Anton BRUCKNER (1824-1896)
Requiem in D minor WAB 39 (1849, ed. Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs edition based on the Urtext 1849 version) [27:53]
Johanna Winkel (soprano); Sophie Harmsen (mezzo-soprano); Michael Feyfar (tenor); Ludwig Mittelhammer (baritone)
Raphael Alpermann (organ)
Simen van Mechelen, Detlef Reimers & Joost Swinkels (trombones)
RIAS Kammerchor
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin/Łukasz Borowicz
rec. live, November 2018, Chamber Music Hall, Philharmonie, Berlin
Booklet in German, English & French
ACCENTUS ACC30474 [56:13]
I am abashed to discover that the last time I encountered this work, presumed to be Bruckner’s first major composition, was a decade ago when I reviewed Susana Acra-Brache’s live performance in the Dominican Republic for The Bruckner Journal. There are not many commercial recordings; the standard reference hitherto has been that on the Hyperion label with the Corydon Singers conducted by Matthew Best, but I find that account to be too polite. This new release couples it with ten mostly short, rarely heard, liturgical pieces: motets and three aequales - short funeral pieces for three trombones to commemorate the dead. Three of those ten are world premiere recordings.
The 24-year-old Bruckner wrote the Requiem in memory of Franz Sailer, godfather of Bruckner's younger brother, Ignaz. Sailer died suddenly of a heart attack; as a result, Bruckner inherited the Bösendorfer grand piano upon which he composed until his own death.
Lightly scored for a chamber orchestra consisting of strings, three trombones, horn and an organ, this is not a work that requires high Romantic heft and the excellent balance amongst the instruments and the choir ensures that we hear all the strands of music which gives little indication of the direction eventually taken by the mature composer. It sometimes sounds somewhat derivative – especially of Mozart – and beyond a few, isolated features such as the frequent use of ostinato string motifs, I strain to “discover the passages in which the mystical aura and sublimity of the large orchestral scores shine through already” which the notes assure me are there. This is predominately conservative, retrospective music even in the era Bruckner wrote it, but it is certainly not pastiche. It is infused with real intensity of feeling and contains many little gems, such as the tiny a cappella Hostias for male voices only and the ensuing fugal Quam olim. A flowing Benedictus and a very brief, poised Requiem aeternam – again, a cappella – are equally pleasing. What a pity, then, that the solo singing is marred by a flawed voice-type increasingly prevalent in modern singing: a strangulated, constricted tenor whose voice obtrudes painfully, failing to blend with his co-singers; I much prefer Acra-Brache’s grainy tenor. The soprano, too, is rather shrill but the mezzo-soprano has a mellow tone. The baritone is in the typically German Fischer-Dieskau/Gerhaher/Goerne school – not to my taste but apparently I am in a minority. The scurrying strings in the Dies Irae are expertly articulated, although I could do with a little more vehemence and attack from the RIAS chamber choir which is otherwise very pleasing: pure, homogeneous and beautifully in tune – and they excel in the supplementary motets.
I was at first slightly taken aback by the way that the Libera me followed without any discernible break the conclusion of the Cum Sanctis of the Requiem but there is no great stylistic disjuncture between them and perhaps that decision was taken to compensate for the oddly truncated nature of that ending; it is as if Bruckner ran out of ideas. Indeed, the first Libera me is the longest, most substantial item in the programme and is sung with great sensitivity. As it is, the ten “bonus” tracks fittingly complement and reinforce the grave beauty of the preceding work. I especially love the melancholy, hieratic timbre of the three trombones in their numbers, recreating a sound-world redolent of Monteverdi. My reservations regarding the solo singing notwithstanding, this is a disc to intrigue and engage the Bruckner aficionado.
Ralph Moore
Other works
Libera me F minor, Cohrs D02 [5:04]
Aequales C minor, Cohrs P03 * [1:37]
Brüder, trocknet Eure Zähren “Am Grabe” F minor Cohrs I11b [2:57]
Aequales in F minor (arr. after “Vor Arneths Grab” by B.-G. Cohrs) *[2:36]
Brüder, trocknet Eure Zähren “Vor Arneths Grab” F minor, Cohrs G01 [3:37]
Aequales C minor, Cohrs K01 [1:46]
O Ihr, die Ihr heut‘ mit mir zum Grabe geht “Todtenlied” No. 1 E-flat major, Cohrs F06/1 [1:05]
Vereint bist, Töneheld und Meister “Nachruf!/Trösterin Musik” C minor, Cohrs H05 * [5:03]
O Ihr, die Ihr heut‘ mit mir zum Grabe geht, “Todtenlied” No.2 F major, Cohrs F06/2 [1:17]
Libera me F major, Cohrs E01 * [3:03]
*world premiere recordings
(This review reproduced here by kind permission of The Bruckner Journal)
