ANTON BRUCKNER

If I had to describe Anton Bruckner in 3 words, I would say: diligent, religious, modest.

With Bruckner’s diligence one has to consider two things: One is the consistency with which Bruckner worked. This applies not only to his composing, but also to his organ playing (Bruckner was a virtuoso at the organ) as well as his teaching (Bruckner was an extremely popular teacher). Bruckner shares this consistency with many other composers (as you can read in Mozart’s and Beethoven’s daily schedules, for example).

The other is Bruckner’s frustration tolerance, and I find that really special. For 60 years, Bruckner was misunderstood by colleagues and the public. Success and recognition came veeeeery late. For me, Bruckner is therefore a tin soldier among composers.

Bruckner grew step by step into the role of a professional musician: coming from a family of teachers, it was actually clear that he should also become a teacher. Thus he began his career at the age of 21 as an assistant teacher in Sankt Florian, a small Upper Austrian market town.

Bruckner enjoyed teaching – this remained the case throughout his life – but music became increasingly important to him. First and foremost was the organ: Bruckner perfected his organ playing and soon became organist in Sankt Florian.

Bruckner was particularly famous for his improvisations throughout his life: he was able to improvise even the most elaborate genres (fugues, for example) – a skill that has long since ceased to play a role in today’s music education. (If you’re interested: In both Thomas Mann’s Doctor Faustus and Hermann Hesse’s Glass Bead Game, you can experience how important improvising fugues was until the end of the 19th century).

But composing also became more and more important. Now, however, Bruckner was in Sankt Florian – idyllic, but not necessarily a musical metropolis. So at the age of 31, Bruckner did the most obvious thing – he took up distance learning 😊

…Of course, distance learning was a bit different back then than it is today. Bruckner got his lessons by letter. And not from just anyone, but from Simon Sechter.

Never heard of him? You’re not alone. Simon Sechter is one of the many “invisible hands” in classical music – that is, he is one of those (mostly unknown) people who trained numerous (much more famous) people. Franz Schubert, for example, underwent his training with Sechter – and so did Anton Bruckner.

When Sechter died in 1867, Bruckner even became his successor as professor of music theory and organ playing at the Vienna Conservatory. And thus began the twofold development of Bruckner’s career: as an organist he was extremely successful (he even undertook concert tours), but his symphonies flopped (apart from isolated successes) in Vienna. Some were even not performed at all. To be fair, it must be said that the music critic Eduard Hanslick also had something to do with this: He made massive public sentiment against Bruckner.

But, as I have already written, if Bruckner is known for one thing, it is for frustration tolerance. And perseverance. He kept going, against all odds. And finally, the international breakthrough came with the premiere of the 7th Symphony on December 30, 1884 (not in Vienna, but in Leipzig).

With this, Bruckner finally got the recognition he had actually deserved for decades…and also some privileges: for example, he spent the last year of his life rent-free in the beautiful Belvedere Palace at the invitation of the Austrian Emperor. Not bad 😊