on favorites, I think we've all come to understand you don't like having favorites. But for millions of other people it's a highly enjoyable experience sharing opinions on favorites and it helps build anticipation, among the endless list of benefits I get out of it.


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## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

Dim7 said:


> I can say one thing for sure, doesn't work with my attention span!


Haha! I'm with you on this. Sometimes you've got to break these behemoths down into digestible sizes.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Dim7 said:


> I can say one thing for sure, doesn't work with my attention span!


It isn't just your attention span. Bruckner's way of building a movement - alternating his ideas in an episodic way, breaking off just when you think he's getting somewhere, doing this again and again, saying "wait, there's plenty of time" - baffles and frustrates many people, including some fine musicians. It took me a while to understand it, first emotionally, then intellectually.

I knew a psychologist years ago whose favorite composer was Mahler. He didn't "get" Bruckner at all, emotionally, and yet he had the wonderful idea that Mahler's music was "temporal" while Bruckner's was "spatial." That got me thinking. It isn't just that Bruckner's time scale is extended; that's true of Wagner and Mahler too, but they feel time much differently, as having more tension and drive in it - more "traditionally," really. Western music, with its sense of progression and "narrative," is profoundly concerned with time, and tonal harmony and the forms it spawned, such as fugue and sonata, developed as vehicles capable of conveying and intensifying this feeling of time as progression, as movement toward a goal. Bruckner inherited the progressive idioms of Western music, but he used them in the context of an architectural paradigm which often seems to contradict their very nature.

I think what Bruckner is doing is this: by setting up expectations of formal development through harmonic progression and dynamic growth, yet refusing to allow his musical ideas to fulfill directly the expectations they set up, but rather parceling them out over a vast soundscape and developing them incrementally, in disjunct stages, he is refusing to allow time to be the final arbiter of form in the very art - namely, music - which most essentially exists in time. And in so refusing, he's making a metaphysical statement: he's saying that what's of ultimate significance is something which includes temporal reality but exists, unchanging, beyond it. For him, this was God. For those who don't share his religious beliefs, it may be whatever we feel to be transcendent within us. But however we conceive it, it is the thing which makes our experience of his music magnificent and unique.

I think my psychologist friend came to enjoy Bruckner's vast "spaces" eventually.


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## Avey (Mar 5, 2013)

The Sixth's adagio goes beyond, like way beyond.


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

The adagios for both the Sixth and the Eighth are beyond the sublime. That of the Seventh is not far behind.


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## padraic (Feb 26, 2015)

Avey said:


> The Sixth's adagio goes beyond, like way beyond.


Indeed when I saw the title my first thought was the Sixth.


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## Azol (Jan 25, 2015)

Were I to name a single revelation of Celibidache conducting Bruckner, it would be Adagio from Sixth Symphony. It's like a parallel universe to what you usually hear.


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## Skilmarilion (Apr 6, 2013)

What is unique about the adagio of the 8th is that Bruckner for the first time (well, not if you include the trio of the scherzo, but that's not the point) feels that his tried and true modus operandi is no longer wholly sufficient to truly express what he wants to express.

... and so he calls upon *those* harps. And they are utterly transcendent.


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## lovetheclassics (Apr 1, 2013)

I love the adagio of the 8th and I like this version from Jochum (as far as I know, it's not issued on CD):

http://www.abruckner.com/downloads/downloadofthemonth/August09/


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

These days (or years), I have an overall preference for adagios perhaps to console the savage beast within. In the case of long particularly moving symphony adagios that exceed 10 minutes at the low end (eg. Schumann Symph#2) and exceed 15-20 minutes at the upper end such as the Bruckner 6 & 8 and a number of the Mahler symphonies, it is my view that these can often stand alone, separate from the other movements.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say that if Bruckner had simply released adagios #6 and #8 with titles such as Lament, Reflection or Consolation, no one would have known the difference or suspected that they were originally meant to be part of a symphony (unless Bruckner hinted at such).

On the subject of movements being tied to the overall work: Some symphonies (eg. Beethoven #3, 5, 6, 9 and perhaps 7, the aforementioned Schumann #2) have a continuity that can't be messed with, but we know that composers fooled around with their own works, sometimes substituting one movement for another or, beyond that, transformed a symphony into a concerto (eg. Brahms Piano Concerto #1). So, I've never been convinced that composers looked on the movements of _some_ of their works as being inexorably tied together. Thus, I don't always feel the necessity to listen to all symphonies or even some concertos as a whole.


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## helenora (Sep 13, 2015)

agree with *some guy* on uniqueness of each movement and each adagio, and still knowing just 4 of his symphonies, but I'm progressing with each and every day, so far for me adagio from 8th is the best resonates with me the best. These days I'm a Bruckner addict !


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## Charlie Mac (May 23, 2015)

I tend to base my overall feelings towards each of Bruckner's symphonies on how much I like the relevant slow movement, I must admit.

I love the slow movement of the fifth (often played too fast, sadly) and the slow movement of the eighth very much.


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## intoTHEvoid (Oct 15, 2015)

The Sixth's slow movement conducted by Celibidache by far.


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## helenora (Sep 13, 2015)

Now as I know them all ( his symphonies ) and in different interpretations, I'd say Adagio from 6th and 8th are sublime, especially the 6th.


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## chalkpie (Oct 5, 2011)

So here is my deal: I have only heard a few of Bruckner symphonies, but in general I am only a fan of the adagios/slow movements. Some of the other movements just don't really capture my attention or imagination all that much. BUT the last few days I have been digging the B8 adagio in a major way. To my ears, it is by far the strongest, most beautiful movement in that symphony. 

I am going to start with B5 and work my way through B9 listening to just the adagios of each piece. Maybe if/when I become more familiar with those particular movements, the others will fall into place. BTW, the B8 recording I am listening to is Boulez. My thought process is and has always been this: if its good enough for Boulez, its good enough for me. 

The B8 adagio is indescribably beautiful and the awe-inspiring moment at around 19:30 is akin to the greatest moment of Mahler and Wagner imo. A magnificent moment in music!

That's my story for now, I will keep you abreast of what other findings I come across.


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## Granate (Jun 25, 2016)

chalkpie said:


> I am going to start with B5 and work my way through B9 listening to just the adagios of each piece. Maybe if/when I become more familiar with those particular movements, the others will fall into place. BTW, the B8 recording I am listening to is Boulez. My thought process is and has always been this: if its good enough for Boulez, its good enough for me.


Please don't miss No.4 and No.3. They are even better than No.5 overall. For an excellent adagio in No.3 you can search the version with the longer Adagio by Osmo Vänskä and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
And for the No.4, the one with a great Adagio is the version by Günter Wand and the Berliner Philharmoniker.
For No.5 the version with my favourite Adagio is the Celibidache recording for DG. He knows how to make the melody evolve rather than try every moment to be marvellous. If you don't like the lenght of that recording, use Wand's Kölner No.5 Adagio


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## yetti66 (Jan 30, 2017)

the 8th's adagio stands out so significant to me - perhaps a good argument to listen more to and work on my appreciation of his 3rd as many recommend!


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## dzc4627 (Apr 23, 2015)

I consider the slow movements of Bruckner 7 8 and 9 to be his most personal and self indulgent, relative to his consistently pious and impersonal other movements. This is why it pains me so that his 9th ends for many on the adagio, as Bruckner would have abhorred the thought that his final cathedral would end with his own selfish musings on mortality and other things. 

That being said, I'd say the 2nd Symphony's slow movement... or perhaps the 7th's, just because it is so good, even if it is less pious than the others.


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## helenora (Sep 13, 2015)

all of them are favorites of mine at different time. one day this, the other day that.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet (Aug 31, 2011)

This is as good as it gets


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## helenora (Sep 13, 2015)

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> This is as good as it gets


absolutely ! and with Celi!:angel:


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

dzc4627 said:


> That being said, I'd say the 2nd Symphony's slow movement... or perhaps the 7th's, just because it is so good, even if it is less pious than the others.


I was going to mention the 2nd symphony too, but I only know a few of Bruckner's symphonies, and thus can't say much. I can't shake this feeling that if you have heard one of his symphonies you have heard them all. Except for his slow movements, of course. 

I tend not to like his last movements much; they all seem rambling and formless, like he has run out of ideas.


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## Chronochromie (May 17, 2014)

brianvds said:


> I tend not to like his last movements much; they all seem rambling and formless, like he has run out of ideas.


Have you heard the 5th?


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

Chronochromie said:


> Have you heard the 5th?


No. The ones I am familiar with are nos 2, 4 and 8. Long ago I had a recording of no 6 on tape, but I can't remember it well. As I recall, I liked it. Of the ones I know, I like them all, but their last movements not so much. Guess I should go on a bit of an exploring spree.


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## pokeefe0001 (Jan 15, 2017)

lovetheclassics said:


> I love the adagio of the 8th and I like this version from Jochum (as far as I know, it's not issued on CD):
> 
> http://www.abruckner.com/downloads/downloadofthemonth/August09/


I think that the Jochum interpretation is one of the best. I don't think the performance or the recording is necessarily the best, but Jocum's technique makes this recording my favorite. In his hands, this is definitely my favorite Bruckner slow movements.

The 8th symphony contains more differences between the Nowak and Haas editions than any other Bruckner symphony (and there are even multiple Nowak editions). Back when I started listening to Bruckner symphonies (in the 1960s) most recording bragged about being "Original Version" without saying what that meant so I have a devil of a time finding the versions I love. That Jochum recording is one of them, and if I've done my homework correctly I now know I want the 1890 Version published by Leopold Nowak in 1955.

There is a wonder (if somewhat dated) web page describing the various versions of the Bruckner symphonies and listing the recording (as of 2012) of each version.
http://www.unicamp.br/~jmarques/mus/bruckner-e.htm
I found the Jochum ORF recording of Bruckner's 8th listed there.


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## Totenfeier (Mar 11, 2016)

The adagios of the sixth, seventh and eighth keep undulating back and forth as my favorites.


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