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From: rchrd@well.UUCP (rchrd = Richard Friedman)
Newsgroups: net.music.classical
Subject: Re: tone poems
Message-ID: <160@well.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 2-Sep-85 00:21:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: well.160
Posted: Mon Sep  2 00:21:14 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 4-Sep-85 05:15:16 EDT
References: <730@charm.UUCP> <1062@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link, Sausalito, CA
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In article <1062@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>, mmar@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Mitchell Marks) writes:
> Paul Kolodner brings up Bruckner in this context.  I'm always surprised to
> remember that he was a religious man, and that people claim to hear deep
> religious sentiment in his music.  I always hear an element of cruelty and
> indifference.  The scherzo mvt in the Ninth Symphony brings to mind a nasty
> rampaging god (or just physical giant), stomping everything flat, including
> those jaunty picnickers (the bucolic sections).  Similarly for the scherzo
> of the Seventh.  (I listen to it anyway -- it's offputting but fascinating).

Bruckner's god was a vindictive god.  Fire and brimstone.
There is a wonderful biog of Bruckner, written in the last 20 years.
(But I/ve forgotten the author.)
Story has it he could be struck with fervor in the middle of
a lecture (he taught in a boy's perochial school) that would drive
him to his knees.
I think his music always shows that intensity.
(Sadly) there is no place for this sort of thing in the (serious) music
of today.  Same sort of ferver exists in Mahler (and, to a degree, 
Shostakovitch.. esp  the last quartets.).

-- 
     
    [rchrd] = Richard Friedman
              Pacific-Sierra Research, 2855 Telegraph #415
              Berkeley, CA 94705 (415) 540 5216
    UUCP: {dual,hplabs,ptsfa,apple}!well!rchrd